Metal Distortion out of a Marshall?

[george walker's closet]

joel's right on with the marshall jcm 800 and 2000. both can sound super heavy if you tweak the knobs right. i have the 2000, and love it. the guy from muse uses it as well, can you beat his guitar tone? nope.
-ira

[housepig]

A lot of it is in the players hands.

have to agree - take my guitar out of my hands, hand it over to my old rythm guitarist, and it takes on a totally different character, without changing a thing - it would go from biting and metallic to much rounder / hard-rock sounding.

personally, I use a Line 6 POD Pro, a Yorkville power amp, and a pair of Marshall 4x12's, and it sounds pretty metal to me...

used to use the same setup, but with a Marshall 9000 series solid-state preamp instead of the POD, used it in hardcore & metal bands with no complaints (other than the clean channel sounded dodgy).

[JohnDavisNYC]

it's all about the player. i played for a few years with Alex Skolnick (of Testament fame) and we were doing a pseudo jazz thing (he went back to school and studied jazz) where we palyed jazz arrangements of metal tunes and stuff. Alex could get the most amazing metal sound of of an archtop jazz guitar and a tech21 solid state combo... it was all in his fingers and how he attacked the strings. he also sounded metal with a tubescreamer into a twin. it's all about the player.

cheers,
john

[I'm Painting Again]

Maybe the rack marshall suff, or a valvestate if you sound like prong...

I was just checking out the 65 watt valvestate 1x12 and you can get for around 170 on ebay. I am thinking about doing this. Just to get something different than my line 6 stuff. Anyone got anything to say about the valvestate's. (VS65R)???? Metal??? Other than prong.

I just did an all girl hardcore/metal band and one guitarist had a valvestate/jackson and the other had a les paul/tripple rectifier both through the same vintage marshall 4x12..on the scale of 1 to 10..and the mesa being 10 the valve state setup was a 7..in terms of nice tone..if i had to describe the difference..the mesa head was more round and smooth and pushed more air and the valve state was more cutting, shrill, and had a more grainy distortion..i also have a pod xt and that pretty much can sound exactly like the valvestate but with more options for tone..the valvestate surely wasn't total crap but it wasn't cream your pants great either..

[ryangobie]

i think it really depends on the settings, i've heard and gotten marshalls to screeam before...

will, does your 800 not get metally enough? hmmm

[george walker's closet]

also, what kind of tubes are you using, that makes a huge difference in the sound.
-ira

[dc11]

I also play in a metal band and over the years, I've gone back to marshalls. I hate boogies, at least the newer ones. The Mark IV and the iicx are the shit though. I use my 30th anniversary Marshall the most, but I still have a VHT in my arsenal, as well as a Carvin Legacy (great cab, and a great head as well, sounds similar to a Bogner). The VHT is what a rectifier is supposed to sound like But the Marshall wins all the time

A trick I used to use was to use a Chandler Tubedriver in front. That or a Fulltone Fulldrive 2 or a Fatboost. The chandler pushes the shit out of the amp. My favorite breakdown sound is to double the guitar using a Marshall and Rectifier (VHT or Boogie).

I don't even know if I answered your question, but theres my rambling for the night

[djslayerissick]

a Sonic Maximizer between the guitar and the amp can make all the difference in the world. maybe not your thing, but its definitely worth checking out.

i know Disturbed uses one. i dont know if thats an incentive or not.

[literati]

boss metal zone (close, but noisy and crappy at the same time)

I was going to suggest that one if it wasn't already on your list. Noisy, crappy, no mids, lots of fizz? Sounds like Mesa!

I once let a studio owner talk me into using that pedal on a record I did with my band eleven years ago. What a huge mistake.

Metal Zones definitely sound like crap on guitar, but one place I've found them to shine is on bass. It's the only distortion pedal I've used on bass that doesn't totally kill the low end. I have one in my live bass rig and I love it. Every now and then the guitar player will borrow it and it turns his tone into ass...

Cheerio,
Literati,
occasionally known as Michael

[supafuzz]

find an original marshall pedal..guv'nor/or drivemaster and turn the bass and treble all the way up and turn down the mids all the way
instant metal..

[bobbydj]

(Triple Rectumfriers).

[supafuzz]

boogie rectal-verb

if mesa stuff is so great why are there more listed for sale than any other amp brand?

[John Jeffers]

My guitarist likes a LOT of distortion. Too much, if you ask me. He used to use a Peavey 5150II, then a XXX, which were OK, but just too...spongy? Saturated? I can't think of how to describe it. The notes just got lost in all the distortion.

Now he has a VHT Pittbull 100, and it kills. Best metal tone I've ever heard. Tight, punchy, defined. We got a total wall-of-sound effect on our lastest recordings that sounds amazing, by blending three tracks of close (left, right) and room mics (center). It also cuts through a live mix, and you can actually tell what notes he's playing, even on complex chords. Of course, it probably helps that he doesn't scoop all the mids out like a lot of metal guitarists do.

There's a big price difference between the Peavey stuff (~$900) and the VHT (~$2500), but the VHT is worth it if you can afford it.

[Lazy_Q]

Has anyone considered getting their metalzone pedal modded? both Analogman and Robert Keeley do MT-2 mods that get rid of a lot of the noise. Of course, it may only help a bit insofar as tone suck, but if you people have them lying around and are willing to give it a shot, it could be interesting.

[XXGABEXX]

I'll add my vote for the SansAmp GT2. It can get really mean sounding. Like a lot of people I'm not fond of modelers, but this sounds awesome when used as just a pedal through a 4x12.

Edit: Oh yea, I run it through a Marshall Plexi reissue and out a plain old JCM900 4x12. Good luck in your search!