That Recent Metallica Thread Got Me Thinking...

angelspade

angelspade

Well-known member
I came across this on YouTube...By listening to these short snips of the isolated tracks I have come to the conclusion that the Load rhythm guitar tone is much better than I had though. It's really thick in the low-mids, has some chewiness and a nice crisp, but not harsh top end. It reminds me of some of the Bogner 101B clips I have heard recently. My understanding is that it was primarily Mesa Triaxis, but I feel like I'm hearing some very un-mesa character in there...Marshall? Wizard perhaps?




I imagine that it may not be tight, or aggressive enough for some of us here...But I think I dig it. Thoughts?
 
I think the Wizard only came in with the Reload sessions. I think the 'arshole' amp might have come in though from Load. I wish the guitar tones were a bit clearer in the mix. It's a dense mix to my ear and the guitar tones get swallowed up too much. I like those iso tones too.
[edit] Wasn't paying enough attention :) sounds cool nonetheless.
 
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cant say i find that tone the least bit exciting but i dont generally go for darker low mid heavy tones, theres just no real character or something. Very meh especially coming after the black album
 
The tones in the OP are not the real stems, they're tones the youtuber created. The vibe is similar to the real deal but they're not quite there. The tones in the video have more honk than the tones on the real album.

As far as the real tones on Load, I remember reading that a lot of them came from James' Triaxis rig, yeah. But I've also read that the Load / Reload sessions feature another metric ton of different amps all over the place too.

I love the sound of the Load and Reload albums. They're some of the best sounding hard rock records ever made imo. Load's songs are way better than the ones on Reload imo, but they both sound awesome.

Listening to Load with a critical ear is interesting. The guitars are super thick but not the broadest bandwidth'ed tone. Of course they're nothing like the hyper narrow guitar tones from the 80's, but it does sound like the Load / Reload guitars have more prominent mids than even the vocals, along with having less high highs and low lows than the guitars in other Metallica records, so like James' vocals sound big and wide but very smooth in the mix almost like they're maybe just a bit scooped, and surprisingly not as prominent as most vocals tend to be, like they sit almost outside of the primary focus. The guitars themselves however are lined up right in the middle of the spectrum to be the most audible thing you hear. Not exactly surprising when you consider it's a Metallica album but still. So often the mantra of most (shitty) producers is "mix it to sound like a Karaoke bar, so the vocals are 100x louder than everything else and make them hit square in the 1kHz region for maximum audibility, because nobody cares about anything but lyrics" but Bob Rock seemed to take a different approach here, and imo it was the perfect choice for the album.
 
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TheGreatGreen said:
The tones in the OP are not the real stems, they're tones the youtuber created. The vibe is similar to the real deal but they're not quite there. The tones in the video have more honk than the tones on the real album.
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Really? I assumed they were the actual album isolated tracks. My mistake....Still kind of like what he did here, does sound close.
 
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angelspade said:
Really? I assumed they were the actual album isolated tracks. My mistake....Still kind of like what he did here, does sound close.
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It does sound super close, the dude even gets a lot of the playing nuances exactly right too. I thought they were stems myself until I clicked on the video and saw the description where the guy mentions he made them from scratch.
 
Philhouse said:
I think the Wizard only came in with the Reload sessions. I think the 'arshole' amp might have come in though from Load. I wish the guitar tones were a bit clearer in the mix. It's a dense mix to my ear and the guitar tones get swallowed up too much. I like those iso tones too.
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It’s the loud vocal mix and huge drum tones. Guitars suffered
 
FWIW, the Lead 2 Red mode in a Triaxis is rather different from the other seven, crisper & far more British-sounding than the Mk IIC+ mode.
Here's how the manual describes it:

'It is much more aggressive in the top end than its yellow counterpart, boasting much enhanced upper harmonics. Though it shares almost identical basic architecture additional parts switch in when Red is chosen that give this once balanced, well behaved mode a downright ugly attitude. Harmonics are boosted and a bit of lower treble is dipped to give this Red a sizzling edge that is unique to this mode only. The harmonic edge
not only benefits high notes...It does wonders for the grinding "Z's" needed for bodacious low end crunch. This enhances the growl
on the low strings as well as it adds cut and sizzle to the higher strings. The frequencies enhanced by this circuit are slightly higher
than those found in conventional power section PRESENCE controls.They are also higher, more rebellious and defined than those
adjusted by the action of TriAxis' PRESENCE control. These highs have that out-of-control-vibe to them, that falling-apart-yet-loosely-
held-together quality that is often associated with modified early British heads using Euro-style EL34 power tubes for their ponies.
This elusive sound affects the feel of the strings and players accustomed to such sounds have difficulty feeling at home on an amp that doesn't deliver these loose highs.'

