Tbf I'd say there isn't one mastermind behind Meshuggah as the writing is split fairly evenly between a number of the members, and it kinda depends on the album. Also necrobump haha!
Fredrick writes most the music except on the new one where dick wrote the majority. Tomas has rythmic(i cant spell) ideas that he programs guitars on. Lyrics are usually done by tomas. Sometimes mårten on his own songs does his own lyrics (ivory tower, demiurge, nebulous). But fredrick is pretty much the brain music wise. And lyrics are usually tomas
@@OHBJJ9634 That's actually a very common misconception. For their first and second records (contradictions collapse and dei) he did quite a lot of the writing and he often would split the writing duties with Jens, but every record since they've split it fairly evenly between him and Mårten. Tomas usually writes at least song per record as well. Tomas writes all the lyrics. Jens just comes in and him and tomas piece the lyrics together. On the latest record, fred did no writing at all. Dick and tomas came together and co wrote 6 tunes together. Mårten came in and wrote 4 of them.
"There's nothing intricate about it as far as the bars and like the time signature goes (4/4) - it's the polyrhythmic stuff, how it moves...and how it doesn't always come to the same place every time it moves over." The genius of this approach is that they're dividing their notes which in sum total are multiples of 4/4 into odd-groups that phase in and out of the underlying 4/4 pulse. Polymeter is actually the precise term theory wise since their notes spill over the bars and don't align on the 1 for multiple measures whereas polyrhythms tend to resolve within the bars. Only Dick in the band is theory trained however so using the terms interchangeably really isn't a big deal since they're quite similar concepts and something they don't really calculate (they do however analyse it on the computer when it comes to arranging everything). Tomas prefers to call it odd-note groupings or odd-time cycles, however he's always listening to the 4/4 beneath and not so much the syncopating notes cycling around it. I love how humble they are because while yeah the math is fairly straightforward, writing it all creatively, making it musical and executing it tightly are very difficult, and much harder than just chop and changing odd time-sigs here and there like other progressive bands. Heck even Tool started incorporating Meshuggah's polymetric approach in some of their more recent songs.
In my my stupid ass opinion, Meshuggah always entertains me. Even if there was no real "lesson" here it's cool to hear about different aspects of their music etc.
Probably already mentioned but "guitarists Fredrik Thordendal and Marten Hagstrom (above left and right, respectively)"... but Fredrik is on the rigth in the video...
+Michel Schallenberg I wasn't really serious about that, I just admire that they can play what they create in the studio, I think every band should be able to do that.
To all musicians, fans of Meshuggah I just want to tell that they have said times and times that they do not think their music in terms of time signatures and polyrhythms ... They have just been practicing a personnal, challenging music taste for more than 20 years starting at, say, a medium level, and this is what we get today. It's a will to surprise and not be too predictable among other things. A strong identity that evolved over 20 years.
i have been a drummer for 25ish years, i have picked up bass and guitar a few times over the years and never cared to really stick with it to any major degree... but if my guitar/bass sounded anything like theirs, i would sit there all day dorking around with it.
@Marshallfan567 the thing is, since they use a 30 inch scale, it stretches the strings a lot more than a regular 25.5 or 27.5 scale length, so it probably feels a lot tighter than you think
@SnoodNoodler True .... they are very much a band that has polyrythmic beats to the extreme ..... Being a drummer, I am inspired and blown away by Thomas Haake.
How do such white Swedes truly understand the ancient simple complexity of poly-rhythm? Intelligent dudes. They get it. If everyone got it, the world would be a much more epic place. Poly rhythm carries over to waaaay more than just music, but music is the perfect medium to communicate the concept. Ask Ghana.
I love Meshuggah. Pure fucking geniuses who have created their own sound and their own style that no one should EVER try to duplicate. Meshuggah is meshuggah is what it is and it's forever what it is.
@iancidplaysguitar The scale length on their guitars is about 4 inches longer than standard strat style guitars, the tension on those strings will be much MUCH higher than it would using the same strings and tuning on any other guitar.
guitars with long necks, usually baritones, 7 and 8 strings. What brand it is doesn't matter. You can play metal on a stratocaster if you like. Don't be a tool and pick something everyone else use, find your own tone. Best way to do that is to go to a guitar shop and play every single guitar until you find something you like. But for this tone? Custom ibanez 8 string baritone with Lundgren M7 pickups.
At 4:00 - THAT is the sound I was trying to find out about. He says it's not really chugging... I thought that was some kind of chord, but it's more of a sound. It really comes out in Electric Red, Lethargica, and a few other tunes on Obzen. It rules! I actually want speakers that make that low rumble jump out.
