THE EVOLUTION OF DOWNTUNED GUITARS: Black Sabbath to A Day To Remember
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- Опубліковано 27 кві 2024
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Downtuned guitars changed rock and metal forever! Here's what I discuss:
* Black Sabbath and Tony Iommi's finger accident
* How bands like Helmet, Soundgarden and Morbid Angel played a role
* When Korn popularized 7-string guitars
* Meshuggah, 8-string guitars and the djent revolution (Misha Mansoor, Periphery, etc)
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0:00 Intro
3:29 The history of downtuned guitars (Black Sabbath)
6:34 Grunge, Soundgarden & Helmet
10:35 7-string guitars, Steve Vai & Morbid Angel
15:50 How Korn changed everything
20:05 Meshuggah & 8-string guitars
23:47 Djent, 8-string guitars & Periphery
26:13 Is it cheating to tune down? - Розваги
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Can you do a video on Type0Negative or Fear Factory?
I think these bands need some respect 👍
Love your channel, sorry for the long message.
Advertising Men's skin care products on downtuned metal guitars video is crazy to me
You’ve become an Alpha
Wait, Finn.... You play? I kind of figured you did. Do a play along video with one of your favorite songs man 🤘😈🤘!
Do a video about power metal please
As a friend of mine once observed: "For better or worse before Korn came around nothing sounded like Korn. Until Korn came around, and then everything sounded like Korn."
I don't if everything sounded like them, but everything was influenced by them.
I remember, reading an interview, I think, in Guitar World magazine, and Korn said they were influenced by Morbid Angel's sound - they just gave the rhythms a little "bounce." Then, after Korn, everyone was doing that.
Realms of chaos bolt thrower is in the same tuning years before
I think anyone who says that needs to put on Streetcleaner and shut up.
just like i remember exactly where i was and what i was doing when the towers fell on 9\11, the same can be said for when I heard "Blind" by Korn on the radio for the first time
Finn: "it made them sound heavy and evil"
Black Sabbath: * wearing pastels in front of a rainbow backdrop *
it... it was a different time.
They were still more badass than half of the "metal" groups today.....
@@ericmoody3944 *more badass than all
they were hippies, man. they just happened to be brummies who wanted to make music that sounded like the heavy industry factories they lived and worked in
@@tyr4489 they weren't fucking hippies at all they made darker themed songs because unlike all the love and peace shit going on in the USA, they lived in Birmingham with shitty lives for the most part and were almost destined to end up in small paying labour jobs, tony wanted to be a fucking bouncer at one point.
"We tuned to B because it sounded Doomier and Heavier...it had nothing to do with my Vocal Range"- Peter Steele, Type O Negative
I don’t believe that. When your voice is like that you accentuate that bad mofo.
My all time favorite band. It’s amazing how many songs of their’s has Pete’s distorted B tuned bass carrying the rhythm while Kenny is doing fills or leads. Also keep your ears open every time there’s a clean guitar, it’s always a standard tuned 12 string or processed to sound that way. You’d think with the existence of the seven string guitar and the five string bass they would just adopt those over baritone tuning their 6 string guitars and four string bass but nope and I love them for it!
Why isn't anyone mentioning Discharge?
Or every other D-beat bands. too obscure?
A few tuning facts I’d like to add:
- Meshuggah’s Fredrik got his 7-string in 1991, and used it in a few places on Contradictions Collapse - in Bb
- Devin Townsend used a 6-string tuned to Open A5 (AAAEAE) with a low A on his Strapping Young Lad 1995 debut, on the songs Goat and The Filler - Sweet City Jesus. And if you take it into consideration, he wrote these songs in 1992/1993.
- Following the previous one, on the same album there is the song Cod Metal King, which seems to be in 6-string Drop D.. a full octave down - however, that may very well be a pitch-shifter in this case.
- Slipknot tuned all the way down to F# (F#F#BEG#C#) on their 6-strings on Scissors, on their debut album (1999).
- And then, just to be clear, Meshuggah played their 2002 Nothing album on 7-strings, because their custom 8-strings weren’t ready yet (later re-recorded in 2006). On this album, not only did they tune down to F and E for most songs, Nebulous was tuned down to Eb, and Spasm even down to Bb (an octave below the 7-string half-step down Bb).
- And then finally, if you count it, on their 2005 Catch ThirtyThree, the section Mind’s Mirrors features an E0.. aka, 2 octaves below standard E, and actually the lowest note (just around 20hz) we as humans can theoretically still perceive as pitch (before we perceive it as a rhythm).
I always wondered what the fuck that even was in Mind's Mirror's lol. Now I know, thanks!
Hell yeah! Strapping Young Lad should be more popular.
Scissors was in F#?!?!?
meshugga would have been much more appreciated here in the States if they slowed their shit down just a bit.. we are more sludgy like crowbar.. meshugga is just the new Doom soundtrack with vocals
Bolt Thrower tuned to A in the 80's. There's an interview with Jo Bench where she talks about it, "No bassist should have to record at that pitch ever, the strings were like spaghetti..." Their later stuff is in C#.
From a completely different point of view, I also think downtuning helped a lot of singers to stand out. Most male singers are in fact baritones and it allowed them to sing in a range where their voice feels more powerful without getting drowned by the music.
