Nail the ToneMetallica

Nothing Else Matters

Metallica · Metallica (The Black Album) · 1991

Most of the song's rhythm part is a very clean electric — Hetfield said in 1991 that he cut it on a Tom Anderson electric, recorded as two clean signals, one through an amp and one straight into the board, with a Guild 12-string acoustic doubling the choruses. Keep the neck pickup, no dirt, mids up rather than scooped, and just a touch of reverb so the open strings stay distinct. The heavy sections later in the song come from his album rhythm rig: the Mesa Simul-Class Mark II blended with Bob Rock's Jose-modded Marshall.

Where these numbers come from: worked out from the documented rig and the sound of the record

Tuning

Standard tuning, no capo

Standard tuning; Hetfield said the choruses were doubled with a jumbo Guild 12-string acoustic with its high E tuned down to D for a fuller sound.

Part: Rhythm

Guitar

  • Tom Anderson Pro Am · single-coil (Anderson) · neck pickup (inferred)
  • Guild jumbo 12-string acoustic
  • Gretsch White Falcon · Filter'Tron · neck pickup (inferred)

Amp

Mesa/Boogie Simul-Class Mark IIC+ (clean channel)

GAIN
3.0
BASS
4.0
MID
6.0
TREBLE
6.5
PRESENCE
4.0
REVERB
2.5

Hetfield said the clean part was cut as two very clean signals, one through an amp and one direct into the board, so half the recorded sound is a DI; blend an amp track with a direct/clean track if you can. He named the Simul-Class Mark II as his album amp, but did not name which amp took the clean signal on this track.

Amp

Jose Arredondo-modified Marshall (Bob Rock's) blended with the Mesa

GAIN
8.0
BASS
4.0
MID
5.0
TREBLE
7.0
PRESENCE
6.0
REVERB
0.0

For the heavy chorus/outro sections, Bob Rock blended his Jose-modded Marshall with Hetfield's Mesa to put mids back into the tone; accounts of the Mesa differ, as Rock has said in recent years it was a Mark III while Hetfield's 1991 interview and session photos point to the Mark IIC++ (with a Mark IV also present).

Pedals

  • Aphex EQF-2 · rack EQ (amp loop) · narrow cut around 1.2 kHz on the rhythm tone
  • Aphex CX-1 · rack compressor (amp loop) · light, for evenness

Tone character

glassy clean, no dirt · chimey top end · compressed and even · controlled low end · mid-forward heavy sections

easy

Fingerpicked open-string Em arpeggios in one hand position — easy shapes, but the notes have to ring evenly and quietly, and the later heavy sections need clean palm-muted power chords.

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Sources