They use Veta IIs, which are modelling amps. So they can basically have any tone they want directly from the head. They don't use cabs either, the Vettas are directly connected to the PA. Their setup is as clean as it can be.
Idk why but I just imagined Marten as a frail 90 year old man showing his grandson his OG 8 string. When our generation is our Grandparent’s age.. that’s going to be pretty difficult to explain lol.
I've got an Ibanez RG2228 and I'm in 74 for the F# (in standard tuning), and in 64 for the B, so I assume they are running something like 54 or 62 for the low B. But as they probably said, there 8 strings guitars have a 29.4" scale, which is huge (RG2228 has 27" scale), so a 70 gauge is not the same for them than for us, even if they mostly play in F (standard tuning 1/2 step down). Rawk on!
I just saw on different forums that he has two different tunings : 5 strings : Bb3 Eb3 Ab3 Db3 Gb3 4 strings : Standard tuning , up half on each strings
@dujl 100% agree John Frusciante said it best "It's not about showing what you can do with a piece of wood and some strings, it's all about the music."
How it grooves but doesn’t always hit on 4 - yea long syncopated non repeating groove that has very intentional accents and dark spoken word over all of it with jazzy ass saxophone style solos - It takes time to understand Meshuggah but god damn when it clicks there isn’t another band that does it like these guys
Those guitars are build like tanks. Probably Mahogany or Alder with the body, most likely hard maple neck and fingerboard. Lindgren makes pickups??? Holy fuck, I want some. In case you don't know, he's the now ex-guitarist of Opeth. Oops, stratch that. I just looked up Lundgren pickups. I don't think the two lundgrens are the same :( Too bad.
I've always made that sound by just fretting a note on the lowest string, then on the next string fret one fret higher, and one fret higher on the string after that. That's what i was trying to convey through my ghetto tab haha. Its a power chord except with a diminished instead of a perfect fifth. Alot of death metal bands use that for the sheer growl it produces. On bass if you did that with distortion it would probably bring your walls down. Hope that helped, have fun \m/
Actually they don't rehearse together much; they haven't since DEI. They live quite far away from each other nowadays so it's impractical to get together very often aside from rehearsing for tours.
I think that he means that, if you tune a regular 6 string down to, lets say Drop B, you lose alot of the tension, the strings can get really floppy. But with an 8 string, you can have a low tuning and still have alot of tension. I think thats what they are saying at least :P
@fingerboy18 Well, for this whole they were not using their normal gear. They simply had their guitars running into the Amps that Guitar World has sitting in their office for lessons like this. Otherwise, they run their guitars into Line 6POD X3 Rack units, then Line 6 Vetta II amp heads. After that, I know Fredrick runs the signal to whatever the PA is where they are playing, and i believe that Marten uses Line 6 cabs Not positive, though.
when he says: the tension and the measure is able to carry the tone.. thats the whole deal. what is he meaning? that in part the sheer mass of the guitar and added tension of the 7th and 8th strings is adding to the overall tone?? can anyone explain please?
" I just improvise til it sounds cool. " Best creative advice ever. Seriously.
Fredrik is so djent, even his voice is noise gated.
+Andrey Andonov hahahhahahahahahahau nailed it bro! also he is stoned as usual! :D
this is starting to get old
Yeah, but the comment is 1 year old.
L M A O
This comment deserves a fucking Nobel Prize xD
"Line 6, the tube."
"I just improvise until it sounds cool, on the album. Live, I just improvise."
-Fredrik, speaking his wisdom
He says "line 6 vetta 2"
Marten and Fredrik = The Penn & Teller of metal.
They remind me to Loki and Skisgwaar from Metalocalypse.
lol waiting for morten to say SHUT THE FUCK UP
More like the *Lennon & Harrison* of Metal.
@@nipulkradmsinatagras8293 and McCartney?
"This is the E string, but I use it as a crash".
Oh maaaaaan😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂 i love this😂😂😂😂😂 This made my day. Tomas the best.
i love how fredrick doesn't really talk, yet he is the master mind behind meshuggah
Tbf I'd say there isn't one mastermind behind Meshuggah as the writing is split fairly evenly between a number of the members, and it kinda depends on the album. Also necrobump haha!
That's a common misconception.
Fredrick writes most the music except on the new one where dick wrote the majority. Tomas has rythmic(i cant spell) ideas that he programs guitars on. Lyrics are usually done by tomas. Sometimes mårten on his own songs does his own lyrics (ivory tower, demiurge, nebulous). But fredrick is pretty much the brain music wise. And lyrics are usually tomas
I find it interesting that Jens just turns up to bust out some sick vocals and thats it. It makes sense but fuck what a sweet gig to have.
