I agree terms may not always mean the same thing. To me a trashy cymbal produces tones that are non musical with no identifable individual note. No ring or sustain, just a quick rattle at various pitches. Others may mean something differnet so I am interested to see how this plays.

Another often undefined term is washy. This may even be the opposite of trashy? To me washy means the sound that forms under the cymbal when you do a roll on it. Of course a cymbal can be washy without a roll, but this how I see that sound in my mind. With a good washy cymbal its almost as if the cymbal is floating on the sound comming out the bottom. The sound is nearly a physical presence, but is also a musical tone with a note, ring, gong, etc. Again, I could be way off base and most people mean something different.

I agree on wash as a definition. I have a mid 50's 22" a Zildjian ride that was a wall of wash. After riding a few minutes, all you heard was that roar of the ocean!

I had Justin Ottaviano beat it into submission and now I love it. It was literally unplayable before.

Ping sounds like ping.

Gongy cymbals have overtones that sound like a gong is also being hit.

What others do we use?

"Trashy": What my current wife calls my former wife...Walking

Good trashy or bad trashy though?

Garbage can lid = trashy.

So is there no difference between a wet wash sound and 'trashy' sounding cymbal?

For example....I have a UFIP splash that is all wash. Is it trashy sounding because it is all wash? This is a UFIP - arguably the finest splash cymbals in the world.

Or does

it does it have anything to do with tone?

No, wash is the swell of "woooosh" that builds or erupts from the cymbal- usually mid range white noise sound.

Trash is dark, Far East sound, like a wuhan Chinese cymbal but in a non- China type, it is just a layer of the sound. Depending on who's describing a cymbal, it can be dark (which I equate to lower range undertones) or trashy by the definition above.

A cymbal with a strong stick (usually a ride) shows clear definition of each tip strike on the cymbal. Weak stick may start strong and then be one hurried under the wash as it develops while riding. My old 22 did that before Justin fixed it.

A ride with a good crash is one where I can be riding along and drop the shank of the stick into the cymbal and get a nice accent that gets out of the way fairly quickly

Dry cymbals tend to have more stick and less sustain and/or wash. I'm not a fan of the heavy unlathed cymbals going for "super dry"- I think it sounds like playing on a school desk.

Bells should be generous. They add to the overall sound profile and just because a cymbal is labeled "crash" does not mean you can't ride it or use that bell either to carry the groove or simply accent it.

Patina. Meh. If a cymbal sounds too dark, choked and dirty, it probably is. I had a friend who was afraid to clean his K Con cymbal because he thought it would reduce the value I said: based on what you are describing and the way it looks, it needs a cleaning. You can either flip it a possibly take a loss or clean it and see what happens. It's your cymbal- drill holes and out rivers in it if you want! After cleaning g it sounds just the way he wanted it- and not surprising just the way it was intended to sound.

This. At least as far as on the recording community side of things. As mentioned in the post above, certainly some Wuhan cymbals fall into this category.

(and this is also addressed to the initial Garbage can lid commenter - FFR428)

Please be more specific.