Type O Negative being a fine example
THANK YOU
@@Kevin-uz6sv Even though the point still stands and I am sorry to correct you, but Peter Steele was a bass which is even lower than baritone.
I am sure singers like Chris Barnes was helped quite a lot by drop tuning.
@@RudolfHorvath it’s why all type o negative songs are so down tuned. I usually play in c standard, I had to tune all the way down to b standard for playing typo o songs
Jerry Cantrell utilizes Drop C# really well, We Die Young, Them Bones, and Dam that River come to mind. Those songs have some pretty damn heavy riffs.
Bizkit
Them bones riff is so chuggy. It's great
@@Cx_Howlett Check out the Grave cover :)
Jerry was every bit an influential metal guitarist in the 90's just as Dimebag or Chuck Schuldiner was. I knew a lot of people back then who were chasing his tone.
Alice In Chains really is quite the amazing band
Loved this video!
What’s your thoughts on Drop B 1? 😂
Like your videos. Just noticed I wasn’t subscribed to ya. Keep up the good work
You get around don't you 🤣
:o
@@nighthawk9532 so regular drop b? Do you mean b0?
Crowbar, one of the most criminally underrated bands ever have been tuning to B on 6 strings way back before it was a common thing to do. Great video \m/
Tune low, play slow. Crowbar 4 life!
@@jasonking454 None Heavier
Came here to see if someone mentioned this. Kirk is the greatest riff writer in history!!
Crowbar is my jam.
\\\AcidbatH///
I have been summoned
Quick! Where's my pokeball! Gotta catchem all!
Just like everything in Metal, it all comes back to Black Sabbath. Over 50 years in Metal & still breaking ground.
I don’t think 13 was breaking new ground imo. But to each their own
@@TheWhills The first six Sabbath albums are still masterpieces and they still feel fresh…to me anyways.
@@TheWhills was the the last album with Dio? Bc I agree.. it wasn't breaking new ground. It was just perfection.
@ghost mall Exactly what I meant. Their influence is still impacting till this very day.
Ozzy had no more tears in 1991. The title song is in drop DB or drop C#. That was the heaviest song I heard when I first was introduced and it was sooooo heavy.
Dillinger Escape Plans Calculating Infinity is probably one of the heaviest albums in standard E
Probably? It easily was
Yesss!!
Ire Works is up there too
You spelled Sylosis wrong...
@@vorpalblades You spelled Summoning The Lich wrong.
When Korn came out I thought the down tuning would be a temporary hype, but when one of my favorite bands of the time, Sepultura, embraced low tunings and people who didn't care for them suddenly fell in love with Roots, I realized it was there to stay. Funny how I only recently got into playing baritones and low tunings myself though 🤗 #latemajority...
Thank you so much for bringing up Helmet and giving them the credit they deserve. It’s criminal how underrated Helmet are and how the big public just has forgotten their Legacy. One of the most original, influential, ground breaking and straight up heavy bands ever. And Page is just the greatest guy in the world. Also, that guitar tone on Meantime is the meanest tone ever, drop D sounds heavier than hell
HELMET!!!!!!
@@mattsmith5253 AMEN. Way overlooked band.
Helmet set the tone and the vibe. So many hardcore and metal bands watched them or listened to their albums and thought "That....we need to do that"
@@robwalsh9843 I'm working on an album right now and the love for Helmet (and other early 90's NYC bands like Prong, Helmet, CSC, and Unsane) is plainly worn on its sleeve.
@@judsonsnell Yezzir!
Helmet are absolutely freaking monumental. Good to see someone actually give them the props they deserve for their influence on modern metal!
I came to say the same thing. Helmet is almost forgotten and I've seen "metal and rock experts" forget their existence. Also Helmet is just good, really good. I don't even mind saying their post haitus albums aren't as bad as people say they are.
I just got into them a few months ago. I actually learned alot from this! Didnt know helmet were so monumental. So cool
@@thedonofthsht76-58 Also worth checking out Handsome - Helmet had two guitarists for a while, and after Paige Hamilton kicked the other guy out, he started the band Handsome. Handsome are pretty similar to Helmet and are maybe a bit more polished and a bit more 'pop' with more hooks, but they still have the big riffs going on. Great band.
@@jamesxlennon sick thanks dude! Def gonna check them out
That's because Pantera Vulgar Display of Power was just a couple of months old when they came out and they already low tuned 1 and a half..
Celtic Frost and their influence on contemporary metal is pretty immense as well.
Morbid angel drummer was born in El Salvador and I'm the best friend of his brother I'm so glad to know his story 👍🏻 hope more people listen to his band.
The future of metal: Hitting the brown note and changing your shorts after the performance.
It’s our destiny.
I play in Drop-Brown Note and everyone immediately goes number 3.
I've been waiting for this my entire life
Melvins already do it!!
One band literally plays in triple drop G# for a breakdown and I assure it sounds heavy af
So... Sunn o)))?
Glad to see Helmet finally getting some love. I've only ever seen you mention them in passing. Criminally underrated.
That first Korn album is the only one I can go back and listen too. It's Dark, Heavy, and has Groove.
