Bands Whose Tone you like, But Don't Like Their Music? Or Like their Music, not tone?

[White Cluster]

Love Dying Fetus but their tone sounds like it comes out a practice amp.

I thought War Of Attrition sounded awesome.The whole mix just kills.

 

[Koshchei]

Beats me. I don't listen to them.

 

[st2012]

Nickelback: Don't care for the music, love the tone.
Pantera: Love the music, hate the tone.

 

[ellengtrgrl]

Criss Oliva's tone on a decent amount of old Savatage stuff is pretty bad (this is what happens when you use two SD-1's chained together ) but the music is so awesome that it doesn't matter.

+1 on that! I saw Savatage live, shortly before Criss died. He had fantastic chops, but his guitar tone, had a seriously bland hair metal sound - tons of upper mids, which I can't stand. I'll never understand why some players seem to be allergic to having much bass in their guitar sound.

being an old school old metallica fan, since their first album kill'em all....

I had a major turn off right after their black album not only because they totally changed but also because of the guitar tone, it turned me off real bad....

I know what you mean Patrick. It's as though they went from one extreme to the other - hardly any mids on And Justice For All, to way too many mids on the black album. It was a big turn off for me too. I like mids, but c'mon, there's no need to go overboard with them!

 

[Randy]

^
I'd add Cacophony to the list. That album is practically unlistenable, for me.

 

[natspotats]

the first slipknot album was terrible tone wise

but its soooo heavy

 

[ellengtrgrl]

^
I'd add Cacophony to the list. That album is practically unlistenable, for me.

You had to mention that album didn't you?! I bought Speed Metal Symphony back in 1986, when it first came out, since Mike Varney hyped it in his Guitar Player column. I thought it would be thrash metal with bigtime chops. BIG MISTAKE!!! Hair Metal tone par excellece!! Also, while I like solos (hence the reason why I typically play lead guitar in the bands I'm in), there really is NO REASON to have songs that are basically non-stop solos!! SO I guess with regards to Cacophony - hate the tone, and the music!!

 

[Quantumface]

Between the Buried and Me. They're one of my favorite bands, I've loved every single album they've released, but their tone =

i think colors had the best to date. but alaskas tone was beyond putrid. his lead tone has always been undesirable too

and Ion Dissonance's tone on Minus the Herd is the heaviest, clearest most delicious tone on record. Great music too.

 

[Pewtershmit]

I think we're all missing a huge one here - Paul Gilbert. Anybody agree that his tone is just horrendous? It works, especially with the super high speedy stuff, but my good god that's some brittle shit! It's so scratchy and wiry!

I have to agree to an extent. Since ditching the Laney's and going back to Marshall I find his tone has been fantastic!

 

[XeoFLCL]

God Forbid's tone on Earthsblood fucking slays. I only really like the single from the new album, unfortunately.. The rest sorta seems a little bland, but to every man his own

 

[JohnIce]

Interesting. You figure with that logic he would've just used the Vetta II all the time then.

Nah, most of the time musicians use completely different stuff in the studio as opposed to live. Generally, you tend to go for versatile gear live that can recreate all the sounds on your record, whereas in the studio, you use very specific gear to create specific parts of different songs. Type example is using a Les Paul for rhythms and an Ibanez for leads, etc. Perhaps a Rickenbacker for a clean part.

The thing is that live, everything sounds loud, a bit harsch, and somewhat muddy. And people (generally) only hear it once. They won't tell any difference. But a studio record will be heard over again and can be scrutinized in every way, so you make the extra effort to make that sound extra good.

 

[vampiregenocide]

+1 on Pantera's tone being bad.

 

[abysmalrites]

Ion Dissonance's tone on Minus the Herd is the heaviest, clearest most delicious tone on record. Great music too.

That album is a big turn off for me. I like the music, but I hate their tone on that one. I was really expecting another Solace, and they seemed to have lost a lot of the aggression with a. the new vocalist (Gab was a lot better in terms of keeping shit intense) and b. the focus on lower frequencies rather than the cutting harshness that was the tone on Solace.

 

[BurialWithin]

I would have to say Spawn of Possession and Arsis for liking the music and NOT the tone. It needs more gain it's almost like they're playing through a clean channel but distorted kind of??

 

[cow 7 sig]

metallica-death magnetic..love the songs/album.HATE fucking hate the tones,could be the shitty production too i guess

 

[caughtinamosh]

I love "Deliverance," by Opeth, but that oh-so-dry guitar tone irks me something horrid.

It sounded godly performed live, however.

 

[dexmix]

^ i like the deftones tones...that seems odd to say. the early albums were shit but their newer ones have nice tone.

The latest Deftones recordings have a great tone if you like a nu-metal wall of sound. If you tried playing with it though - you would probably hate it, because it has no definition, or punch, just an even low mid based wall of frequency. Riffs are basic mud, and you have to adjust your playing style accordingly. You can't chug, or thrash like you would with a more metal oriented tone.


I personally love it, but if you take a second listen - notice how you can hardly tell single string notes, and any picking or strumming has literally no attack, punch or definition.

 

[fretninjadave]

The guy hasn't been able to play guitar since the 80s, what did you expect?

Yeah but he still make music.+ people had good tone in the 80's.Just not him

 

[Scar Symmetry]

Yeah but he still make music.+ people had good tone in the 80's.Just not him

There's not much he can do about tone even if he wanted to

You're right though, there were people around in the 80s with good tone, but some lenience should be given considering modern standards.

 

[Mindcrime1204]

+3 for Meshuggah. Shit music, awesome tone