Metal Reviews

This should definitely garner a little thinking. What are your personal favorite guitar tunings?

D.

But you have to be careful not to become a "chugga chugga" band that keeps playing lower chords all the time.

Standard, But i like both drop-d and drop-c. And i like the D#

Standard, then D#

My favorite to play in is EADGCF for consistency. You can play any chord anywhere on the fretboard. Memorizing melodies and playing leads is easier for me this way too. The extra tension makes the sound a little richer. Strings 42-32-22-17-11-8

EADGBE (standard) 42-32-22-17-11-9

F# (standard, but 2 steps higher) 42-32-22-17-11-9

D (46-36-26-20w-13-11)

Drop D (46-32-22-17-11-9)

standard

I forgot to mention nashville tuning, whatever the fuck that is, haven't tried it yet, but some of my favorite songs were done in that tuning.

standard and nothing else


surely that makes it harder to play chords anywhere on the fretboard coz you can't use your index finger as a bar accross all the frets if you raise the top 2 strings a semi tone ?

For the Nashville ( ) tuning, the high E and B string remain unchanged, while the G through low E string are tuned ONE OCTAVE HIGHER. You would probably have to get a set of strings made for a 12 string guitar, and just use the really light strings for that.

My favorite tuning is BEADF#B. Death metal forever!

I've been playing guitar since I was in primary school (around 8-10 y.o.) and I've never used anything else other than standard tuning. It's mostly because I've always hated tuning and hated anything that would mess my strings. Too late to change now.

I don't need that many chords. I stick with about five to ten of them and use those all over the place to get different sounds. I don't play the way anyone else does really. I really don't use more than three strings at a time playing chords. Sometimes four. I mean it is pretty easy to get any kind of sound that way for me due to what i've experimented with. I don't play using tabs or anything, I generally just play and try to get the feel right so that I can write my own stuff like that. The chords may not be right, but what I do play sounds kind of unique and interesting and it can be applied to my own ideas more easily than trying to copy someone elses. I basically play guitar Michael Schenker style, with three fingers.

standard for me , although occasionally drop D makes an appearance.

Standard. Its hard enough for me to remember where all the notes and chords are in standard tuning. If i changed tuning i would be even more lost

I tried to tune to that new standard tuning Fripp made up. Broke some strings and got mad. lol

Personally, my favorites are Eb, Ab, C#, F and Bb tuning. Eb C#, F and Ab just naturally have a cool sound to them IMO. And Bb (particularly Bb minor) has this romantic/sexy sound to it.

ok...see what you mean now. But you can't play any chord anywhere on the neck. I mean you can't even play 7th chords or anything. you can pretty much play triads and power chords. Bit of an over exaggeration.

Standard, anything else fuxx up my fretboard mind.

Yeah, I can also make up chords like voivod or double notes and do some strange stuff.

Standards the best. I like D# and D as well but even at D by bass strings are loose and start flapping. Loose strings are great to play on your fingering hand as it is soft, but it fucks up my picking hand cos of the looseness. I hate galloping on loose strings. My friends told me to intonate my strings to D, but then I'll fucking blister my fingers if I wanted to play anything on E after that.

Chimin' in on this one.....I have always preferred standard tunings but with the band I play in, we tune down a half-step to E flat to put less strain on our singer's voice. A few bands tune that way in the studio (Van Halen, Kiss, Motorhead etc.) and many do live (including Rush). Lately, I've been experimenting with drop D tuning on the low E (which is used to death by many "modern" bands including ugh! Nickelback). It does allow for some really cool sounds though. Ozzy's No More Tears is tuned that way. My band is also doing some Black Label Society stuff (Funeral Bell and Suffering Overdue) that tunes the low E down to B....that....is very cool and allows for a really heavy groove. I've been writing some cool stuff with that tuning as well.

drop c