@@OHBJJ9634 That's actually a very common misconception. For their first and second records (contradictions collapse and dei) he did quite a lot of the writing and he often would split the writing duties with Jens, but every record since they've split it fairly evenly between him and Mårten. Tomas usually writes at least song per record as well. Tomas writes all the lyrics. Jens just comes in and him and tomas piece the lyrics together. On the latest record, fred did no writing at all. Dick and tomas came together and co wrote 6 tunes together. Mårten came in and wrote 4 of them.
This video is literally gold. Can’t believe this was uploaded 11 years ago. Time flies!
Probably the only video we can hear fredrik speaking english
"There's nothing intricate about it as far as the bars and like the time signature goes (4/4) - it's the polyrhythmic stuff, how it moves...and how it doesn't always come to the same place every time it moves over." The genius of this approach is that they're dividing their notes which in sum total are multiples of 4/4 into odd-groups that phase in and out of the underlying 4/4 pulse. Polymeter is actually the precise term theory wise since their notes spill over the bars and don't align on the 1 for multiple measures whereas polyrhythms tend to resolve within the bars. Only Dick in the band is theory trained however so using the terms interchangeably really isn't a big deal since they're quite similar concepts and something they don't really calculate (they do however analyse it on the computer when it comes to arranging everything). Tomas prefers to call it odd-note groupings or odd-time cycles, however he's always listening to the 4/4 beneath and not so much the syncopating notes cycling around it. I love how humble they are because while yeah the math is fairly straightforward, writing it all creatively, making it musical and executing it tightly are very difficult, and much harder than just chop and changing odd time-sigs here and there like other progressive bands. Heck even Tool started incorporating Meshuggah's polymetric approach in some of their more recent songs.
2:20 very important words about how they get their sound
2:32 best solo every written!!!
8:30 Fredrik is NOT human!
it improvise
When Fredrik said "This is actually a bass string", I just gained 10 kilos of heavyness
In my my stupid ass opinion, Meshuggah always entertains me. Even if there was no real "lesson" here it's cool to hear about different aspects of their music etc.
been listening to their new ablum lately it is unbelievable how they create those sound using guitar and drums
7:16 DAYUM
Oh my
okay okay okay
This is revolutionary
Probably already mentioned but "guitarists Fredrik Thordendal and Marten Hagstrom (above left and right, respectively)"... but Fredrik is on the rigth in the video...
Tomas Fornem You are a psychopath!
?
Can't be. If it were flipped, the guitars would look left handed.
1:31 Marten realizing Fredrik just talked
"Guys why did nobody tell me he can do that..?"
Yeah, Meshuggah's sound is like distorted bass guitar, which is badass.
Meshuggah and Ministry Tour?
Must've been incredible!!
Great stuff. I met Marten but I'm pissed that I lost my Obzen tour shirt because I had to go to hospital after an injury and it was cut off.
......Explain......
+Fragmenta Official Keep in mind, these guys do the same (cool) shit since they were teens. I think they used to practice a lot back in the days.
+Michel Schallenberg I wasn't really serious about that, I just admire that they can play what they create in the studio, I think every band should be able to do that.
+XMetalChefX I was wearing it while I was attacked in a home invasion.
To all musicians, fans of Meshuggah I just want to tell that they have said times and times that they do not think their music in terms of time signatures and polyrhythms ... They have just been practicing a personnal, challenging music taste for more than 20 years starting at, say, a medium level, and this is what we get today. It's a will to surprise and not be too predictable among other things. A strong identity that evolved over 20 years.
two of the most beautiful 8 strings i've ever seen!! D:
this is actually a bass string
Was searching for just that comment.
Which bass string?
the best part was ''yeh it is''
_B W O N G_ (F)
@@rvega8038 lmao
Next, Meshuggah will play concert on city street...with guitars from telephone poles and cables, not strings
Fredrik has a Iceman 8 string..damn thats beastly!!
70 gauge 8th string tuned down half a step. So essentially Meshuggah has 3 bass players
If I remember, originally, that was Jens's idea, for Meshuggah. |m|
frederik is a Wizard, he even talks like a wizard. "Seventy"
"I just improvise 'til it sounds cool, on the albums. And live, I just improvise." Lmao. I fucking love Meshuggah.
i have been a drummer for 25ish years, i have picked up bass and guitar a few times over the years and never cared to really stick with it to any major degree... but if my guitar/bass sounded anything like theirs, i would sit there all day dorking around with it.
major props on the celtic frost hoodie!!