For younger people that were not around in the 90s: i'm 43 and its true what he says about Before Korn vs After Korn , he pretty much NAILED it ,I remember a night in my room, it must have been late '96 , i was listening to a Korn tape someone had given to me ,that contained the best songs of their 2 records , prior to that,i had been listening to them but only casually ( whenever the videos came on MTV or when they came on the radio) and i really liked the music (but i didnt have any of their CDs), and it dawned on me ,that other music i was into at the time , just sounded "dated", i mean i don't think i verbally thought that word in my head , but in hindsight the best word i can think now , more than 25 years later, to describe what i felt , is DATED, it kinda made all other music automatically irrelevant in a way, and more so after Follow the Leader and Significant Other by Limp Bizkit dropped , Nu Metal in 98 ,99 just took over EVERYTHING. Even my mom took notice and asked me "why every song u listen to is sooo agressive!" lol
Hm I was around then and I when I heard Korn I thought: hm that sound is like carcass heartwork, just worse because of the slap-bass...
Sabbath’s “Into the Void” metalist song of all time
"Into The Void" is the ultimate metal riff.
Fuck Yeah SIr. Golf Clap
To the last point, I’d add that now there are bands who tune down to drop A but aren’t heavy because the production is thin and compressed (like Fallujah).
Also honorable mention to Kyuss, who tuned down to C standard as early as ’87.
Doom metal bands have been down tuning since Saint Vitus back in the early 80’s if I remember correctly.
Kyuss definitely should be mentioned in such video. Also maybe Life of Agony and Type O Negative.
I'll give crowbar an honorable mention as well for tuning down to b standard on 6 strings as early as '93
@@sunburnfudge There were simply many heavy bands in 90's - Prong, Machine Head, Godflesh.
And they played out of bass amps too
I discovered Dopethrone about 10 years ago.
They brought heavy music back into my life.
And my 10yr old boy
Dimebag's playing is what got me into playing guitar. The heavy riffs gets me pumped.
Eddie's the one for me,and it's almost the same tuning than Dime(surprise surprise...)
Noel Gallagher did it for me
his tone was killer.. i remember phil talking about it on i think a Loudwire video. Said he fought for years finding a tone he liked. I had a magazine that came with a dvd where he was at the Krank amps company (remember them?) and said everyone thought he played tube bc it sounded warmer but he was always solidstate guy. he said tube amps always had a bluesy sound like ZZ top or a nasty cut like AC/DC until Krank came around and sent him a free amp he found he could get the gain and the warmth and the "cut your fucking head off dimebag sound" lol and he was using those until his unfortunate passing RIP
In my heart Dream Theater will always be the band that made seven string guitars popular, but I've gotta give credit where credit is due, and admit it was Korn.
So...by that logic...if my calculations are correct...that could possibly mean Korn is...
PROTO MODERN PROG METAL ?
@@startervisions recalculate
@@ChainsawChristmas what?
Without Steve Vai, metal bands may not have been playing 7-strings at all.
@@startervisions Unironically Korn was prog in their debut self-titled album due to having time-signature changes.
Whenever people talk about Helmet I always think about how good their bass riffs were
Their drummer, John Stanier, is a boss too. His playing is always one of the best parts of the bands he's in, like Battles and Tomahawk.
Saw em live 3 years ago in Düsseldorf and they still rock like hell.
Helmet drums + Tool riffs = Nu Metal
Henry Bogdan only plays lapsteel guitar in jazz bands now. He left heavy music behind, a shame.
Henry Bogdan was the reason I picked up the bass and also bought a G & L. He had some absolutely killer basslines and amazing tone.
Morbid Angel are so underrated, their combination of experimentation, heavieness, catchiness and songwriting sensibilities make them really unique. M.A. and Carcass really stand out above the rest.
Morbid Angel is an amazing band!
And Death
i thought the tone on Gateways to Annihilation sounded so damn heavy.. that was my first introduction to the band as a teen. the music matched the sick album art.. so low, dark and just other worldly. Personally i think Kingdoms Disdain is right up there with that and if memory serves me right he was playing a 8 string on that and it sounds it
um why do so many people always say "So-and so" band is so underrated, as if you are saying that you are the only one that appreciates said band, and are letting the rest of us know about this mysterious underrated band yoou guys are privelage too.. lol .. So Morbid Angel is 100% NOT UNDERATED, and in fact, extremely successful, and respected to this day.
@@raidermaxx2324 i get that..probably meant he wishes they were more popular than they are but hard to be popular when you're playing death metal. But they were on a major label at one point. I guess cannibal corpse went as mainstream it can get 🤷
I do love the sound of down-tuned guitars, but I can appreciate when modern metal bands do use standard tuning, if only because in the modern landscape, it gives them a unique sound. One band I love is Vektor, who tunes a half-step UP, completely bucking any of the tuning trends of the day, but their music is very thematically sci-fi, and that sound seems to suit the subject matter. An almost antiseptic futurism, rather than the dark gloom of their peers.
Charging The Void absolutely rips. When I first heard the choir come in it felt like I was going through the star gate at the end of 21st Century Space Odyssey
Black Sabbath are so damn amazing. Easily the most important band in metal history.
I mean they did invent the genre.
Aye mike Perry and black sabbath. What a combo. I like you already hahah
Sabbath is more important than the Beatles
@@MrVongogol Now THATS what I call a hot take. Real shit though I wrote a thesis paper on that exact topic for college. I dropped out shortly after and never turned it in.
