How to Dial in a Metal Tone with Amped 2

If you’re striving to create a great metal tone, there are a few simple steps you can follow to get some great results. A great metal guitar tone should be tight, high gain, articulate but heavy!

When it comes to metal, there are two types of tone voicings that are useful to know. You have an American voicing which has pronounced lows and highs and a scooped mid, or a British metal sound which has more mid range and more of a classic overall tone.

In this lesson we’re going to learn how to dial in a great metal tone with the Amped 2 that you can use to start crafting your perfect metal tone.

Amplifier

For metal guitar tones, the 6L6 tube is hard to beat in the power amp response section. This tube choice naturally has a slightly scooped midrange and an overall tighter sound.

EQ wise, you don’t have any do anything crazy, keeping things around 1 or 2 o clock works well and you can use the midrange control set lower for a scooped American sound or higher for a British sound. The Classic voice has the most gain available so that is the most logical choice here.

Reverb

Metal riffs aren’t known for their reverb layers so if you want to use any reverb, keep it subtle. The best reverb type for metal is a Plate reverb. This will give your sound more of a polished studio feel.

Drive

You can use a drive pedal to hit the front end of your amp harder and help tighten things up. Choose the Drive option (Boost will also work great), set the drive to 0 and the level to 10 and use the Tone to taste. This will tighten up the amp signal, shave a little low end off and just add some articulation.

Modulation

Modulation is usually reserved for clean parts in metal, but Chorus set very subtly can actually give you a thicker, wider tone. In a live situation, for a solo guitarist, this can create a similar sound to double tracked guitars. It also helps thicken up single note runs for solos.

Delay

In metal, delay often just appears in lead guitar or ambient segments. A linear delay will give you a crisp, digital repeat. This is a useful delay setting for thickening up and adding some character to any lead guitar lines. This also stacks well with the chorus for the ultimate 80s metal tone.

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About the Author

This article on how to dial in a metal tone was written by Leigh Fuge. Leigh is a professional guitarist and content creator and also works alongside musicteacher.com to create guitar focused, educational and entertainment content.

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