the development of guitar tone and technology and ...

[genocide roach]

...how it has affected the development of metal.

basically. do you think extreme metal would be possible without the development of high gain amps and instruments designed to give clarity in down tuned situations?

i say metal is reliant on new high gain technology. as metal bands look for a more aggressive sound, they would require new technology. i couldnt see a band like morbid angel effectively using the amps black sabbath used in the late 70s.

on the flip side, there seems to be a movement in the doom/stoner scene where vintage gear is key to their sound.
~gR~

 

[LithiumLulu]

I don't think any technological advances were necessary. They may help, but I think if anything the music drove the technology, not the other way around.

The effect technology has had, IMO, is that better gear has become available at lower costs allowing more people access to great sounds and good, reliable instruments.

 

[BlackMetalWhiteGuy]

Heavy guitar tones have been available for quite a long time, just not at prices that are as affordable as they are now. The big technological difference that I've noticed is the sample quality in keyboards. It used to cost thousands of dollars to get clear, realistic, orchestral instrument sounds out of a keyboard, and now you can download a lot of great free samples and soundfonts from the internet.

I've even noticed quite a difference in the technology over the past few years, as the sound quality of my keyboard from highschool (roughly five years ago) is put to shame by my new keyboard, produced by the same company, in an equivalent price range.

 

[Acey Jendell]

I don't really think guitar tone has much to do with the development of extreme metal, because if you look at it, extreme metal started with bands from the NWOBHM, like Venom and Angel Witch, who inspired Metallica and Exodus, who used fairly low gain mid range guitar tones, and Slayer, who use a bit more gain but were shrouded in reverb (Show No Mercy, Hell Awaits) who went on to inspire some young kids down in florida who made up this new thing called DEATH METAL and had bands like Death, Morbid Angel, Cannibal Corpse, Deicide, and such, and you couldn't even HEAR the guitars on their albums because they were drowned out by the drums and shitty reverb infected vocal tracks.

When you think about it, today's metal bands display mostly crisp and clear high gain sounds with shitloads of bottom end, and the guitar tones back in the day were more mid range or treble oriented. So basically, extreme metal existed before the new technology of digital amp modelling and such, it's just that the same dudes use different gear nowadays.