Meshuggah is black Sabbath 2.0
Interesting facts:
- Yes tuned down to A in Big Generator, a 1987 song.
- Smashing Pumpkins tuned down to Bb in 1979, a 1995 song - you can clearly hear the baritone guitar note at 2:56.
- B52's used a baritone guitar tuned to C in their mainstream rock song Rock Lobster from 1978.
- Also, Matando Gueros by Brujeria was tuned to A in 1993. One year before the first Korn record.
I personally started tuning down because of Nirvana, then Helmet, AIC and Soundgarden. Then it got lower with stuff like Sepultura and Korn. By 97 I was tuning to B and A frequently. By 2001 I got my first 7 and by 2013 I got my 8 string. Interesting to see how mainstream it got.
Another funny fact is Wes Borland from Limp Bizkit tuning down to F# for their song Stalemate on a demo tape from 1995, which was probably written in 1994. (Pantera and Slipknot did something similar, but a couple years after LB). That song went on to their first album and they went on to use that same tuning on their single Nookie in 1999 which, and correct me if I'm wrong, is the LOWEST tuned rock song to ever hit the mainstream. So shouldn't that make Limp Bizkit the kings of low tuning until 2002 when Meshuggah released 'Nothing?'
Pentagram did A# in 1984 for the song All Your Sins
@@nicholasfink1186 Wes did use a modified 4-string guitar, tuned F#F#BE, which was a dort of diy-hybrid of a guitar and bass - so some people might argue that doesn’t count here
Early Bolt Thrower tuned down to A back in the late 80s, early 90s, before Korn, even before Morbid Angel started using 7 strings tuned down to A#. Godflesh was tuned down to B back around the same time as Carcass.
@@ippos_khloros6163 Everybody except Fred is very talented & went to music school.
Man I remember hearing that first Korn album for the first time at the little headphone sample bar at Sam Goody, and being so blown away by Blind. Really can't express how revolutionary that song really was at the time.
I think the physical aspect of bass moving air is a part of it, but in some cases, the fundamental frequency from the distorted guitar is significantly quieter than all the harmonic content. It’s like the actual *note* is implied rather than heard.
It makes for a sick tone.
there's also been the progression of the deftones, starting in standard, then flat and dropped, then a whole step down, then 7 string, to 8, to 9... the story is still playing out in real time!
all sounds like deftones to me.
Yea cause Steven carpenter is a huge Meshuggah fan
@@vin7941 and Periphery are huge Deftones fans:))
What deftones song has a 9?
yeah if i saw a video with stephen and chino talking about guitar tunings on all the albums. from start (adrenaline era) it was standard, dropped tuned on around the fur, dropped tuned again on White Pony (which surprised me bc it doesnt sound lower), then he got the 7 string for self titled and continued to drop down each album then got the 8 string i believe on No Koi Yokan or Gore. He always played like a hybrid lead/rhythm guy and does it well. btw im not a guitar player just what i remember them saying
I read an interview with Carcass a long time ago. They said the reason they tuned to B. Was because the band Trouble was tuned to C. They said that they thought Trouble was the heaviest band they ever heard. So if they tube to C, tuning to B has to be even heavier.
Pantera tuned to B on Southern Trendkill and c# on Far Beyond Driven. That was early nineties. Also The Acacia Strain really brought the super down tuned heavyweight sound to the front of the underground scene in 2003/2004. They would shake the walls.
Motley Crue always tuned down a whole step to D standard, even going back to their early stuff like "Too Fast For Love" or "Looks That Kill".
Yes
Thats just the sound of heroin
Damn, I'm a Gen X child and I'm always learning new stuff about music I never dreamed of happening when we didn't have social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, UA-cam, and etc. to connect us all. I only had MTV, Radio, and magazines to keep me updated on the music scene.
When I was in Iraq during my second deployment over there I had just discovered Zune and MP3 players to replace my CD player to listen to my music. Flash forward to today when I watch your videos you are a majority of the time talking about stuff I never knew when growing up.
Keep up the good work and thanks for the insight on the music I grew up on.
It's kind of interesting to note that the development in metal towards being more rhythmic and bass oriented is kind of mirrored by the direction pop music's gone in, the latter of which is typically associated with the growing influence and mainstream acceptance of rap music. With bands like Helmet and Korn, metal was kind of an early adopter.
Rick Beato made a video on top 10 Metal songs on Spotify and I kid you not, one of them sounded like Imagine Dragons but ever-so-slightly more aggressive. And even Imagine Dragons don't consider themselves a rock group, iirc.
well that influence goes back even further to Run-DMC on their first album with "Rock Box" and even more so on their third album with their collab with Aerosmith in "Walk This Way" and Public Enemy and Anthrax in "Bring tha Noize" as far as mainstream acceptance of rap... But its true metal and rap shared the one thing that pop music didnt hame, they were both cutting edge and listened to by fans that appreciated "cutting edge" music, therefore it was natural for rap and metal together, to be used as a vehicle to be brought to the pop listeners\masses...
Mikael Åkerfelt of Opeth is very good at creating super heavy compositions with standard E, such as Deliverance and Heir Apparent.