Not suggesting that this mode actually was used for the tracks in question.
Only saying that Triaxis is capable of some sounds that aren't typically Mesa-ish.

As an aside, it still surprises me how various modes in the thing affect string feel.
My Tri is an early one, when they still had the Rectifier Orange channel on a separate circuit board.
In that mode with the Mids set low, it literally feels as if the guitar has lighter gauge strings.
I have no idea how, but it's the honest truth.
 
I remember when I bought "Load" and listened, it was like Bob told James not to have that tight rhythm he is known for. Be looser playing wise, pick amps that are not as tight, turn thr gain down, etc. I got into Metallica to hear tighter tones and if I wanted to hear looser feel, I had STP and other bands covering that arena.

There are some great songs on Load and Reload and some tones I really dig. Devil's Dance is so heavy sounding, dig the solo tone on Hero of the Day, etc. But I remember hearing Ain't My Bitch and thinking "why does that sound clanky and mid gainy?". It was Southern Rock gain.

I've said it before here on the forum, I'm glad they experimented with different tones and didn't just do the same sound over and over because I plucked some things out of those other years thst I really loved. My core is the first three albums but here and there some great tones later.
 
This album came out, and a year later I started playing guitar. These guitar tones have a special place in my heart, and are definitely my favorite Metallica tones.
 
romanianreaper said:
I remember when I bought "Load" and listened, it was like Bob told James not to have that tight rhythm he is known for. Be looser playing wise, pick amps that are not as tight, turn thr gain down, etc. I got into Metallica to hear tighter tones and if I wanted to hear looser feel, I had STP and other bands covering that arena.

There are some great songs on Load and Reload and some tones I really dig. Devil's Dance is so heavy sounding, dig the solo tone on Hero of the Day, etc. But I remember hearing Ain't My Bitch and thinking "why does that sound clanky and mid gainy?". It was Southern Rock gain.

I've said it before here on the forum, I'm glad they experimented with different tones and didn't just do the same sound over and over because I plucked some things out of those other years thst I really loved. My core is the first three albums but here and there some great tones later.
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That and they said themselves they wanted to expand and do something different. Unfortunately, it was also around that period that they completely lost themselves and what made Metallica a great band to begin with. I love those guys but Kirk and Lars seem like whiny little girls to me know :(
 
"I used a vst called amplitube 5, and i’m running a diezel head into the King Nothing IR. There’s a few eqs at the end of the chain, but it’s fairly simple overall. Then ofc the guitars are panned left and right, only about 60% though. Hope this helps!"

Dude's got the playing on lock and knows how to dial it in.
 
Inearthed said:
"I used a vst called amplitube 5, and i’m running a diezel head into the King Nothing IR. There’s a few eqs at the end of the chain, but it’s fairly simple overall. Then ofc the guitars are panned left and right, only about 60% though. Hope this helps!"

Dude's got the playing on lock and knows how to dial it in.
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Agree 100%
 
I like those tones as well. I actually don't mind a few songs from Load/Reload. I think they're fun. But they're certainly a different approach to what they used to sound like before, and I don't think they'd fit the "good" old Metallica tunes.

I remember seeing a vid where they played Master of Puppets around those Load/Reload times where James had the combed-back long-ish hair, and it sounded so miserably scratchy and undergained with no punch behind it. Like one of those pub cover bands that just play Metallica stuff because that's what people ask for.
 
Bob Rock and his engineers sculpted those tones. I imagine you are hearing several layers of EMG'd ESPs and Les Pauls through Mesas, Soldanos, and Marshalls... I imagine none of which would be stock amps that the band members owned.

Metallica was on a roll from 1994-1999. Their live setup was pretty consistent, and represented those Load/ReLoad album tones pretty well. You might see if there are any old videos of them talking about their setups in that period. The Mesa Triaxis were/are just the power amp section, confirmed multiple times.
So that leaves preamp... which does not sound like a Mesa to my ear. I am guessing a blend of an old Marshall and early 90s Soldano.

I do prefer those 90s album tones to the latest tones, though.
 
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