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Re: Metallica and their success
"For some reason..." yeah, probably wasted [img]graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]
And Metallica's tone on those early albums was explained in a GW interview - they recorded each track multiple times, layering the guitars, and each track only had one note of each chord all the way through.
Which means they played "Master of Puppets" once fretting only the roots, then went back and layered the 5ths or whatnot, then went back again and layered the octaves. Then they doubled those three guitar tracks.
If you've got recording equipment, try recording like that. You'd be surprised how tight and forcefull the sound gets.
Also, they didn't use Max Gain for the rhythms. At higher gain levels, the tone begins to dissolve and buzz, but by doubling tracks, lower gain levels seem to smooth out and sound like high gain - hence everyone chasing that tone through Mesa, VHT, Bogners, etc. Every recent "Metal" amp like the Double and TripleRecs were built to try to duplicate the rhythm tones on Ride and Puppets, because that's what players/customers wanted.
As for Metallica's success - heavy constant touring. When other bands did a few months of touring and a couple of months of recording, then a couple of months of marketing (street team stuff, etc), Metallica were touring. When Justice came out they toured 2 years straight to promote it. They toured to promote each album when it was released instead of waiting at home for the sales reports. They got the success by playing anywhere and everywhere they could set up, and for anyone that would listen. They also had a great deal of help from fans who passed out the recordings of their shows and their "EP" No Life Til Leather.
The worldwide underground fanbase system worked for Metallica - fans would mail boxes of copies of their live shows to friends and family all over the world (literally) and they would pass them out for free just to spread the music.
Of course, people seem to forget that fact when they b!tch about Metallica suing Napster and MP3.com and the like, but once upon a time Metallica NEEDED the fans to freely distribute their music; they don't need their fans to do that anymore.
Of course, once upon a time Metallica said they'd never have a contrived, stupid video ("One" was neither contrived nor stupid - the movie clips in it were from the same story the song was written from), and they slammed MTV - then one day they show up on stage playing 'Beat It'.
It doesn't change the past, but it sure does darken their future.
Newc
"For some reason..." yeah, probably wasted [img]graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]
And Metallica's tone on those early albums was explained in a GW interview - they recorded each track multiple times, layering the guitars, and each track only had one note of each chord all the way through.
Which means they played "Master of Puppets" once fretting only the roots, then went back and layered the 5ths or whatnot, then went back again and layered the octaves. Then they doubled those three guitar tracks.
If you've got recording equipment, try recording like that. You'd be surprised how tight and forcefull the sound gets.
Also, they didn't use Max Gain for the rhythms. At higher gain levels, the tone begins to dissolve and buzz, but by doubling tracks, lower gain levels seem to smooth out and sound like high gain - hence everyone chasing that tone through Mesa, VHT, Bogners, etc. Every recent "Metal" amp like the Double and TripleRecs were built to try to duplicate the rhythm tones on Ride and Puppets, because that's what players/customers wanted.
As for Metallica's success - heavy constant touring. When other bands did a few months of touring and a couple of months of recording, then a couple of months of marketing (street team stuff, etc), Metallica were touring. When Justice came out they toured 2 years straight to promote it. They toured to promote each album when it was released instead of waiting at home for the sales reports. They got the success by playing anywhere and everywhere they could set up, and for anyone that would listen. They also had a great deal of help from fans who passed out the recordings of their shows and their "EP" No Life Til Leather.
The worldwide underground fanbase system worked for Metallica - fans would mail boxes of copies of their live shows to friends and family all over the world (literally) and they would pass them out for free just to spread the music.
Of course, people seem to forget that fact when they b!tch about Metallica suing Napster and MP3.com and the like, but once upon a time Metallica NEEDED the fans to freely distribute their music; they don't need their fans to do that anymore.
Of course, once upon a time Metallica said they'd never have a contrived, stupid video ("One" was neither contrived nor stupid - the movie clips in it were from the same story the song was written from), and they slammed MTV - then one day they show up on stage playing 'Beat It'.
It doesn't change the past, but it sure does darken their future.
Newc
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