Great video. One quick note; Korn tuned even lower than B to A. Fear Factory didn't use a 7 string until Obsolete. Dino said he used a 6 string to record the Demanufacture album. Great band regardless. Also, I still love Korn almost 27 years later!
Other notable pioneers of drop D: Kings X (they had some songs dropped even lower, like drop B), Neil Young (Cinnamon Girl was in double drop D, Harvest Moon in drop D), Led Zeppelin (Moby Dick), the Allman Bros. (Midnight Rider), Fleetwood Mac (Never Going Back Again), Van Halen (Unchained).
Van Halen's Good Enough has the 6 string tuned down to A.
I recently started learning guitar and it's given me a bigger appreciation for what bands like Nile and Fear Factory have been doing all these years.
As for "feeling" the lower notes, I saw After The Burial two years ago and it was wildly better than listening on my phone.
Yes, Nile is is a big one. They pretty much pushed the envelope to an extreme. Drop A and really fast riffs. I still say it’s the limit for doing groove riffs, sludge riffs, and also fast choppy riffs.
'Wildly better than listening on my phone'. And you're surprised?!
@@jamesbedford3774 I know right?! Any live show or even a decent system is better than a phone
@@kdogg7882 Got to have some sort of hi-fi and a physical copy, for the best 'at home' experience. MP3s don't cut it, for me. Live is a double-edged sword. Sounds great (if you're lucky), but you'll pay a fortune to watch it through somebody else's fucking phone. I'm old enough to have enjoyed gigs before phones were 'a thing'. It was great. Now? Total waste of time.
@@Divine_Serpent_Geh and on 24.75" gibson scale length haha
Quick story: My friends' dad is the one who introduced him to Master of Reality as a kid. 20 years later, he shows his dad Electric Wizard and his dad just goes, ".........well that was dark."
Respect for making this video, mate. I assume you've already heard Sabbath Bloody Sabbath- mean drop tuning riff. Hearing that at age 12 was what threw me into metal. 40 years later, still there. And, that riff is still heavy.
19:17 As my highschool music teacher used to say to us: "oh, I'm so though and angry that I will downtune my guitar and blow up the speakers so nobody can notice when I mess up and every noise will feel intentional". It was mostly just to tease us, for the most part he still encouraged us to play music we liked.
Let's hear it for public school music class.
I give you props for mentioning Jimi and his tuning.
I like Eb tuning, and so does SLAYER.
Hell Awaits is in Standard
@@michaelhunziker7287 proves you don’t need to down tune if your riffs are heavy
Jimi tuned that way because it fit his vocal range better, not to be heavier.
@@60degreelobwedge82 cool, I thought it was so he could more easily bend the strings
First Drop D song I ever learned was Tesla's "Heaven's Trail". Well, double dropped D.
I, personally, don't think you can really talk about this without talking about King's X and Alice in Chains.
Dude... Love your insight and knowledge on all things heavy music... You have a gift and we appreciate you taking the time to share it with us, I disagree with you sometimes but that's what makes your input so vital.... Thank you! Thank you, thank you...
Thank you!
@@ThePunkRockMBA anytime! Please keep up the great work... A favor please, can you do an overview on the beauty of Converge and how they continue to bring us incredible music in the most punk way I know? Please!!!!! It would be outstanding. We would love it!
Let’s not forget Mick Mars tuned down one whole step (D standard) in like 1980 before most others. No one was tuning down like that back then
Mick is highly underrated as a guitar great. Only really held back by the other members of the band.
On top of that Mick Mars' guitars is basically holding the songs together. As far as their genre goes and much of 80's "Pop-Metal" if you ask someone to hum a Motley Crue songs it's more often than not going to be Mick's lines. For other bands if you ask them to hum the songs it's usually the Vocal lines.
@@TheDeadStretch very true.
How about Black Sabbath, they were tuned to C# standard much earlier than Motley Crue
@@siddhantpanwar95 How about watching the whole video, he mentions Black Sabbath and Iommi.
So, I am a metal and rock fan starting with the likes of Sabbath and Deep Purple from childhood. I can’t really relate to the majority of the videos you post as they often times mention bands and sub-genres I have not been exposed to. I know it’s there I just don’t really know anything about them or the scene. Your knowlede is what makes me watch your videos. Your research and attention to detail draws me in, and videos like this, a overall well informed and cool video about a subject that hits the whole industry is a prime example of that. Great work!
Broaden your horizons dude! I'm in my 40's, and this is a time of discovery for me. I've found dozens of bands that I passed over when I was younger that I absolutely love now, and there's a ton of newer, really awesome bands that keep me going on this juggernaut of metal that I call life.
Dude, just binged a bunch for your videos.
So informed and a great storyteller. 🤘
Don't forget about Bolt Thrower. They are pioneers of downtuned guitars and they were wayyy ahead of their time!
Finn: "... I think it's gonna here to stay"
Me: instant singing some KoRn.
Congrats Finn, you knocked this one out the park. IMO this is one of your best.
You deserve 10m subs... over the past 3 years you have put so much work into your content. So much research. Never stop sirrrrr
Jerry Cantrell of Alice in Chains was a big innovator with down tuning. He has these huge, crushing and dense guitar tones.
