# Guitars in Deathspell Omega!!



## Kr1zalid (Aug 16, 2011)

Hi all! Wanna do some research on this topic, especially their music/songs in the Kenose, Fas - Ite, Maledicti.... and Mass Grave Aesthetics eras!

First of all, I tried TAB-ing out some of their songs such as Kenose I and The Shrine of Mad Laughter but I can hardly focus my ears on their guitars, let alone the notes they are playing. And their harmonies are really, really dissonant. Sometimes I really thought they are playing microtonal or non-fretted guitars.

I tried seaching for tabs around, found few but not what the songs I'm looking for. Tried search for any info on their guitarist(s), found almost none other than his name, Hasjarl...

Tabs are not my main question now but what do you think about the techniques they incorporate in their songs? What guitars and effects are they actually using? Any (music) theories to explain their style or genre?

Here's a song for reference/as an example:



Thanks!


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## ixlramp (Aug 16, 2011)

Amazing band! 'The Shrine of Mad Laughter' gave me the biggest WTF? moment in years ...



I bought the album almost instantly after hearing that


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## Infamous Impact (Aug 17, 2011)

Shrine of Mad Laughter is insane. All I can say is listen to a lot of Portal, Ulcerate, and DsO. There's massive amounts of dissonance in all.


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## in-pursuit (Aug 17, 2011)

one of my students put me onto Deathspell Omega about a year ago, great stuff and I second the Portal comment they have some similarities for sure. I worked out a few of their songs for said student and I'd recommend you look at the diminished scale first of all if you want to understand whats going on. You're right that there is a lot of dissonance in their music, and also a fair bit of dual guitar harmonies using dissonant intervals and what not. They really arent the kind of band that you can pidgeon-hole in terms of their writing style (guitarwise), but as far as I've heard there arent a whole lot of effects going on other than just distortion.


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## Kr1zalid (Aug 18, 2011)

ixlramp said:


> WTF?
> 
> ....


 
More or less my reaction *everytime* I listen to those albums that I stated in the first post... 



Infamous Impact said:


> Shrine of Mad Laughter is insane. All I can say is listen to a lot of Portal, Ulcerate, and DsO. There's massive amounts of dissonance in all.


 
I won't quite agree with Ulcerate, because they are slower compare to the other two... 

However for Portal's part, after watched their video of Glumurphonel live, the guitarists, 1 held a Stephen Carpenter 8-strings and another held a 7-strings similar to a KxK custom, played A LOT OF RIFFS, different riffs, sometimes I can hear minor and diminished riffs at the time they slowed down. And from my observation most those riffs are Chords like so they create a very huge distorted sound atmosphere (mostly from the heavily distorted guitars sounds)...



DSO have no live videos at all (or just that I cannot find any of them!) Still I want to try to figured out how they play their guitars by listening... 

Btw, IMO the similarity between Portal and DSO is the way they produce their songs. The difference between them is the writing part, Portal sounds way more atmospheric compare to DSO.



in-pursuit said:


> ....I worked out a few of their songs for said student and I'd recommend you look at the diminished scale first of all if you want to understand whats going on. You're right that there is a lot of dissonance in their music, and also a fair bit of dual guitar harmonies using dissonant intervals and what not. They really arent the kind of band that you can pidgeon-hole in terms of their writing style (guitarwise), but as far as I've heard there arent a whole lot of effects going on other than just distortion.


 
The problem is, DSO don't really use much of diminished scales, I've tried this one. Dissonant intervals are there but that should also include m2, M2, aug5, m7 and so on, at least, that's what I found out through my attempt to TAB their song in the first post.

Anyway, I agree much on the dual guitar harmonies and effects parts. They sound like 3 guitars, distortion with EMG pickups only... 

...............................

The Shrine of Mad Laughter Tab anyone???


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## in-pursuit (Aug 18, 2011)

i'll take a crack at it for shits and giggles. once i get through a couple exams this week


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