Unlocking your amps best tones

samzadgan

i watched a video on "getting the most ouf of your gear" on the tube...and the guy did something very practical...he hooked up his guitar to a Ditto looper into the amp...played a riff utilising all the string and a few different positions on the neck, with the EQ set at noon...then he let the loop play...put his guitar down, and adjusted the knobs...i never thought about doing that, it would make the whole process so much easier!

Cabicular

I've got one of these. I think I'll look it out

http://www.drzamps.com/amps/carmen_ghia/

Fez

Similar to the Music radar article a Fender rep once showed me how he sets up an amp by turning the three tone pots to 0 then Play an open E chord and sweep the bass pot to the sweet spot then play an A chord and sweep the middle to it's sweet spot and repeat with a D chord for the treble. This gives you a good general sound which you can tweak I usually take a bit of middle out for the band mix.

Rocker

Well done guys, this is a very useful thread. One of the best.

Rocker

RaymondLin said:

capo4th;392473" said:

Put your amp on a stand or sideboard and you will discover new improved tones....

Not sure why this isn't widely practiced. It is well known and a must in HiFi that you put your speakers on stands or spikes. Otherwise you lose a lot of energy (sound, or tones or whatever you want to call it) through vibrations to the floor.

It's simple physics.

Close but no cigar my friend. You put "bookshelf" hi-fi speakers on stands to raise the tweeter to ear level. Spikes are used (1) to ensure that the speakers are vertical [plus or minus absolutely nothing] and (2) to provide a one way energy sink [from speaker to ground]. The positioning of hi-fi speakers is critical to the sound you hear, thus spiking them prevents them being moved easily. IMHO guitar speakers have little in common with hi-fi speakers. Apart from operating using the same principles that is.

paulads

doesn't everyone just buy a different amp and sell the one they couldn't get the best tones out of?

ThePrettyDamned

Fez;399319" said:

Similar to the Music radar article a Fender rep once showed me how he sets up an amp by turning the three tone pots to 0 then Play an open E chord and sweep the bass pot to the sweet spot then play an A chord and sweep the middle to it's sweet spot and repeat with a D chord for the treble. This gives you a good general sound which you can tweak I usually take a bit of middle out for the band mix.

Tone controls are usually interactive - in other words, raise the mids and see what it does to the bass and treble. Usually, it's not "nothing".

I just turn them until it sounds good. On some amps, it sounds good everywhere near enough, so it's not really worth worrying about.

Even on a picky-to-dial amp, it doesn't take long.

The hardest was the mesa mark. It has two eq's but once I understood that one was pre distortion, one post, it was still quite easy.