Jerry is definitely underrated... Even Dime was impressed by him
Paige Hamilton is my number 1 influence when it comes to guitar. Not a crazy fretty guitarist, but the groove and sludge was unreal. Fucking love it
His Jazz influence translated so well to Helmet. I didn't quite understand it when it came out, but I knew I liked it and even more now.
@@Kevin-uz6sv the dude had a lot to bring to the table. His music professor thought the whole thing was dumb, but Paige definitely proved him wrong
too underrated
I feel that with the all recording advancements and techniques that came with stupid low tuning, it’s kind of come full circle where you can djent and chug on riffs in e standard and have it sound HEAVY. Like my VSTs I use on my laptop sound brutal on standard tuning as well as drop G lol. This vid was a banger
Power trip comes to mind for me. They were heavy as fuck thrashing around in e standard!
@@sunburnfudge aye for sure good example
Thank you for mentioning the MELVINS! They never get the props they deserve! We're coming up on the Anniversary of their amazing album "Houdini" Sept 21st. Would be awesome if you made a video on them and their influence on Grunge and Metal.
Random trivia: Wes Borland of Limb Bizkit played a 7-String with a second high string, but tuned the whole thing down to C# standard. The extra high string was usually unison with the other one (both C#), sometimes he tried higher.
Also worth to mention he just played them because Ibanez gave them to him for free for advertisement, these where back then 25.5" aswell so thats why he a few years later got rid of them and gone back to play public 6 strings because the 7th got in the way.
Their first Album where also recorded on a (I think it was a) Washburn 6 string that was his second guitar he buyed.
He really hates being still asked about them..but reading the comments I totally understand this🤣
@@g.koch. I feel like the 2 high E strings might have been helpful on a song like “Rearranged” because of the clean tone pull-offs. It’s a small thing but it has a feeling of its own.
Fun fact: thrash metal band Vektor tunes UP to F standard and it makes their music insanely intense. Check for example their track Cygnus Terminal.
Checked it, intense is the right word
F is just the heaviest key. Listen to Caustic are the ties that bind by trivium or bulls on parade. Or even the octave down F like meshuggah. F supremacy for pure brutality😂
Vektor is still the fastest band I've ever heard
Listen to LCD for absolute progressive technical sci-fi blackened thrash metal goodness. Killer track
WTF was that... that track was fucking amazing, thanks dude, really. Im hooked now.
I’m surprised you didn’t mention dimebag and the way he tuned down like 1 and a quarter steps. And you know, also to G on the Underground in America, lol. Great video Finn, I love learning more about this music I love so much!
it was sandblasted skin with the really low G
@@bwzarchive708 unreal song. Both are. All of them are!! Lol
@@bwzarchive708 yeah. It makes them Disappear too
Cowboys was tuned down half step I think, most of the songs sound good in standard e as well
If you want him to just talk about every guitarist that ever down tuned, this would be a 30 hour video.
Awsome video, man! You could make a mini series out of this, about the drums, bass and of course vocals.
Meshuggah is just brutal nu-metal.
I have never been so offended by something so accurate and true.
Well, much more technical than nu metal. Your average Korn wannabe band couldn't master those rhythms.
They have this nu-metal vibe in some songs, can’t deny. But the deeper you go on Meshuggah further alway they distance their song from Nu metal.
There is more Jazz in Meshuggah than nu metal, this is why their composition is full of broken patterns and rhythm changes.
I hated most so called “brutal bands”, but my love to Jazz made my transition to Meshuggah quite easy, because at first I was curious they caught my ear, and after little time, I was going deeper and deeper into their discography.
It is amazing how the first album was basically Metallica, and then the band found their song and kept evolving it and honing their craft.
@@raphaelcalado4335 This. Their None EP has some very nu-metally, even metalcory riffs all throughout.
@@peterdepalma6714 None was pretty alternative metal so yes close to nu metal
Drop D is my favorite tuning. Its a gym aggression rather than a murder suicide aggression.
Yeah drop D for the win
For rhythm guitarists especially, it just seems natural to want to extend your range. I also always wondered how much people shit themselves when they heard Children of the Grave for the first time!
I love your videos, Man! Every time I watch one, I play albums I haven't heard since the 90s. It was truly a great era for music.
I like hearing the actual notes the guitars are playing. Some bands are purely percussive.
Helmet's influence to this day is absolutely insane considering they were never really part of the mainstream
Dude I literally just got into them like 6 months ago. Funny how you can be a metalhead and still find heavy bands lol
@@thedonofthsht76-58 it’s a never ending journey
@@Malum09 that's a fact! Hate when people say metals dead. Just bc it isnt on the radio. Gotta dig
I remember seeing their video for Unsung pretty frequently on MTV back in the olden days.
Helmet weren't an underground band, they were pretty solidly in the B-tier of the mainstream in the 90s.
I NEED an entire video dedicated to Meshuggah. Absolutely love that band. I’ve listened to Bleed hundreds of times and I still get the same chills every time I hear the opening
I’m old so i loved Nothing. And when they remaster it and re recorded with 8 strings it was perfection.
I've seen Korn many....many times, but I remember seeing them in a smallish club on the tour to promote "Life Is Peachy" and it rocked my world. I was maybe 10 feet from the PA and when Fieldy hit those sub notes it literally moved me across the floor from the vibrations.
