Death Metal Bands at the Rehearsal Space

Ask again nicely, and if they refuse go in and lay the biggest one out. They'll turn down.

Tom
 
I dunno. My guitarist is a tone nazi and he isn't confortable with his overdrive/ distortion/ crunch unless his amp is turned up to at least "3" (he has a line 6 bogner designed 100 w tube head driving a 4x12 mesa with 75w speakers). Even on "3", it's brutally loud to the point where he can't even hear the kicks. Of course, my bassist has to match him with his400 watt GK head and 2x15 mesa road ready cab and then my other guitarist has to crank his Marshall JCM 2000 half stack to balance it and then they want to slap a mic in front of the kick and pipe it through the PA. I don't understand why they just don't give up some "tone" and come down?? Excaserbating the fact is that our jam space is small and they are all facing their stacks directly at me, so I get the full force of their playing at point blank range. I just bring my shooting earmuffs and wear them at practice now (thank God!)

Practice facilities should all use this stuff:

http://www.quietsolution.com/QRock510_dsheet.pdf

it's like 40 bucks per 4x8 sheet. hangs like drywall, Works like a champ.
 
I dunno. My guitarist is a tone nazi and he isn't confortable with his overdrive/ distortion/ crunch unless his amp is turned up to at least "3" (he has a line 6 bogner designed 100 w tube head driving a 4x12 mesa with 75w speakers)...

Note my previous post. 20-40w is plenty to hang with a drummer, more than that is a carry-over from the days before effective PA systems, or for guys who want to play dead clean.
 
Note my previous post. 20-40w is plenty to hang with a drummer, more than that is a carry-over from the days before effective PA systems, or for guys who want to play dead clean.

For practice purposes, i agree. We've played several reputable venues down here in south florida that don't have good sound systems or any at all, so for those shows, a half stack is required. Problem is getting my guitarists to buy a smaller practice combo when they already have a half stack. I can just see it: "i don't need a dinky combo, i'm already turned down to 3!!!".
 
In my experience, it also seems to be the (death) metal drummers who are responsible for all the damage and wear to the practise kits at studios. Except for overtightening cymbal stands, lots of inexperienced drummers do that regardless of their genre. Expecting to find the kit exactly the way they left it a week (and several bands) later. Idiots...

I was in a metalcore band once, and I was (not to brag) the most experienced and technically proficient member, which gave me enough authority to make the guitarists turn down their amps and the low end of their sound (they sometimes would have the low end turned up high enough to make a big muddy mess combined with the bass player).
 
Being into Heavy Metal myself i can see the need to play loud but i do believe it is not a necessity if everyone can be heard at certain volumes. However death metal and extreme metal is way different. George Kolias once said if you don't use triggers in death metal you can't play cause no one can hear you and the bass drum plays a huge part in providing time for guitar players etc as people here have clearly pointed out. I see your frustration and we practice next door to a death metal band almost every Sunday and they are loud but i just think cool man they sound awesome. It actually inspires me to play as good as i can and then when i sit down to practice we do our thing and can't really here what's going on next door as we are taped up in doing what we do. I would say you should treat practices just like you should treat actual gigs so yes i think it is necessary for them to be that loud.
 
Hi I run a working cover band and rent a monthly rehearsal space for our practices I also use it for my own drumset workouts. These rooms are 10' x 20' and have the usual amout of sound bleed from other bands which is no big deal until the death metal band shows up. It's pretty obvious the drummer is micing both bass drums and running them through one or more sub woofers with the rest of the band turning up their volume to keep up. It's so loud the floor literally shakes when they are playing which leads to my rehearsals being cut short because we can't hear ourselves think. I've asked the band if they could turn down but pretty much get the response just deal with it, no co-opeation from the studio manager either all he cares about is that everyone pays their rent.

I just want to know is it really necessary for death metal drummers and bands to rehearse at this kind of volume? Maybe there is something I'm missing here, I had to leave my last rehearsal space because of a different death metal band doing the same thing, now it looks like I have to look for something else again.

Anyone else had this problem??

well he dosent need to mic his kit. there is seriously no reason for that.
 
George Kolias once said if you don't use triggers in death metal you can't play cause no one can hear you and the bass drum plays a huge part in providing time for guitar players

With all due respect to George, I would have to disagree with him on that one. Maybe if he replaced the words "Death Metal" with "when playing around 280 bpm", I would agree, but great Death Metal drumming doesn't have to be all about how fast you can move your feet. Death Metal can be groovy too :) I've always thought a lot of Death Metal drummers use double bass like a crutch.
 
With all due respect to George, I would have to disagree with him on that one. Maybe if he replaced the words "Death Metal" with "when playing around 280 bpm", I would agree, but great Death Metal drumming doesn't have to be all about how fast you can move your feet. Death Metal can be groovy too :) I've always thought a lot of Death Metal drummers use double bass like a crutch.

Agreed. My first thought was Don Tardy of Obituary, who isn't the fastest, but is a really groovy, solid player, and doesn't use triggers.
 
Agreed. My first thought was Don Tardy of Obituary, who isn't the fastest, but is a really groovy, solid player, and doesn't use triggers.

That's not the point that George made (George if you read this, correct me if I'm wrong). You can substitute "mic'ed bass drum with eq and a ton of compression" for "trigger" in his statement. You have a very special guitarist if he can play independent from what the drummer in the death metal band is playing and still stay perfectly in time. Death metal is about playing very quick and /or fast riffs on guitar but those punches are accented by double bass rolls 90% of the time. It is critical that the guitarist and drummer hear every minute detail. That's why triggers are ideal for death metal, the samples that are played are already eq'ed, gated, limited, and compressed so you can hear that clicking sound that articulates the kick pattern. If you don't have a lot of processing gear and a competent sound engineer, just slapping a mic in front of the bass might result in a low, undistinguishable rumble instead of a clean roll that you can pick out. When the whole band is playing at 200 bpm and riff out quick sixteenth note patterns, the last thing you want to do as a guitarist is play to a rumble. Again, my solution for the OP with his dilemma is an in-ear monitoring system. The only thing that needs to be in the monitor mix is kick+snare, then the whole band can turn way down.
 
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