Drop D and low tunings

[mesa115]

I was asked a question recently that I'm sure my fellow Mesa Boogie lovers will be able to answer for me.

Who was the first band/guitarist to really make this ( drop D or drop c, low tunings) popular. I was thinking Korn, or LimpBizkit, but that was 7 string guitars, my guess was GodSmack.

Can anybody fill me in on the history of this?

 

[vulture2600]

godsmack? no way!!
soundgarden has been using drop d (i dont know about C) since 1984!
as far as drpp c, i dont know off the top of my head.
good trivia!

 

[mesa115]

Cool,

The guitar geek site also reminded me about Soundgarden.

Thanks!

 

[screamingdaisy]

Who was the first band/guitarist to really make this ( drop D or drop c, low tunings) popular.

Black Sabbath (C#, F#, B, E, G#, C#)

Kim Thayil (Soundgarden) was taught the drop D thing by King Buzzo (Melvins)....I don't know who King Buzzo learned it from.

I suspect it came from slide players dropping the low E so they could use the slide to barre a chord on the bottom three strings, but that's just a guess.

 

[Inearthed]

You guys aren't reading his question properly. "Who was the first band/guitarist to really make this ( drop D or drop c, low tunings) popular." I'm sure that tons of folks have been using these alternate tunings for years but there are specific groups or styles of music that have really made these alternate tunings popular. So these guys are definitely not the first people to use the said tunings.

If this is all concerning the general public... Here are my answers.

For tunings like drop D, I'd have to say alternative rock / grunge bands from the early 90's were the ones to really popularize that tuning.

For tuning down a ton of steps you could probably say Black Sabbath but I think it never really got immensely popular until bands like Korn / other nu metal came along

The seven string guitar was made popular by Korn, when in reality they could've accomplished what they were doing just by tuning down.

 

[screamingdaisy]

The seven string guitar was made popular by Korn, when in reality they could've accomplished what they were doing just by tuning down.

I dissagree.

There's a fair number of Korn songs that require both the top and bottom strings. Simply tuning a six-string down to A doesn't cut it.....trust me, I've tried.

 

[mrdylan]

Drop D is definately Soundgarden / Alice in Chains that whole seattle movement was using drop D like crazy I am sure they all learned from each other.

Pantera also used drop D years ago as well still not as far back as Soundgarden though.

Most heavier bands and even Motley Crue were using half a step down right from 1981 and Sabbath did alot of downtuning as well but that was more for Ozzys voice as he couldn't hit the notes back then I have seen them actually say this.

 

[axwielding1]

I must chime in here... I agree that the grunge movement in the early 90's made drop D tuning popular. But... Eddie Van Halen is the guy who made it cool originally, just not many picked it up back in 1978...
Jerry Cantrell actually took lessons from EVH, and picked up on the drop D tuning, and figured out how to use it properly. Kim Thayill has done it for years. Godsmack was formed as basically an offshoot of the AIC tone.
So, EVH was the guy to use it first, then the grunge movement picked up on the heaviness of it and made it popular...
I must also say that the earliest guy I can think of to use low tuning was Albert King. His V tuned to C was amazing, given the time it was done. Many guys were influenced by his tone through the years, so through his influence, many used it. However, in a modern sense, Black Sabbath are the first to use it in a hard rock venue, because of the Iommi accident of lopping off the tips of his fingers, making it difficult to bend strings. So the lower tuning was to facilitate bends, but added a real heavey tone to their music, giving them an original sound from other bands through the 70's.
So, I would say they made low tuning popular....
ax. :twisted:

 

[leftyjackson]

COC - drop C?

 

[MrMason]

...Sabbath did alot of downtuning as well but that was more for Ozzys voice as he couldn't hit the notes back then I have seen them actually say this.

I don't know who said that, but the REAL reason is because Tony Iommi got the tips of 3 of his fretting hand fingers cut off right before forming Black Sabbath. He made prosthetic finger-tips (because they didn't exist, he had to make them himself), and the only way he could play with them was by downtuning. Iommi said this in an issue of Guitar Player last year.
EDIT: Also, if you try to play anything Ozzy did with Randy Rhoads, you'll notice Randy was in standard tuning. And Iommi played tuned down half a step with Dio too, and Vivian Campbell played in standard tuning when Dio left Sabbath.

 

[stompboxfreak72]

Motly Crue " Shout at the Devil " from 1983 is loaded with drop C songs as is their first CD Too Fast For Love.

They certainly did not invent the idea but they were a good 15 years before Godsmack.

 

[MrMason]

It's not Drop D or anything like that, but Hendrix also played mostly a half step down from standard.

 

[RJ2213]

and 7strings have been used by morbid angel since there early days. dream theater was using 7strings in 1994, thats before anyone knew who korn was. and of course, lets not forget Vai, once again way before korn's popularity. and Macabre has also been using 7strings since i think the mid 90's. i'm sure i'm forgetting alot of others.

point is, it doesnt need to be on the radio to be popular, in the context of the 7string, these guys are the ones that first made it popular, korn and limp biskit made it commercial and a fad.

 

[RJ2213]

and i believe Death was using D tuning(not dropped D) since there first cd. and dont get me started on bands like Carcass or Entombed or Grave or Candlemass.

 

[lailer75]

for the "drop" tuning the first band that comes to my mind is Metallica Garage Days re-revisited. the small hours, oh so heavy!!!

 

[Sustain]

S.O.D.

march of the stormtroopers of death / Sgt. D

These 2 songs are by far the most popular drop D songs ever known to mankind, and influenced every artist before and after the recording of these songs, famous artists dating back to michelangelo, world leaders everywhere, the reptile people from the 10th planet who will return in 2012 playing S.O.D. on giant speaker-ships, the atlanteans, even satan himself.

And the rest of it was tuned standard. Like it should be.

Down with fake-heavy. You dont need to tune down to be heavy.

This is of course all my personal opinion, which has a worth of billions of dollars on the internet, except for the part about S.O.D. above, which is 100% undeniable unrefutable truth from gods own mouth.


\m/

 

[loki]

It was Tommy Iommy actually..

In his early years he was working in a factory and had an accident with some machinary which severed two of his fingertips.. he had fake tips put his fingers and worked out that he could play powerchords easily by "drop tuning" the E string.

Cool hey?! What a dude!

 

[Sustain]

Tony Iommi and Sabbath dont drop D.

they tune down like a half step or a step.

besides, if he dropped D he wouldnt have needed his 2 fingers back, would he.

 

[Sentinelsf]

Eddie Van Halen used Drop-D on "Unchained" (1981) - I guess he was probably another early user. Also - he developed the mechanism on the Floyd that allows quick Drop-D via the "Drop-D Tuna".

 

[mikey383]

Dropped D dates back centuries to classical guitar.

Tuning down isn't anything new either. Country/western songs have been using baritone guitars (tuned to B or lower) since the 40s and 50s. In the 60s, CCR used C and D tunings dubbed over E tunings on a lot of their songs.

1/2 step down has been done for decades also. A Strat feels better tuned down a 1/2 step.

Iommi tuned down to C on "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath" to facilitate Ozzy's singing on that song.

As for making Dropped D popular like it is today, I say it came around in the late 90s, early 2000 with AIC's last studio album, Creed, and Sevendust.