Heaviness (was Re: Day job)

[Sean Costello]

tomg wrote:

> I didn't mean to sound like I was bragging, I really do know
> better. It's just something someone said, I thought it was
> funny. Pretty dammed heavy thought. The first time my wife
> heard any of it she screwed up her face and said "It sounds
> like a wall of noise to me." A lot of people are really
> going to hate this crap...probibly my wife too. She likes the
> stuff that sounds like songs (humph)...but I like to hurt things
> and record it. A little brain damage now and then is a good
> thing...%:-)

Try hurting things and making it sound like songs. I have found that the
more melody, catchiness, hooks, and general "songability" you add in one
direction, the more noise, distortion, feedback, and evil sludge you can
add in the other direction.  There are plenty of bands out there that
are heavier than the ones I've listed, but at some point it becomes
unlistenable.  It is very easy to be unlistenable; the trick is taking
previously unlistenable sounds and putting them in a song where they
become listenable.  Riding that edge is where the excitement comes from.

A few other choices:

- "Come to Daddy" by Aphex Twin.  Take "Jimi" by the Butthole Surfers,
and put audio-rate jungle drums in there.  Brilliant.
- "Acid Police" (pronounced "A-CID! PO-LI-SAY!!") by the Boredoms.

As far as sonic heaviness, it is a difficult quality to quantify. For
some people, sludginess defines heaviness: lots of bass energy, sloppy
attacks on the notes, somewhat chaotic (think guitars and bass tuned
down several tones, run through a nasty fuzz like a Big Muff or
Superfuzz; the Fuzz Face also generates this sort of sludginess, with
its characteristic sluggish attack response).  Other people want a
sharpened crispness for their heaviness, which requires instruments at
tighter tension, and distortion that emphasizes the attacks and clarity
of the notes.  

A common theme for heaviness seems to be a "notched-out" midrange, with
lots of bass and sizzling treble.  All of the really "huge" sounding
distortion boxes do this, and most "heavy" bands try to approach this
with EQ.  I wonder if this sort of frequency response approximates the
ear's frequency response to sounds above a certain decibel level. For
myself, full-wave rectification (or maybe a balanced modulator where the
input signal is the same as the modulation signal) emulates the sort of
intermodulation effects that the ear produces at high volumes - in other
words, the sort of "internal" distortion I heard at Metallica in 1988 or
Soundgarden in 1991.  Add a few high sine wave generators for the
tinnitus, and you're set!  (Fortunately, I haven't been to any loud
concerts in a year, and my tinnitus is fading - gotta take care of those
ears.)

OK, enough ranting from me.  I just REALLY used to love very very loud
and distorted music. Still do, in smaller doses.

Sean Costello