I learned so many great riffs from watching this video.
This is actually a bass string.
yeah it is...
I love these guys
This is old...Saw them this year and Fredrik was playing through a Digitech RP1000...Sounded soooo sic...
i'm glad to know they sufffered the same suffering i do while learning bleed
I think Meshuggah is one of the most quality death-trash metal bands on this plant since their first album.
That was a great line: "I just improvise it until it sounds cool on the albums. And live I just improvise." :D
I saw them four days ago, Damn, shit was awesome, such a bass rumble with every single instrument
@Marshallfan567 the thing is, since they use a 30 inch scale, it stretches the strings a lot more than a regular 25.5 or 27.5 scale length, so it probably feels a lot tighter than you think
where is the "dat 240p" comment?
Above yours actually 😂
Above yours lol
@SnoodNoodler True .... they are very much a band that has polyrythmic beats to the extreme ..... Being a drummer, I am inspired and blown away by Thomas Haake.
How do such white Swedes truly understand the ancient simple complexity of poly-rhythm? Intelligent dudes. They get it.
If everyone got it, the world would be a much more epic place. Poly rhythm carries over to waaaay more than just music, but music is the perfect medium to communicate the concept. Ask Ghana.
I love Meshuggah. Pure fucking geniuses who have created their own sound and their own style that no one should EVER try to duplicate. Meshuggah is meshuggah is what it is and it's forever what it is.
Dear God, that tone. That. Tone.
I just improvise until it sounds cool.
Yes Frederik. Yes.
@iancidplaysguitar The scale length on their guitars is about 4 inches longer than standard strat style guitars, the tension on those strings will be much MUCH higher than it would using the same strings and tuning on any other guitar.
*F (super damn low)*
*A# (low)*
*D# (low)*
*G#*
*C#*
*F#*
*A#*
*D# (high)*
guitars with long necks, usually baritones, 7 and 8 strings.
What brand it is doesn't matter. You can play metal on a stratocaster if you like. Don't be a tool and pick something everyone else use, find your own tone. Best way to do that is to go to a guitar shop and play every single guitar until you find something you like.
But for this tone? Custom ibanez 8 string baritone with Lundgren M7 pickups.
At 4:00 - THAT is the sound I was trying to find out about. He says it's not really chugging... I thought that was some kind of chord, but it's more of a sound. It really comes out in Electric Red, Lethargica, and a few other tunes on Obzen. It rules! I actually want speakers that make that low rumble jump out.
loving marten's celtic frost longsleeve
man i love that guitar tone!!!
Dude Fredrick’s iceman 🫣
They use Veta IIs, which are modelling amps. So they can basically have any tone they want directly from the head. They don't use cabs either, the Vettas are directly connected to the PA. Their setup is as clean as it can be.
Gods.
Frederiks guitar looks like the United States
I believe epiphone had a guitar that was USA shaped lol
Those iceman shapes always did haha
8:34 That chuckle.
the grandpas geetars
that gave me a giggle
They totally remind me of that band/show (in a good way)
Idk why but I just imagined Marten as a frail 90 year old man showing his grandson his OG 8 string. When our generation is our Grandparent’s age.. that’s going to be pretty difficult to explain lol.
Fredrik really needs to hop his D onto a new Special defects album.
I've got an Ibanez RG2228 and I'm in 74 for the F# (in standard tuning), and in 64 for the B, so I assume they are running something like 54 or 62 for the low B. But as they probably said, there 8 strings guitars have a 29.4" scale, which is huge (RG2228 has 27" scale), so a 70 gauge is not the same for them than for us, even if they mostly play in F (standard tuning 1/2 step down). Rawk on!
I just saw on different forums that he has two different tunings :
5 strings : Bb3 Eb3 Ab3 Db3 Gb3
4 strings : Standard tuning , up half on each strings
With locking tuners, restringing an 8 string is actually a little faster than restringing a 6 string.
Actually it's not Martin, but Mårten. (pronounciation wise, think morten, almost like mark mortons last name.) Common mistake :)
@dujl 100% agree John Frusciante said it best "It's not about showing what you can do with a piece of wood and some strings, it's all about the music."
"Unfortunately... *rollseyes* I have NO idea what kind of wood selection..."
I lol'd.
"Poor bastard...."
