What is the best guitar for metal?

[vurt]

bc rich warlock or mockingbird of course. in black.

[greententacle]

i would use a metal guitar

[Uncle E]

Martin 00-18.

Does it chainsaw?

[machinesworking]

Tony Ommi played and SG mostly. After that people use whatever they want. The Humbucker palm muted bar chord is about as metal as it gets though. In complete contrast some shredders love single coil for feedback etc.

Generally, metal guitarists abhor feedback and want tight, controlled tone.
Humbuckers really are a must for smooth dynamics when playing fast riffs.
Single-coil will sound abrasive and sloppy unless the guitarist is really skilled.

Speaking of Tony Iommi, because of his injury, he used ultra light strings, which have been generally favoured for metal for speed, particularly in the '80s.

Yeah no, basically humbuckers are better for rhythm, but a decent amount of metal shredders prefer single coil for leads. Ommi's other guitars besides SGs are all telecasters for instance. KK Downing used a Strat off and on over the years.

My point wasn't that it was super common, but that it's just convention, and easily you can find exceptions to any rule on what to play for metal.

[Namestar123]

Esp Ltd Ec-256. Good stock Pickups, but I changed Pickups with EMG 81/85's.

[jamcat]

Sure, there have been some pretty famous players who have used Les Pauls. Randy Rhoads, Zakk Wylde, Adrian Smith and James Hetfield from time to time, and of course Slash and Jimmy Page, though both are more in the classic hard rock category. Slash switched from a Gibson Explorer to a Les Paul specifically because it was a classic hard rock look, to set himself apart from everyone else on the Sunset Strip playing superstrats in the '80s.

So while they're out there, for every 1 guy playing metal on a Les Paul there's 100 playing a superstrat.

And maybe some guys have single-coils somewhere on some guitar. Though generally it would only be in a middle or maybe neck position with a humbucker always at the bridge, which gets almost all use. Single coil might be used for clean parts. Single-coils lack the smoothness and sustain of humbuckers for leads in most hands. Single-coils are for a classic rock sound, like Hendrix or Ritchie Blackmore. Yngwie Malmsteen looks like he's playing single-coils but they're actually vertically stacked humbuckers. He just wants to have Hendrix's look.

Dave Murray has always played a Strat too, but it's always had a humbucker at the bridge. KK is os one of those rare players who can make single-coils sound good shredding, but he also plays guitars with humbuckers.

So likewise, for every 1 guy playing metal with single-coils there's 1000 playing humbuckers.

What I've never seen though, is anyone playing metal on a Les Paul with single-coils.

[spoontechnique]

It depends what you're into. I'll try to give a more modern answer.

There's only a few important considerations. Body shape, neck size, wood, are all personal preference. Superstrat vs Gibson is an aesthetic consideration. Some people prefer thin necks, some don't. You probably want a hardtail bridge. Whammys are rare except in retro-styled bands.

The first real decision is tuning/strings. Lots of people got 7/8/9s to go lower, but the real factor is scale length. More strings don't mean you can tune lower, scale length does. It's why basses have 30"-37" scale lengths. This is a good jumping off point for what scale length fits what tuning: https://thebunn.ca/scale-tuning-tension-index

Tuning depends heavily on genre and era. If you're playing a genre that started before Meshuggah (I.E. death metal, black metal, hardcore, sludge, thrash), anything from E standard to B standard is common. After Meshuggah, that range extends down to double drop C (Black Tongue's album Nadir). Black Tongue actually uses a 30" 6 string, not a 7-10 string. A good starting point is to look at what your favorite bands use and pick something in the ballpark.

The second real consideration is pickups. Don't buy a guitar based on the pickups, they're easy to change. Humbuckers are standard, and the bridge humbucker is much more commonly used than the neck. Single humbucker pickups are fine. You can probably save money by only buying a bridge unless you love the neck sound for leads or cleans.

However, the advice to get actives is a bit outdated. Actives were preferred in the past because they had higher output and could push amps harder. Now there's high output passives and everyone uses at least a boost pedal anyway. At least, that's the reasoning I've heard. EMGs are still common, and Fishmans are a lot like EMGs with a couple new features.

Passives are making a comeback. Most pickup companies have options aimed at high gain (Seymour Duncan has Sentient/Nazgul). Bareknuckle pickups seem to be really popular. I hear people using Bareknuckle Cold Sweats/Nailbomb/Aftermath/Juggernauts all the time.

But there's a lot of wiggle room depending on the style. If you play djenty, doom/sludgey, core, cavernous DM, black metal, there's always different considerations. At the end of the day, any hardtail with humbuckers works fine for most styles.

[Uncle E]

Actives are still quieter. Better for tight stops. Also, if someone wants that crisp, cutting 81 sound, I’ve never heard a passive pickup that can do it. Dimarzio Tone Zone and Norton are excellent for high gain, it’s just a different sound.

[vurt]

obviously, the one, that when you hang it over your shoulder on the strap, you can't help but do devil horns \m/ and pull "the face!"

[Uncle E]

Dude, “the face” is real. Never question physiognomy. When I was a kid playing metal, I wish someone had pulled me aside and told me my “the face” looked like BB King, I could have gotten into blues a lot sooner.

[vurt]

i have a face for "back stage"

[arkmabat]

Is there a guitar that can switch between single coil and humbuckers?

[vurt]

edit

[spoontechnique]

Is there a guitar that can switch between single coil and humbuckers?

Any humbucker can, this is called coil splitting. It's done with a push/pull pot (you pull the knob out to split the pickup). As far as I can tell it sounds the same as a single-coil, since you're just bypassing one of the coils. The humbucker might not necessarily sound good as a single coil, but some pickups (EMG TW series, Fishmans) are designed to coil tap well.

I installed my Fishmans this way. The Fishmans also have a push/pull knob that changes the pickup response. So with an HH setup, you have 3 pickup positions x 2 profiles x 2 split options (humbucker/single coil). That's a lot of options...which I never use because I just go bridge humbucker every time

[spoontechnique]

Actives are still quieter. Better for tight stops. Also, if someone wants that crisp, cutting 81 sound, I’ve never heard a passive pickup that can do it.

If that's true it's not significant enough a difference to matter. In the studio, you can just edit the stops. One example: I know Periphery all use passive pickups (Misha has BKP Juggernaut and BKP Ragnarok, Jake Bowen the Dimarzio Titans). Their style makes heavy use of tight chugs.

There definitely was an era of EMG dominance and a period where high-gain passives couldn't keep up. But I think we're past that. The current generation of passives are built to compete with actives.

Edit: I'm looking at the Bareknuckle artist roster...you've got Lorna Shore, TDWP, ADTR, Tesseract, Acacia Strain, Nile, Monuments, Architects, Distant, Darko, etc. All bands that probably would have gone with EMGs a decade ago.