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Good Fuzz for Bass in a Heavy Metal band...


juri

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What kind of metal? Thrash, Diamondhead/Metallica style stuff, Doom, Death, ... ?

 

Regardless of the answer, get a pedal that lets you blend dry signal or a dedicated dry looper. Competing with double kick means your bass frequencies have to be tight and your attack has to be fast otherwise you get lost.

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What kind of metal? Thrash, Diamondhead/Metallica style stuff, Doom, Death, ... ?


Regardless of the answer, get a pedal that lets you blend dry signal or a dedicated dry looper. Competing with double kick means your bass frequencies have to be tight and your attack has to be fast otherwise you get lost.

 

 

in flames/arch enemy with some Metallica influences as well, fits under heavy metal but its harsher than 80s but lighter than like death metal

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I'll be different and not suggest a muff variant (though it's a proven choice). Scooped mids mean becoming Tom Araya in Slayer: felt but never, ever heard. Try something that's more of an overdrive or light fuzz that can blend with the dry bass (for attack). If you want to know something off the wall, for a time I had the Electro-Harmonix Steel Leather pedal and running that AFTER the bass big muff was surprising. Super aggressive treble, cut like an ice pick, almost Big Black sounding. I always thought if I played a metal band I would put a fuzz and the steel leather in a blend loop and it would slay. Try it out if you can.

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I don't think fuzz is the best thing for that kind of metal. The Boss ODB-3 is tits, though.

 

 

Cliff "The Good Member of Metallica" Burton used a Russian Muff, if I remember correctly!

 

Edit: The below posts are right, they didn't exist yet, but he used a plain Big Muff and a Morley Fuzz Wah

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Cliff "The Good Member of Metallica" Burton used a Russian Muff, if I remember correctly!

 

 

i don't think they were making russian muffs yet during his lifetime. i should know what he used, being a big fan of old metallica, but i don't. i don't really know {censored} about his gear.

 

bass definitely sounds better when i'm not playing it, so i stay away from them and all. but i know the musket actually sounds pretty good on bass in a metal set up. humancertainty can speak to that more, as he actually has been known to play bass in metal bands and i saw him using one once.

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Yeah but Cliff also does a good disappearing act when Metallica starts riffing (maybe more to do with their production on those early albums). His solos cut because he used a Morley Power Wah Fuzz, one of the harshest fuzz sounds I've ever heard, even before it's paired with a wah! Kind of depends what role you want for bass in the band I guess.

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Nothing wrong with fuzz on bass, but if I were in a heavy metal band, I'd be looking for something in the overdrive or distortion realms. The fuzz might be too loose and huge?

 

My favorite pedal in a stoner rock band playing bass was a Wounded Paw Attack Goat. Really nasty powerful dirt sounds that didn't fade away into a mix....which is both good and bad.

 

Muffs, muff clones and the ODB-3 will easily get lost.....but I've had some luck with the ODB-3 and a mid focused clean tone. The ODB-3 can sound pretty huge.

 

OF course a RAT is always nice, and the distortion on a MXR DI+ is decent for metal.

 

Clean blending can help with saving your low end, but eventually I ditched the BS and just ran the pedals straight.

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Cliff "The Good Member of Metallica" Burton used a Russian Muff, if I remember correctly!


Edit: The below posts are right, they didn't exist yet, but he used a plain Big Muff and a Morley Fuzz Wah

 

 

ODB-3 is still tits.

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The mammoth is terrible for the kind of metal he's playing. I would strongly recommend not buying a fuzz pedal if you're doing Swedish DM meets Metallica style metal.

 

That kind of bass tone is traditionally a cranked SVT or an OD pedal. Most bands used the ODB-3 but there are a lot of things out there nowadays that will be better. Other than the ODB-3 definitely look into a Sansamp if he isn't going to be running a real SVT.

 

Fuzz is great for anything downtempo or riffy but would just be a garbled mess on bass at the tempos he'll be playing.

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Not to toot my own horn, but I build a pretty cool bass fuzz called the Thunderhorse. Its a fuzz circuit with a clean blend. You can dial in just a tad of fuzz and you get a pretty cool overdriven amp sound, or a ton of fuzz with a little bit of the clean signal to retain a lot of the bass frequencies lost in the fuzz. I'm selling them for $100 so that I can get as many out and as much feedback from players as possible.

 

EAD Thunderhorse

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