Frustrated with Drop B tuning on the MKIV

[kenkamm]

Hello,

I have a MK IV (an "a" I'm pretty sure based on what I've read here on the forum.) I play hard rock and some metal. I love the sound of the MK IV. However recently I decided to get another guitar and set it up with heavy strings for Drop B tuning, so I could play some Chevelle, Breaking Benjamin, etc.

The problem - the amp sounds great on standard tuning or Drop D. But tuned down to Drop B, it sounds terrible. It sounds overly boomy, muddy, and harsh instead of tight. A Drop D open chord sounds very nice, with a warm, textured distortion but still enough high end for a good "chuh-chuh-chuh" palm mute sound. Drop B sounds messy and loose. The higher frequencies sound harsh and abrasive yet the palm muting just results in "thud thud thud."

I have two of the same guitar, with the same Seymour Duncan SH-6Bs for bridge pickups, one tuned to drop D and one Drop B, so it's easy to compare the sounds.

At first I tried a set of strings that was too loose - the bottom string was a 56, and it flopped around like a wet noodle. I just picked up a set of ghs boomers which have a 60 for the bottom string. That helped, maybe a little, but it still sounds like crap.

I have tried going back to standard strings and tuning on this guitar, and it sounded fine. So I'm pretty sure the guitar isn't the problem.

Are there some recommended settings for this amp for Drop tuning? I have experimented with different settings for several hours now, and just can't get the distortion sound to "clean" up, if you guys know what I mean.

I do tend to play a lot in my house, at lower volumes, if that makes any difference.

Thanks,
Ken

 

[iFreedom]

Hello,

I have a MK IV (an "a" I'm pretty sure based on what I've read here on the forum.) I play hard rock and some metal. I love the sound of the MK IV. However recently I decided to get another guitar and set it up with heavy strings for Drop B tuning, so I could play some Chevelle, Breaking Benjamin, etc.

The problem - the amp sounds great on standard tuning or Drop D. But tuned down to Drop B, it sounds terrible. It sounds overly boomy, muddy, and harsh instead of tight. A Drop D open chord sounds very nice, with a warm, textured distortion but still enough high end for a good "chuh-chuh-chuh" palm mute sound. Drop B sounds messy and loose. The higher frequencies sound harsh and abrasive yet the palm muting just results in "thud thud thud."

I have two of the same guitar, with the same Seymour Duncan SH-6Bs for bridge pickups, one tuned to drop D and one Drop B, so it's easy to compare the sounds.

At first I tried a set of strings that was too loose - the bottom string was a 56, and it flopped around like a wet noodle. I just picked up a set of ghs boomers which have a 60 for the bottom string. That helped, maybe a little, but it still sounds like crap.

I have tried going back to standard strings and tuning on this guitar, and it sounded fine. So I'm pretty sure the guitar isn't the problem.

Are there some recommended settings for this amp for Drop tuning? I have experimented with different settings for several hours now, and just can't get the distortion sound to "clean" up, if you guys know what I mean.

I do tend to play a lot in my house, at lower volumes, if that makes any difference.

Thanks,
Ken

I play c tuning on my mark v in mark iv setting and it's pretty tight using emg's. And I use 10's for strings. I found the heavier the string the muddier it gets.
What I've noticed is playing dropped tuning requires a different type of playing especially with really loose strings. I use the same setup that JP has on his mark V (see one of the recent mark V postings it has a pic of his mark iv channel setup) and I'm happy with the tightness. But, it takes practice to make it tight.

Sorry, probably not much help, but it may not be your gear.

 

[dylan7620]

I'm running my 7 string tuned standard (aka B) and it sounds great. gain and drive both set to 7 (both pulled) treble @ about 8, bass and mids around 3.5 w/ presence @ around 7. pretty standard V on the eq, nothing extreme. what are your settings?

 

[tony777]

Rule of thumb on mark series amps when playing with a lot of gain, is to dial the bass knob very low, and increase the graphic eq for more bottom end.
There are many gain stages in the mark series that amplifies the signal over and over, so if you dial the bass knob high, it gets flubby, however, the graphic eq is positioned after the preamp and will not produce that extra boom.

 

[kenkamm]

Thanks for all the advice. Here are my settings.

Lead gain 6-7 pull, seems to work best with the Duncan pickup.
Lead treble 5
Lead bass 3-4
Lead mid 5
Lead drive 6 (neither in or out seems to make a good sound but both work fine with Drop D.)
Lead presence 4, pull.
Lead volume 3
GEQ standard V pattern, but have tried several settings to try to clean it up to no avail.
Overall volume setting around 1.5 to 2. I play about as quiet as I can, to keep the neighbors from yelling.

With E standard or Drop D, it sounds delightful. Wonderful texture to the distortion, not boomy but still full, not harsh on the higher frequencies.