"He likes it"
"And thomas was like.." (mimics legs hurting). God, they're HUMAN. :D
How it grooves but doesn’t always hit on 4 - yea long syncopated non repeating groove that has very intentional accents and dark spoken word over all of it with jazzy ass saxophone style solos - It takes time to understand Meshuggah but god damn when it clicks there isn’t another band that does it like these guys
Meshuggah are probably the only band that could make a line 6 vetta 2 amp sound good.
@swedisheinherjer that's not a Floyd Rose it's an Edge fixed bridge that looks like a tremolo, it's standard on all 8 string Ibanez guitars..
even when Fredrick is just sitting he has to still practise, thats why hes so insane
1:50 first and only time i see fredrik laugh
These were the first 8 strings I saw when I was 15 and thought it was crazy....and now there's nine
Johnathan Trevino Legator recently came out with a 10 string.
theres always been multiple string guitars
you ever heard of a guy named Jared Dines?
Actually Meshuggah uses Line6 Vetta II heads. Still I saw information that Meshuggah also had started to use Fractal Audio AxeFX Ultra processors.
@th1nkman Not true, dear Sir. Pickups are Lundgren M8=)
Guitarz are maple neck-through with ebony fingerboard and alder wings.
Those guitars are build like tanks. Probably Mahogany or Alder with the body, most likely hard maple neck and fingerboard. Lindgren makes pickups??? Holy fuck, I want some. In case you don't know, he's the now ex-guitarist of Opeth.
Oops, stratch that. I just looked up Lundgren pickups. I don't think the two lundgrens are the same :( Too bad.
no, they switched to using the fractal audio axeFX, which is a rack preamp
@DezeroMusic For sure they are underrated.I am still playing on 6th string guitar still haven't played ever on 7th string and even talk about 8th :)
God, I love Marten's Iceman guitar.
I've always made that sound by just fretting a note on the lowest string, then on the next string fret one fret higher, and one fret higher on the string after that. That's what i was trying to convey through my ghetto tab haha. Its a power chord except with a diminished instead of a perfect fifth. Alot of death metal bands use that for the sheer growl it produces. On bass if you did that with distortion it would probably bring your walls down. Hope that helped, have fun \m/
@horrorandmetalfan001 Have you not listened to songs until the solos such as on one of their most famous tracks 'New Millenium Cyanide Christ'?
I think Mick Thomson was unaware of Meshuggah when He said 'Seven strings are Gay'..The Bleed riff kicks brutal ass.
Meshuggah is by far superior to Slipknot.
@musicguitarlessons whoa are you gonna make a video on it?
Actually they don't rehearse together much; they haven't since DEI. They live quite far away from each other nowadays so it's impractical to get together very often aside from rehearsing for tours.
@Azgaroth666 Well, I was right about the maple and the Alder lol. What's the main body wood?
im sure im not the first to say this, but Marten in on the left, Fredrik is on the right. respectively.
@Theseventhknight Scale length changes the tension considerably.
I think that he means that, if you tune a regular 6 string down to, lets say Drop B, you lose alot of the tension, the strings can get really floppy.
But with an 8 string, you can have a low tuning and still have alot of tension.
I think thats what they are saying at least :P
those are monsters of guitars. i love that iceman though.
@fingerboy18 Well, for this whole they were not using their normal gear. They simply had their guitars running into the Amps that Guitar World has sitting in their office for lessons like this. Otherwise, they run their guitars into Line 6POD X3 Rack units, then Line 6 Vetta II amp heads. After that, I know Fredrick runs the signal to whatever the PA is where they are playing, and i believe that Marten uses Line 6 cabs Not positive, though.
I would take life for those guitars.
Someone can tell me what is the tuning of meshuggah for six syrings?
line 6. you heard it folks. let it go... lmao
That's old news bro. They got that Line 6 idea from Dino of Fear Factory. I've read about before RUclips in 1990s.
@Xiphos707fx yeah fredriks on the right its backwards on the description
i love how marten is like "the poor bastard" and fredrik says "he likes it" in that voice. no idea why but it made me laugh so hard.
they have such great accents tbh
Standard tunings:
7 string - BEADGBE
8 string - F#BEADGBE
That's what the longer scale is doing for you, then you can use "lighter" strings and it still is tight!
I watched the whole interview to see what Frederik had to say.
@ibanezbloke Because a baritone-style 6 would limit soloing and high notes altogether. They do utilize high notes once in a hundred years.
when he says: the tension and the measure is able to carry the tone.. thats the whole deal.
what is he meaning? that in part the sheer mass of the guitar and added tension of the 7th and 8th strings is adding to the overall tone??
can anyone explain please?