"Good" Black Metal Tone On A Budget

[AngryMcMuffin]

Obviously, when you're going for a Black Metal guitar tone it being "good" is very subjective. But, I was on another forum and someone was asking about how to get a lo-fi super distorted tone, and he wanted to spend as little money as possible. I mean, I'm not going to get into amps because a tube amp will always be your best bet for anything. I'm talking about a pedal you can buy and use really simply for this sort of lo-fi "classic" Black Metal tone you hear on Mayhem's earliest albums or Burzum's Filosoflem. (Which was a Boss Metal Zone MT-2 plugged straight into what he was recording with.) But that's not how we're getting this sort of sound.
Go out and buy a Danelectro Black Coffee Distortion pedal. Though they may be somewhat noisey and have no gain adjustment, this is why it works so well. I bought one for those reasons and that it has tons of high end, but can still crank out a lot of bass. Anyhow, I do plan to get rid of the noise with mine by modding it, (I'll let you all know how that goes) and then it will be wonderful for "old school" or "classic" Black Metal playing.
To quote one user's comment I read on the other forum; "Just turn your amp's kvlt switch to the on position." I now have a "kvlt switch" that's actually existent, and super cheap. So if you have a desire for that horrid tone, as I do occasionally, run out and buy this at Guitar Center or a pawn shop or anywhere with used pedals.

 

[Devyn Eclipse Nav]

First of all, WHAT IS WITH YOUR FONT GOOD LORD

Also that does sound like a good idea. I'm picking up a Boss OD-20 and kinda hoping the HM-2 model is up to snuff, but we'll see.

 

[Loomer]

Heh, I actually have one of those.

 

[Grindspine]

I consider it less "black metal" and more "industrial noise", but I keep an old DOD Corrosion pedal around for when I want to add some texture noise to my rig as opposed to a tight, musical tone. I think it's fairly close to what you're mentioning though.

Also, OP's font was comic sans; I do not know why.

 

[JonusGrumby]

I'm more of an OD guy than a distortion type.
But, I constantly review gear and sometimes get a pedal that surprises the Hell out of me.
Some good suggestions for a black metal tone straight into a clean channel:

Boss Metal Core
Akai Distortion Factory (this little gem does it ALL)
Boss Metal Zone with Twilight Zone mod (easy to do)

 

[Necris]

Alternatively, buy an old Peavey Bandit; dime the distortion, turn up loud, set eq to taste. Boom, black metal tone. For whatever reason they do it really well, you probably won't even need to bother with pedals.
Emperors "In the Nightside Eclipse" features one.
The early burzum albums before filosofem likely feature one as well based on vargs description.

Tube amps are fun, but for black metal they're hardly a necessity considering a few bands, most notably Burzum as you mentioned, have bypassed amplifiers completely and gotten good black metal tones.
The guitars for Emperors "As the Shadows Rise" EP were allegedly recorded without any amps at all, just a guitar into a Digitech Death Metal pedal direct into whatever it was they used to record.

 

[Cobhc221]

orrrrrrrrrrr you can just buy a used 5150 block lettered model with a mesa boogie rectifier cab with a Maxon 808 overdrive and call it a day?

 

[HeHasTheJazzHands]

orrrrrrrrrrr you can just buy a used 5150 block lettered model with a mesa boogie rectifier cab with a Maxon 808 overdrive and call it a day?

You've never heard a black metal song in your life, haven't you?

 

[User Name]

orrrrrrrrrrr you can just buy a used 5150 block lettered model with a mesa boogie rectifier cab with a Maxon 808 overdrive and call it a day?

this brings the chucklz

 

[MrNotFlyWhiteGuy]

gonna put in my vote for the digitech death metal. its 50 bucks and doesn't sound very good for most applications but I think it might be able to do black metal pretty well

 

[Leuchty]

Valnott pedal...

 

[Shimme]

My tube peavey vypyr using the XR wild pedal on the twin reverb model actually sounds pretty good

 

[Klaptrap]

Sorry whats the difference between black metal tone and other metals?

 

[PF Chang]

Black metal tone on a budget is a redundant statement.

 

[Andromalia]

If you can find one, DOD's old Thrash Metal pedal will do it. Plus, a pink pedal live will have a true "I don't care about conformity" meaning.

Sorry whats the difference between black metal tone and other metals?

No milk. No sugar.

 

[Vostre Roy]

No milk. No sugar.

Back on topic, I'd say get a good Solid State amp (Marshall or Randall) and add some more distortion through a pedal or something.

Probably a good Mesa could do the trick too

 

[Shimme]

Sorry whats the difference between black metal tone and other metals?

There aren't any hard and fast rules, but generally speaking it doesn't really have the low mid punch of death metal, and it has super high treble with ridiculous amounts of gain that give a biting, but not super defined "buzzsaw" sound.

 

[minorseventh]

Euronymous a played a Les Paul into a JCM 800 with Mayhem. Emperors early stuff was played with Marshall Valvestates. Theres no rules. its whatever works, but generally you want the warmth sucked out of your tone.

I like a Danelectro EQ pedal into ANY amp, with the frown curve boosted. its such a noisy shitty little pedal.. its like blasphemy in a box.

 

[Les]

Find the shittiest cheapo amp you can find, turn the gain up all the way, and play the shit out of it until it blows up. THAT is Black Metal.

 

[crg123]

First of all, WHAT IS WITH YOUR FONT GOOD LORD

Glad I'm not the only one..

Also.. This!

Find the shittiest cheapo amp you can find, turn the gain up all the way, and play the shit out of it until it blows up. THAT is Black Metal.

I vote for a blown Gorilla amp with a boss metal zone or a DOD Thrash pedal as mentioned earlier. I had it and man that thing sounded totally Kvlt with its Pink color to balance out the fun/ demonic sound of a tru black metal band...



...sorry couldn't resist! In reality, there aren't any rules just experiment with what you have, that's what they did! Good luck!