Tone library / Metallica / The Four Horsemen

The Four Horsemen amp settings — Fender Champion 20

The Metallica guitar tone for “The Four Horsemen”, dialed in for a Fender Champion 20 with a Fender Player Stratocaster. Studio version, Kill 'Em All (1983)

Original rig

Marshall JCM800 amp, Gibson Les Paul with humbuckers, Tube Screamer-style overdrive for tightness

Aggressive mid-forward thrash crunch with tight low-end and cutting high-mids

Amp settings — Fender Champion 20

Knob	Setting (0–10)
Gain	3
Bass	4
Mid	7
Treble	5
Presence	0
Reverb	0
Master	7

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Guitar

PICKUPbridge TONE7 VOLUME10

Signal chain

01Cube Baby (distortion mode)

Set to highest-gain distortion voicing available. This is your primary gain source — amp stays clean to avoid mud.

Gain/Drive 7 · Tone 5 · Level 6

Why these settings

The Champion 20 is a solid-state practice amp with limited gain on tap and a Fender-voiced scoop — it cannot replicate JCM800 saturation alone. The Cube Baby provides all distortion; amp gain stays at 3 to prevent double-clipping mud. Mids pushed to 7 to compensate for the Fender scoop and your Strat's thinner single-coil output versus the original Les Paul humbuckers. Treble dropped to 5 because single coils are already brighter than PAFs.

PRO TIPRoll your Strat's tone knob to 7 and use aggressive downpicking right over the bridge pickup pole pieces — this adds the percussive chunk that single coils lack versus humbuckers on thrash riffs.

Get this tone on your amp

These settings are for a Fender Champion 20. ToneAdapt matches any song to whatever amp, guitar and pedals you own — first match is free.

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Song, artist and gear names are used to identify the tone being matched; ToneAdapt is not affiliated with or endorsed by the artists or manufacturers mentioned. Settings are AI-generated starting points — trust your ears.