As soon as I plug in my Drop B guitar, the texture goes away and is replaced by mud, while at the same time, sounding harsh on the high frequencies.

You know what it sounds like? A cheap transistor amp with a big speaker. IF I strike the open chord very lightly, it sounds only slightly better but still not great. If I fret at the 3rd fret or above, it starts to sound pretty decent. But an open chord just sounds like a garbage truck going by while dragging metal garbage cans!

I have tried adjusting the volume knob on the guitar, and the guitar tone knob, and have varied the height of the pickup. Nothing seems to work.

Tonight I will try to get some recordings and post them here.

Thanks again,
Ken

 

[screamingdaisy]

Try pulling your bass knob back to 2 or below, then add the bass back in with the sliders on the EQ.

Also, and this may seem counter productive at first since you're dealing with harsh high frequencies, but try running your treble up a bit higher... say somewhere around 7 or 8.

 

[stephen sawall]

Welcome to the forum

Like said above redo your bass setting. I can tell you the problem probably is the speakers or the cab you use. It also may be the guitar. Play the guitar without plugging it in to see if that is it. If you do not have the master near 2 or higher you may have problems keeping it tight. As it takes some power to reproduce the lower you go.

 

[kenkamm]

Thanks. I will certainly try all your suggestions. One question regarding the bass setting. If I turn the bass knob down, it's filtering bass out of the earlier stages. Then if I boost the bass on the GEQ, isn't it trying to boost a signal that's been attenuated up stream? Maybe I'm thinking about this too hard...

Would there be any merit to trying a Boss GE7 EQ to get a little more control?

 

[screamingdaisy]

Thanks. I will certainly try all your suggestions. One question regarding the bass setting. If I turn the bass knob down, it's filtering bass out of the earlier stages. Then if I boost the bass on the GEQ, isn't it trying to boost a signal that's been attenuated up stream?

Yes.

Here's the thing.... I don't remember the exact preamp layout, but the regular EQ's are located prior to all of the gain stages. The more bass you try to stuff down those gain stages, the more messy and exagerated the bass sounds. Attenuating the bass prior to the gain reduces this, and gives you a cleaner distortion, however it can sound a touch thin, particularily if you're not cranking your amplifier. This is where the graphic EQ comes in. The graphic EQ will allow you to take that nice tight bass and boost it back up to where you want it. This can be particularily useful for low volume players since they can't rely on blasting the hell out of their speakers to fill in the bottom end.

Would there be any merit to trying a Boss GE7 EQ to get a little more control?

Not really. You'd be more or less acomplishing the same thing, but using something different to accomplish it.

 

[zebpedersen]

The Rectifiers were designed with drop-tunings in mind and voiced accordingly. A Mark Series, particularly the IV, is designed with jazz, blues, rock, country..... in mind. Yes, it can do drop-tuned metal (just ask Lamb of God, Metallica...and even Petrucci with a 7 string) but is it just me that thinks drop B is perhaps just a step too far for this amp?

Your bass, gain and drive are key here, and none are that close to being full-up at all - I really think you should consider a different amp, particularly seeing as you've only listed here the settings for your lead channel, it's clearly the gain that you seek, and a dual- or triple-Recto will give it to you in spades, whereas this Mark is struggling to do a job it just wasn't designed to do.

 

[kenkamm]

I only listed the settings for the lead channel because that's my concern here... I'm talking about heavy rock with distortion. If I should be focusing on Rhy2, by all means let me know!

Is drop b too much for this amp? I don't know, but I have read a lot of success stories regarding the use of this amp for drop b. Searched this very forum and found some positive comments, and googled and found many more. It's fairly widely published that Chevelle's amp of choice is the Mark IV, and they are all about the dropped tunings. Now, this amp is fairly configurable, and everyone's setup is different. Just because Pete Loeffler uses a Mark IV doesn't mean I can... heck I know he wouldn't be using a 1x12 combo, but I was hoping there was a setup in there somewhere that would yield a good sound. I'm not even looking for bone crushing distortion. It seems the sound I'm after isn't all about gain, but a balance which produces a thick textured sound, not necessarily fuzzy with lots of sizzle.

Even though I've gone up to a 60 on the low string, it still moves around a lot compared to the other strings. I've read that Loeffler uses a 72, but that might be for drop A#. Still, I don't know if I should try something heavier than 60; I know some people seem to be using as low as 52 or 54. I suspect that the low string flopping around might be part of my issue. Also maybe my technique just sucks. I'm not an expert player. Just above novice, I would say.

 

[tony777]

The Rectifiers were designed with drop-tunings in mind and voiced accordingly. A Mark Series, particularly the IV, is designed with jazz, blues, rock, country..... in mind. Yes, it can do drop-tuned metal (just ask Lamb of God, Metallica...and even Petrucci with a 7 string) but is it just me that thinks drop B is perhaps just a step too far for this amp?

