The Black Hole Sun by Soundgarden guitar tone is built on a Mesa/Boogie Trem-o-Verb + Electra Dyne, dialed in at gain 4/10, bass 6, mid 5.5, treble 6, presence 5.5 (community-researched baseline). Full breakdown below — then adapt every knob to your exact guitar and amp, free.
thick grunge, mid-forward, dark & heavy, down-tuned
Recording context
studio
How it’s played
thick, mid-forward grunge gain distortion. This shapes how hard the amp is pushed and where the EQ sits for the Black Hole Sun sound.
What makes the Black Hole Sun part tricky
unusual down-tunings, odd time signatures, dark dynamics. GuitarToneAdapt gets the tone right so you can focus on the playing.
Note: Black Hole Sun is two tones: dreamy CLEAN verses through a Hughes & Kettner Rotosphere (Leslie swirl) with low gain, then a heavier chorus — drop the gain right down and use a rotary/chorus for the verses, push the dirt for the chorus., Soundgarden's Kim Thayil is a Mesa/Boogie player (Trem-o-Verb + Electra Dyne, earlier a Mesa Dual Rectifier / Peavey VTM / Music Man HD130) running plenty of gain and compression with a mid-forward, thick grunge voice. Guitars are humbuckers (Guild S-100, Gibson Les Paul). Soundgarden are famous for UNUSUAL down-tunings (Drop D, but also Drop C, Drop B, EEBBBB and other oddities) — check the specific song's tuning., A CAE boost is almost always on; he kicks an overdrive in for extra dirt. Keep mids up and bass full for the heavy, dark, drop-tuned riffing., Settings are community-researched starting points, not official recall sheets — and Soundgarden's tunings are weird, so confirm the song's tuning first.