Fieldy is the second greatest Bassist of all time! (Behind Les Claypool only in unique Bass playing)
@@ashirrelevent1062 I don't know if I'd go that far lol His playing and tone are 100% unique and I enjoy listening to him, but I could rattle off a number of bassists that leave him in the dust musically.
Life of agony was one that sticks out for me when I think of early drop tunes
This tiiime
Pantera's Vulgar Display of Power was massively influential with down tuning, came out 4 months before Helmet's Meantime, and sold WAY more copies.
Hemlet > pantera
@@123612100 Preferences don't change the facts. Helmet is great, but I'm just talking about influence, and it was a ridiculous oversight that the video didn't mention Pantera's influence on drop tuning.
@@darrentg6 pantera influenced all the wrong bands.
@@ConvincingPeople Dimebag was racist. There's a video of him at NAMM where he keeps calling a dude the N word.
Helmet was influential to many including Pantera. From interviews you can hear Phil was a fan and Dime knowingly used one of Page's riffs cause he dug it so much. Everybody's greatness made everyone better.
Dillinger Escape Plan play in standard almost exclusively I think. And they’re heavy as hell.
all mathcore/chaotic hardcore sounds quite high pitched, I guess it's a part of the style
Definitely one of the exceptions, and exceptional
That band sux. Spazz rock
@@michaelhunziker7287 sounds like an I heard one song and didn't like em band review
I saw them with Thy Art is Murder, it felt just as heavy.
Hell yeah! I’ve been waiting SO LONG for someone to make a video on this topic!
I'm so glad someone made the tie of djent to korn. the influence is uncanny
Helmet's Betty is one of the best and heaviest albums of all time
I´m gonna listen to it right now, once again.
Their pre hiatus output is legendary, especially Aftertaste, and people write that off. Their post hiatus albums aren't bad either, just not as good.
John Stanier’s drums bludgeon so much, I love his snare on that album.
@@yy-hj4br I agree, newer Helmet isn't as good, but it's still good. Page just has that sound down.
It's cool how Drop D was a sleeper tuning back to '69 with Moby Dick by Zeppelin, a few songs by Queen of all bands (like Fat Bottomed Girls in '79), and Unchained by Van Halen in '81.
Dude I loved Helmet as a teen, and most just didn't see them at the beginning, love that you talked about them! Their drummer and bassist were amazing
Great video as always! I used to tune to, and play along with Master of Reality by ear on vinyl. Also my band was just me and a drummer, so I tuned down to make up for the fact that we didn't have a bass player. Also (Interesting accident) my first amp was a 60 watt brute bass amp, so it was able to handle a lot, and had a big sound. This was in the 90's. I think we scared our neighbors.
Meshuggah was popular in the USA long before 2008! I saw them play Ozzfest 2002 on the 2nd stage, they had a good sized crowd & reaction, but they were already covered by Metal publishers years before then in the U.S. Maybe it was simply that their influence wasn't impactful yet till the late 2000s.
C Standard and Drop A# are my favorite tunings. Drop G is pretty fun for grind and slam stuff. Ive never enjoyed playing E Standard
I listen to two extremes. Thrash metal classics and doom external Djent
i went full circle and now my band plays only in standard. it can be heavy if you do it right.
CGCFA#D#GC for me
@@mathewpierce2129 im not even that concerned with the heaviness. Mainly just the difference in scales im able to play. If im playing slam, im definitely going as low as i can. But if im playing prog or jazz, i usually do C or D Standard. Anything else, I've been in favor of drop b
This was an AWESOME video! I'm 46 and remember playing in Drop D as a teenager. Outshined by Soundgarden was heavy at the time. Also check out "In The Meantime" by Helmet. Still one of my favorites to this day.
Love the video as always, but someone you for got to mention that plays a lot in drop tunings is Josh Homme. In Kyuss and in the early QOTSA records he plays solely in C Standard tuning. Although he isn’t necessarily revolutionary in doing this, it did make their music unique in the more Alternative/Hard Rock Scene at the time and helped create the Stoner/Doom genre. Great video as always and I learned a lot, keep up the good work!
That whole High 7th String would have totally caught on in Black Metal! I mean is there even bass at all in most trad lofi Black Metal?! One of the few genres to not evolve to include downtuning, and Thrash's speedy attack sounds crap when downtuned too far too.
Annal Nathrakh would like to have a word with you...
Ironically Black Metal, isn’t even “heavy” at all? And it’s supposed to be the darkest of the genre. Well, was supposed to be back then. Grunge was Heavier.
@@JohnSmith-rk6jy depends on how you define heavy. If heavy to you is exaggerated low frequencies and chugs, then yeah, black metal isn’t gonna be ‘heavy’, especially if you’re talking about the first wave or early second wave where the lofi production was pretty much void of low frequencies. And yeah, for it’s time, it was the heaviest... ok... the most *extreme* thing around. Then again, so was punk ins the 70’s. It’s all about time frame and what YOU personally define as ‘heavy’. But by the time Dimmu put out ‘Puritanical’, the bass-focused production and adoption of open string staccato riffing was surely ‘heavy’
@@evergray5063 Yeah that's fair, some people could argue some Sabbath is heavier than 80s Thrash, and Dissection were black metal that definitely incorporated death/thrash riffing and like you say Dimmu incorporated the 'chug' factor. Heaviness is ultimately subjective and comes in different forms...I loved Mikael Akerfeldt's quote - 'Tell Me That Mozart's Requiem Isn't Heavy & I'll Kick You in the Fucking Cunt' 😂😂
@@85vesti I never heard that quote, that’s fuckin hilarious 😂
God bless you for the 2008 screen shot of some guy asking "Are you REALLY playing guitar if you drop tune?"