Your bass, gain and drive are key here, and none are that close to being full-up at all - I really think you should consider a different amp, particularly seeing as you've only listed here the settings for your lead channel, it's clearly the gain that you seek, and a dual- or triple-Recto will give it to you in spades, whereas this Mark is struggling to do a job it just wasn't designed to do.

This is the biggest nonsense I have ever read on this forum. My MKIV can do my baritone with drop G tight as hell with tons of distortion, a recto can never be as tight as a mark amp.
Raise your treble and lower your bass, then add the bottom end you need on your GEQ.

 

[Fronzil]

The Rectifiers were designed with drop-tunings in mind and voiced accordingly. A Mark Series, particularly the IV, is designed with jazz, blues, rock, country..... in mind. Yes, it can do drop-tuned metal (just ask Lamb of God, Metallica...and even Petrucci with a 7 string) but is it just me that thinks drop B is perhaps just a step too far for this amp?

Your bass, gain and drive are key here, and none are that close to being full-up at all - I really think you should consider a different amp, particularly seeing as you've only listed here the settings for your lead channel, it's clearly the gain that you seek, and a dual- or triple-Recto will give it to you in spades, whereas this Mark is struggling to do a job it just wasn't designed to do.

This is the biggest nonsense I have ever read on this forum. My MKIV can do my baritone with drop G tight as hell with tons of distortion, a recto can never be as tight as a mark amp.
Raise your treble and lower your bass, then add the bottom end you need on your GEQ.

QFT.

 

[screamingdaisy]

The Rectifiers were designed with drop-tunings in mind and voiced accordingly. A Mark Series, particularly the IV, is designed with jazz, blues, rock, country..... in mind. Yes, it can do drop-tuned metal (just ask Lamb of God, Metallica...and even Petrucci with a 7 string) but is it just me that thinks drop B is perhaps just a step too far for this amp?

The Rectifier was designed for hair metal. No one really used it for drop tunings until Korn came along two years after it was first released, and by then Mesa was already producing the final Dual Rectifier revision. I don't buy the theory that Mesa voiced the 2 channel Duals for grunge or detuned metal... I think it was a fluke and they lucked out.

 

[stephen sawall]

I own a Mark IV and a Tremoverb. Both from the first run. Both original owner. The Mark IV blows away the Tremoverb for keeping low tunings tight. I would take a IV over a Rectifier any day for low tunings.

The treble, mid and bass are all full range controls with a different center. The whole spectrum comes threw all of them. You can turn the bass off and quite a bit comes thru. 0ff - 3 is where you want to be to keep it tight. You can get a ton of low end with the EQ with it set this way.

It your guitar does not sound tight unplugged it well never sound tight plugged in.

If it is not your guitar I think it is your amp and cab. I well bet it is the speaker and cab. What speaker and cab do you use ?

 

[kenkamm]

Thanks again for all the help everyone, I really appreciate it!

You mentioned that if the guitar doesn't sound tight unplugged then it won't sound tight plugged in. Well, that certainly is part of my problem. Unplugged, I can hear and see that the low string is muddying things up by moving around a lot compared to the 4 and 5 strings. How does a 7-string use a .054 or so and not be completely loose, when I'm already up to .060 and that string is still flopping around?

The amp is a 1 x 12 combo (I don't think it's the widebody) with the Black Shadow Electro-Voice. The speaker also says "Mesa" on it. I'm not opposed to changing the speaker or even turning this into a head and using a separate cabinet. I'm all ears.

I've played around with the tone and EQ settings as suggested in this thread, and seen some improvement for sure, so thanks very much. That said, it still sounds muddy and loose compared to my other guitar, which is identical except tuned to Drop D (and strung accordingly.)

It seems that I might be used to playing my other guitar, which allows a bit more aggression on the strings before it turns into mushy noise...

With the Drop B setup, the bottom string is quite loose, despite the heavy .060 string. All the other strings are fine. It seems to pretty much require some level of palm muting at all times, to keep that string in check and keep it sounding "tight." Is that normal? As I said before I am just above the novice level, I think, so some of these techniques are not quite natural to me yet.

Thanks again everyone,
Ken

 

[screamingdaisy]

I prefer 25.5 inch scale guitars for down tuning... Strats, Ibanez, guitars like that.

24.75 inch (like most Gibsons) leaves the strings feeling looser. That said, plenty of dudes use downtuned SGs and they seem to do alright.

 

[kenkamm]

I'm using a Schecter with a 25.5" scale... but that .060 string is still floppy at Drop B. :?

 

[stephen sawall]

A open back cab is not very tight. I recommend taking both guitars and your amp to try out some different cabs. 2x12 and 4x12. This should make a big difference. The lower you go the more problems you well have.

 

[Fronzil]

ya get a closed back 2x12 or 4x12 recto cab..holds that low end in like no other.