Well first off i think we have to give some credit, if not quite a bit of credit actually, to the producers who know how to capture the guitar tones that make it to the end product which we end up hearing. So hats off to them.
That being said, I LOVE guitar tones with a lot of crunch! I remember when i first heard Exodus's guitar tone on their Shovel Headed Killing Machine album i finally felt that i found what i was looking for and decided right then and there that this is the tone i want. Such a massive low-end and mids presence that's just perfect for me.
I suppose for me it would probably be the likes of Rammstein and Soilwork. Bright, tight and clear.
Just the right of cutting edge, thickness and clarity. I like to have a good balance of bass, without too much harsh treble, and I boost my mids for more pop. I remember reading so much about the "California" sound, the scooped mids and boosted bass that was inherently built into many amps. I remember people talking about the "smiley face" EQ created by removing all of the mids from the sound. It just made it sound like there was a pillow in front of the amp when I tried this. Yeah it sort of sounded heavy, but it didn't good. I never knew what I was doing when I first got my PodXT, I didn't know how to EQ an amp, I just twiddled until it sounded good. I never stopped on the "California" tone though, because I thought it sucked.
Then I tried boosting the mids and easing off the treble and bass, and I started to find "my" sound. Then I realised that this kind of EQ, when played in a group setting with a bassist, was tight and heavy as fuck. I also prefer it for playing alone, for the increased note definition.
My tone came on in another leap when I recently got my Peavey 6505+ 112, such a huge improvement to have tubes over the PodXT, which I had previously been running into a Fender DSP 90 SS amp. One of the cool things about the 6505 series amps is the presence and resonance knobs, which alter the voicing of the amp, so you can set your EQ and then change how the amp projects that EQ. It's a super cool feature, I think of it as having "your tone, but more", in a way. All the clarity of a mid-boost EQ (on an already fairly middy amp), with a cut from the presence and some bass punch from the resonance. Lovely!
Petrucci, early Van Halen, Death, AcDc, Megadeth. Also Metallica and Pantera for the heaviness (but i dislike the mid cut). I generally love mid-heavy tones, with just that minimum gain necessary to enter "high gain" zone.
Birelle Lagrene, The Faceless (deconsecrate and the like), Impending Doom, Novallo (Tides), Subscale (s&m Cover), Chelsea Grin (Lilith), Whitechapel's new stuff