how to get that 90's INDUSTRIAL GUITAR TONE

hi guys! Just wanted to clarify that I wasn't trying to replicate any particular tone. I wanted to create a tone that sounds 90's and that is accessible for everybody, taking bits and pieces of known bands setup! I almost went the ZOOM9030 way but I might keep it for another video ;) hehe I'm curious, let me know what you guys are using!

The go-to trick we used to make huge 80s/90s guitars was a reverb with a massive size, but super short tail. You shouldn't hear the tail at all, really. Usually we had cheap crappy verb rack mount units, not high end one's. And if the verb couldn't shut down the tail fast enough you could use a gate, but those can get very chattery easily so better to do it on the verb itself. After you dial in the "big", add tone color and character by adjusting other parameters on the verb. Honestly, almost everybody had low end affordable gear and all of it could get you pretty much any tone you wanted. Don't get hung up on what the gear was... go for the production technique instead and explore the tonal ranges.

Oh baby, I'm gonna make sounds like it's 1994 all over again!

Sick! I could almost hear George Bush Sr. talking about the need world order

This has been my favourite type of metal since I was a teen in the '90's. You really nailed the vibe. I would love to hear your take on the industrial metal in the style of early Fear Factory and Strapping Young Lad.

MINISTRY N*W*O!! Great video man!! Thumbs up!!

Holy crap you posted this literally the day I needed it! You're amazing haha thanks a bunch for this payload of info

That guitar sound instantly reminded me of some early Rammstein songs. Well done, even without a Triple Rectifier type plugin.

Fuck I miss Industrial Metal. Rammstein, Manson and Ministry are the 3 bands that really got me into Metal.

The video I was waiting for! 🤘

You can’t go wrong with a Tone 21 product like the SandAmp GT-2. I had one for years since I couldn’t afford an amp, and couldn’t make the noise/gain a highly driven tube amp needs to sound good. I wound up selling it a few years back For a while now, I’ve been using the amp sim in Logic 9. I love that you can pick out the speakers and the cabinet. But now I picked up a small tube now, and I have a JHS distortion pedal, and it’s an absolute beast.

I got my rackmount Marshall JMP-1 around 2000 I believe, and still have it. You nailed it, thanks for putting this great video together.

Very cool video!

Ha. Very good. I was missing some lows/low mids in the final mix of everything, but you definitely dialed in the aggression. I was opening for, or mingling with, a lot of the bands in that scene when they came through NYC in the 90s. From what I observed or asked about: Ministry was definitely big on that JMP. Without any cabinet. Just direct into the board. At least on the recordings. Rammstein was a mix - Richard used guitars with EMGs into a Dual Rectifier and Paul used guitars with passive pickups into a SansAmp. I think that specific combo (especially when Paul went fully to Les Pauls) is a big component of their guitar sound. NIN and Manson (because Trent produced the Manson albums with those tones) used various amps (often Marshall 800s or 900s, and JMPs) but did a lot of signal shaping with pedals or post-processing. Some of the huge tones (like on Suck) came from tracking the guitars at double-speed (tape) an octave above the part. When you slowed the tape back down, the parts were back at the right octave, but the timbre was brutal and huge. KMFDM was passive pickups originally into a Soldano SLO100, and later a Mesa Triple Rectifier. I should also note the guitars that showed up a lot were (but not always) Gibsons of that time period, especially Les Pauls. The 498T bridge humbucker gives a particularly bright, aggressive sound, and when you combine it with the maple top on (most) Les Pauls of the time, it really has teeth and makes “that tone” easier to get. It’s a funny thing. I have spent a lot of time trying to dial up tones like that in the box, and I’ve had pretty good success, but last month I plugged my 90s Les Paul into my SansAmp PSA-1 -> Rocktron Solid-State PowerAmp -> Cabinet with Vintage 30s, and that sound was still RIGHT THERE. A big cheat is taking that Rackmount SansAmp unit (which you can get in plug-in form), going to preset 46 (Pantera), and dialing it a little (more low end, maybe less shrill). That will get you there quickly too.

The tone on the guitars in these type of albums is lots of layers of super thin and fizzy guitar , the key to the heavy part of the sound is lots of layered bass synths ( That's the heavy sound and thump you hear and love ) . Even the bass guitar is way back in the mix , again with layers and layers of bass synths over the top of the bass guitar .

Great job man. I appreciate you taking the time to watch all of the videos, documentaries and interviews to find this info. I’m a huge fan of the Nails, Ministry and Manson guitar sound. And like you mentioned in the beginning of the video, a lot of the times they’d go direct through a pedal. No amp. To get that tin and tearing sound. Great job, I’m going to look into that amp sim.

That song has been my wake-up alarm for over a decade. Gets me up everytime.

DARUDE - SANDSTORM

Ive always loved the early Ministry sound. Excellent upload even though I only use real amps so I cant use any of the ideas.

Think my favorite tone from this era was Demanufacture by Fear Factory