MARTEN HAGSTROM
&
FREDRIK
THORDENDAL
Undoubtedly, this is some of the
WEIRDIST stuff I've ever heard! :-) I say this
in praise. This is true musician's metal! If you're looking for extreme heavy
metal where EVERYTHING is in odd-time signatures, odd-phrasing, & polyrhythms out the ying-yang... look no further because this is it!!! Upon hearing Meshuggah's newest release, Chaosphere, my ears perked up with utter bewilderment! The sheer strangeness of their sound will make you think "How the hell did they come up with stuff?"
Meshuggah's Unique Polyrhythm Technique: Imagine 4 bars of 4/4 time, it equals 16 beats, right? While the drums keep a 4/4 time, the guitar will play an odd-phrased riff. For example, they'll split up those 16 beats into a 5/4 bar, 4/4 bar, & finish off w/ a 7/4 bar to bring it back full-circle. It's strange as hell, but this piece of ear-candy will leave you wanting more!
Instead of doing the same old, re-hashed metal
licks that many acts do, this Swedish guitar-duo, (Marten Hagstrom & Fredrik Thordendal)
have come up with a very unique style all their
own. With twin 7-strings tuned in Low B flat,
their angular riffage and solo work will have
you're head spinning from the abuse it indures. Warning: It'll take some getting used to...but worth it!
Marten & Fredrik both use stock Ibanez Universes though they both wax the coils of their bridge pickups to reduce output.
Their amp systems are very complicated. Both rely on Marshall Valvestate 8200 stereo 100-watt heads w/ Marshall 4X12 1960A cabs onstage (Thordendal prefers Mesa/Boogie Dual Rectifiers in the studio). They cut the amp's midrange entirely while adding some Contour control to increase definition.
Hagstrom's setup:
Hagstrom send his guitar (fitted w/ D'Addario strings .009-.052) to an A/B box: his crunch rhythm sound goes to a t.c. electronics Booster/Line Driver into the amp, where it's sent through the amp's "series mono" effects loop to a Behringer Intelligate & a Kawai rack mixer, where Hagstrom adjusts the levels, pans the rhythm sound hard left & returns it to the mono effects loop, where he exploits the Marshall's hi-gain-channel. "My clean sound, on the other hand, is in stereo," he adds. "It goes from the splitter into an ART FXR Elite multi-processor for stereo chorus, then into the Kawai rack mixer, where I process it w/ different stereo delays from the auxiliary channel, & that signal is sent back to the parallel stereo return on the amp's effects loop."
Thordendal's setup:
This one's more complicated! His guitar (fitted w/ GHS strings) is sent through a Nady 201 XL series wireless unit, then to an A/B box. Signal A--his crunch rhythm tone--passes through a t.c. electronics preamp before hitting the Marshall amp; through the Marshall's effects loop the rhythm sound is treted by a Symmetrix 544 Quad Expander/Gate & retured in mono. Signal B--his Holdsworth-inspired lead tone--passes through a t.c. electronics Booster/Line Driver on its way to a Mesa/Boogie 50 Caliber+ amp, w/ a t.c. electronics 1140 parametric EQ/preamp hooked up through the amp's effects loop The Boogie's speaker output is sent to a Roctron Signature Series Juice Extractor, a Symmetrix 544 Quad Expander/Gate, a custom-modified Yamaha breath controller, and an ADA STD-1 sereo delay unit, before being attenuated by a Rocktron G612 line mixer, & sent back to the Marshall amp in stereo. The amp's stereo speaker outputs harness a pair of Marshall 1960A 4X12 cabs loaded w/ Celestion 75s.
Did you get all that? :-)
Be sure to also check out their new monthly lesson article in Guitar World Magazine entitled "Tempo Mental." (I couldn't have said it better myself.)
Other albums to check out:
None
Contradictions Collapse
Destroy, Erase, Improve
True Human Design
Explore more 7-string
players!
Back to
Homepage
The Official Meshuggah Website"