Help with distortion pedals?!?

[DalyTek]

OK, I'm a complete noob to the world of tube amps and pedals. I have been using Line 6, Vox, etc. modeling amps up until now.
I have a Crate Vintage Club 50 half stack now that just has the most phenomenal clean tone I have ever heard.
I am on my 3rd metal distortion pedal now though. I am having the same issue with all of them. I just can't seem to dial in the tone that I am looking for.
I think it's got a lot to do with the mid scoop/frequency controls.

I am using a Gibson SG Platinum with EMG JH "Het Set" and my current pedal is a Hardwire TL-2.
(I have gotten the best tones that my limited skills can dial in with this pedal, which is why it's the one I stuck with.)

What I am looking for is a good general purpose Metallica rhythm tone.
Can anyone help me with understanding the controls and figuring out how to dial in the tone I'm after?

The control layout looks like this: LEVEL, HIGH/LOW (Concentric Pot), MID/FREQ (Concentric Pot), GAIN, TIGHT/LOOSE (Toggle Switch)

[Nightbat]

I am on my 3rd metal distortion pedal now though. I am having the same issue with all of them. I just can't seem to dial in the tone that I am looking for.

Can't help you there, I always had that same problem with pedals, too fizzy, or buzzy, or thin or honky or,...

Perhaps it's an idea to -instead of a distortion- put an EQ pedal in front and boost the OD channel on the amp to the acquiered level of distortion
and use the various bands to shape the tone

[DonP]

Looks like the same layout as the MT-2.

For a scoped tone with the pedal shown above, set the low and high to the mid point, make the mid lower than midpoint. From there, it's a matter of taste. Use the freq control to control where the mids are cut, and boost or cut the lows and highs to taste.

[Grim]

What era Metallica? They are very different sounds. I would say a bit of a scoop... on the "tight" setting

[RR2772]

To save you time and money. Metallica tone is besides your fingers amp distortion and in the early days:

Kill'em'all: Pro co rat and Marshall amp
Ride: Ibanez tubescreamer + Marshall amp
Puppets: Mesa Boogie mark 2C+ heads and Marshall cabs
Justice: the same though pictures also shows a Mesa/Quad preamp
Black album: Mesa Boogie 2C+ which is on all albums from puppets and forward.

The Quad preamp will help you along way gain wise. Then it is a matter of power amp and fine tune. Forget pedals!

[VitaminG]

To save you time and money. Metallica tone is besides your fingers amp distortion and in the early days:

Kill'em'all: Pro co rat and Marshall amp
Ride: Ibanez tubescreamer + Marshall amp
Puppets: Mesa Boogie mark 2C+ heads and Marshall cabs
Justice: the same though pictures also shows a Mesa/Quad preamp
Black album: Mesa Boogie 2C+ which is on all albums from puppets and forward.

The Quad preamp will help you along way gain wise. Then it is a matter of power amp and fine tune. Forget pedals!

he did ask about a general purpose Metallica rhythm tone using the gear he already owns. Not what gear needs to be purchased to exactly replicate their tone

[Devotee]

Strangely enough, i managed to get pretty close to that classic Metallica tone by using a Boss DS-1 into a Boss HM-3 (which is very similar to the classic HM-2) into the clean channel of a practice amp. It might like overkill using two distortion pedals, but i remember i used to have the gain on the DS-1 set at around 9:00 and the gain on the HM-3 around 12:00 or 3:00 so i got a nice balance and an interesting combination of distortions.

I still have that HM-3 and i love the fucking filthy sound i can get from it.

[j2379]

unless your buying a high end distortion pedal IMO use the amps distortion to get as close as possible, then use the pedal to boost the gain and tweak the tone, but don't use the pedal as THE distortion and tone.

[Sephiroth]

Metallica used to use the old-school thrash "scooped" sound............highs and lows set to 10, mid set to zero. Did you try that?

Plus a tube overdrive pedal is nice too.

Plus what JS378 said..........

[bucketbrian45]

I always really liked the Metal Muff but I never went for Metallica tone.

[xenophobe]

To save you time and money. Metallica tone is besides your fingers amp distortion and in the early days:

Kill'em'all: Pro co rat and Marshall amp
Ride: Ibanez tubescreamer + Marshall amp
Puppets: Mesa Boogie mark 2C+ heads and Marshall cabs
Justice: expensive post production
Black album: expensive post production

Fixed it for you. Anything after puppets is many tens, if not hundreds of thousands of $$$$ of post production.

[Sephiroth]

Kill'em'all: Pro co rat and Marshall amp
Ride: Ibanez tubescreamer + Marshall amp
Puppets: Mesa Boogie mark 2C+ heads and Marshall cabs
Justice: expensive post production
Black album: expensive post production
St. Anger: whatever recording gear could be stolen from local grunge band

Re-fixed it for you

[VitaminG]

Fixed it for you. Anything after puppets is many tens, if not hundreds of thousands of $$$$ of post production.

"To save you time and money."

[Whoopu2]

I've never found a distortion pedal that I liked. I went through a bunch of em when I was a kid trying to find a "Metallica-ish" tone. I eventually went to Multi-FX units and finally good old OD pedal into a tube amp.

Not saying all distortion pedals are bad, just that I never found one that worked for me. Any of em that had "metal" in the name seemed to be absolute crap.

[jgcable]

To save you time and money. Metallica tone is besides your fingers amp distortion and in the early days:

Kill'em'all: Pro co rat and Marshall amp
Ride: Ibanez tubescreamer + Marshall amp
Puppets: Mesa Boogie mark 2C+ heads and Marshall cabs
Justice: the same though pictures also shows a Mesa/Quad preamp
Black album: Mesa Boogie 2C+ which is on all albums from puppets and forward.

The Quad preamp will help you along way gain wise. Then it is a matter of power amp and fine tune. Forget pedals!

+ a million.