Thinking out loud about tunings, some opinions?

[Mattayus]

At the moment my band is in Bb standard on 7 strings, with most of our EP already recorded.

Only problem is, we incorporate a lot of 6 string stuff in too now, and D standard/Drop C seems to be where we feel most comfortable with those songs. Eb/drop Db would be the natural progression given our 7 string tuning, but it's just that bit too high and not really ballsy enough.

That's made us question whether we should give A standard a shot, as it's carrying on with that D standard "theme" if you will (if we were to continue to use that tuning, that is).

So I have it a shot today, played about with it. And although I loved it initially, there was a certain aspect of clarity that was missing. I know it's only a semi-tone down from our current tuning, but as a lot of you will already be aware; tuning down is exponential. i.e. a semi-tone's difference up at E/Eb is hardly anything, but down at Bb/A it's a huge difference.

I'm not really entirely sure about the point of this thread, just thinking out loud to catch some opinions/thoughts on the matter?

A flavour of our current sound in Bb standard - Fervently Despicable

 

[Trevoire520]

It's just one of them things, higher tunings sound tighter and faster and the lower you tune the bigger and slower you tend to get and you lose a bit of clarity.

Maybe you could try jumping up a string guage to compensate for the lower tuning, you might get some clarity back?

 

[Mattayus]

Would that not give an even woofier sound though? I'm already using a 59 for the low Bb, I guess a 64 wouldn't be that much more of a jump.

 

[Mago]

Would that not give an even woofier sound though? I'm already using a 59 for the low Bb, I guess a 64 wouldn't be that much more of a jump.

I guess your sevenstring has a longer scale then the axe I use for Bb standard (25'' 6 strings). .60 is enough for B, but not at all for Bb. Switched to .64 for that!
I only have it on Bb because our standard tuning is Eb standard, and the 2nd guitarplayer doesn't have/want a guitar tuned that deep, so he plays the same stuff higher (which is actually quite nice live I must say). On that guitar is a FR so tuning everything up would be a bitch with it, so -> Bb. Personally that's the lowerst I would go.

I write totally different on that guitar though, so the riffing fits the tuning. Can't play most of our songs in Bb.

 

[Mattayus]

Yeah man that's the thing, you write differently depending on what tuning you're in, and I'm really comfortable in Bb, at least for the style of this band. I have a death metal project on the go that I will probably go to A/D standard for, it makes more sense to get the relentless sludginess out, but for this band which is more thrash orientated I'm gonna stick to Bb/Eb/Drop Db

 

[Full_Tilt]

Depends on the guitar and pups . Some low tunings sound better on different guitars . Its a pain in the back side tho when you feel you have it all sorted and then you go to play a piece of much older material where say your palm muting in a different area to normal and you realise everything is a compromise .
I have a cheapo Kelly P.S 67 ive owned for about 15 years with some old stock BC rich high output pups and quite a light set of strings at B standard that sounds good for chugging around the bottom of the neck (probably better than the others) but its a one trick pony I use for the slower deeper parts .
My other guitars are better at so much more but no where near as heavy in tone and have too much top end for the gear im using .

 

[Jordon]

Low tunings = slow? Tell that to Soilwork.

 

[Full_Tilt]

I wouldnt say low = slow but slow definitely sounds better low