Love that you played a lil snippet from a Demilich track, love that band so much, crazy ridiculously heavy.
Never listened to metal until a friend of mine played KoRn on Cassette tape, After "Are you ready?" I was hooked for life.
Korn drop their 7-strings down a whole step so they have been tuned down to A since 1994.
Nile also came in with A in 1998.
Nirvana's "Bleach" was in drop D...but they forgot it was already in drop D, so "Blew" ended up being in drop C after they tuned down again...woops. Have to mention Stephen Carpenter of the Deftones when it comes to 7-strings and odd tunings.
I think that they re-did most of the album apart from 'Blew' after they realised their mistake
I'm not understanding this. If you're in E Standard and you go to Drop D, you're only lowering the tuning of the low E string from an E to a D.
If you repeat that, you end up in... CADGBE not Drop C. Drop C is CGCFAD.
Also you drop tune either with a tuner, or relative to the other strings. So I'm not sure how either of these tunings was possible - either you drop the E string another full step down to C but don't check that on a tuner or relative to the other strings, which is... interesting. Or you tune it relative to the other strings, but before doing that you drop the entire guitar a step.
I guess it was in Drop D, then they tuned relative to D Standard because they forgot the E string was already dropped.. then dropped the lowest string from D down to C? I might be overthinking this.
Basically, in the studio, tune with a tuner. Glenn Fricker wouldn't have any of this!
Finn is afraid to talk about Deftones. Good or bad, it's just not worth the comment storm haha
@@jamesxlennon I was looking for this comment. You mean to tell me when you drop your guitar you don't start with 1-5? Lmao. You're certainly not overthinking it.
@@jamesxlennon agreed. There's no way this story is true. They're in studio and somehow not using tuners, intonating guitars, and the producer never mentioned anything. All very unlikely.... Except maybe the intonation. Haha.
I always tune my Strat down to drop A, because most of KoЯn's early songs are played in that tuning.
Great video, but I was shocked you didn’t use the Deftones as an example. Steph Carpenter started out on a six string and, as albums went on, tuned lower and lower while adding more and more strings to his signature guitars. It’s almost like you can track the progress of metal’s adoption of lower tunings and more strings with Steph’s gear.
Couldn't imagine what Dillinger Escape Plan would sound like tuned down. That shit sounds nasty as is!
@@rorz999 Arp is on a whole different level of skill.
The guitars in that band are focused on screechy chords, not chugging, so it probably wouldn't do much to their sound but make it muddier honestly. On one of their later albums they had a single song that did some chugging and I think they actually played in drop D for just that song. There was a guitar switch live and everything. It sounded good for that part for sure!
You could check out Ion Dissonance. Basically what DEP would sound like downtuned. Cursed is a pretty gnarly record.
“Meshuggah on a bad ketamine trip” sounds like a fun as fuck time
Then you haven't had a bad ketamine trip
@@m1sza_CS Oh I definitely have I’m just a bit of a masochist and Meshuggah while in a k-hole would feel like you were in a different dimension, probably not a fun dimension but that’s besides the point.
@@Dayman420 I understand with the masochism in mind then 😂
"This Flight Tonight" by Joni Mitchell in 1971 is tuned with a low G on the low string. I don't know a huge amount about folk, but I know they used all sorts of low stuff and influenced a bunch of players.
Reminds me of Neil Young playing down tuned acoustics with songs like “Don’t Let It Bring You Down.”
She also used a open version of Drop B on Hejira in 1976. She's the OG of downtuning and alternate tuning.
Nice job researching and including the guitar mags, also, thanks for the Helmet love, think you're dead on with them
MELVINS were an interesting intersection of tuning very low and being more grunge than metal, especially the early records like Ozma and Bullhead
Melvins are a kind of group that were avant-garde by sheer incident. I feel like they just do whatever they want to get weirder and more confusing, to their complement. It will forever be a godsend that sludge and grunge are genetically tied but Sludge is more the awkward family member at the edge with a solid side-hustle.
Melvins are also often included in sludge metal and doom metal. They've had a wide influence.
It's crazy how much "bleed" propelled meshuggah into the mainstream.... especially considering the amount of amazing shit they have put out before that... stuff that was arguably better
But tho bleed was worth the game cause of the insanely hard picking and kick pattern
@@yourself_and_i_music yeps already heard Meshuggah in the early 2000s but Bleed has the x factor. It was like as Smells like Teen Spirit was for Nirvana
@@amx1820 yeah exactly
Youd be surprised how much of a good "hook" in a sense bleed has. That picking pattern is basically the modern metal version of 0 3 5
Winds of Plague started out playing in standard, with a 5 string bass tuned to drop A, and they would just use inverted power chords with the bass creating the aural illusion of drop tunings for the breakdowns lol. Main reason was the guitar preferences of the guitarists - I think one was using a H-H Tele or something, and the other was playing a fixed bridge H-S-S Strat.