TONE... VOL... who knew!

markblack

Watched this...



Then spent the last week seeing what I could do with a tone controls. It was bit of an eye opener. I wouldn't say I was an all on ten guy, but I didn't use them as much as I should of. 

I know, I know, this is pretty bloody obvious.

Bridgehouse

Just ask @miserneil about a LP Junior with just a tone and vol and the range of tones


(I'm a wimp and I have to have a Special with a neck pickup..)

DiscoStu

I saw a guy doing a YouTube demo a while back who was killer with the tone and volume knobs. I think he's well known, it wasn't an amateur vid and I think he was playing through a Dr Z amp. I'm sure someone will know the vid I'm talking about.

proggy

Interesting that. It's a shame most of us have become too reliant on pedals.

They are easier though.

stimpsonslostson

Bridgehouse said:

Just ask @miserneil about a LP Junior with just a tone and vol and the range of tones


(I'm a wimp and I have to have a Special with a neck pickup..)

I have an SG Jr. I set the amp for my dirty sound with the guitar vol & tone on 10, to get my clean sound I just roll off the controls on the guitar. 
I occaisionally use a Bad Monkey for a lead boost, but that's pretty rare as I'm terrible at lead playing. 

I'd also say that picking dynamics are hugely important- if there's one thing I try to carry over from my days as an acoustic player it's getting different sounds by attacking the strings or playing gently, pick or no pick, playing at the bridge or up towards the fretboard. It all makes a difference- I noticed Joe goes to finger picking when he wants a smoother tone.  

There's another good video on this somewhere I'll have a look for it. 

Edit: here it is. 2.30 is where he demonstrates the controls 

axisus

I'm in two minds over tone knobs. I've generally used them a fair bit, but my next guitar won't have one. It will need  2 knobs already and I don't want a third so tone has to go.

Alnico

Does it surprise anyone to know that my EMG 81/85 set up is very sensitive to volume and tone. It's 18v and it's set to be vol 7 as normal and up to 10 is incremental boost. The tone control is stupidly sensitive and itself has around 6 sounds i can use.
As soon as i'm off these strong meds and i can function properly, i'm fitting the two extra pots to have independent vol and tone for each pickup, it's that important on this guitar.

markblack

I had an old partscaster that I made into a single pickup - I wanted something different so I went single neck.

I haven't really played it much since I finished it, but I went super paired back - think it's time to dig it out.

Sassafras

I've always used the volume control but I only use tone control on one of my guitars to rein in some of the treble on the bridge pickup.
Generally, I'd be quite happy with no tone controls.
I absolutely hate the mushy cloying 'woman tone'. Almost as much as I hate chorus pedals.

TTBZ

I used to be "all on 10" for tone but changed this recently. The only time I use tone is on singlecoils / p90s. Currently have a neck p90 and I roll the tone down to 7 ish to make it blend with the bridge humbucker/emulate a humbucker a bit more, wind it up to 10 if I want the twangier singlecoil sound. Humbuckers I have no need for a tone, just makes things muddier. I use the volumes all the time, since I first got a single channel amp 10 years ago!

Bridgehouse

TTBZ said:

I used to be "all on 10" but changed this recently. The only time I use tone is on singlecoils / p90s. Currently have a neck p90 and I roll the tone down to 7 ish to make it blend with the bridge humbucker/emulate a humbucker a bit more, wind it up to 10 if I want the twangier singlecoil sound. Humbuckers I have no need for a tone, just makes things muddier. I use the volumes all the time. 

P90's were made for a good tone control I reckon.

Specially if you have neck and bridge - the blends can be really good and you can get a totally different sound (usable). Agree about humbuckers tho

Garthy

This place stuns me sometimes.

Rave

Garthy said:

This place stuns me sometimes.

Funny isn't it. People banging on about tonewoods, arguing over the slightest things affecting tone....but don't actually know how to use a guitar!

chris45

@stimpsonslostson have you any tips in making this work (dirty - 10; clean - roll off volume)?  I would like to do this but I can't get round the volume loss

ESBlonde

chris45 said:

@stimpsonslostson have you any tips in making this work (dirty - 10; clean - roll off volume)?  I would like to do this but I can't get round the volume loss

You need to have your volume clean on the amp at the level you would like it with the guitar on about 7, anything more and the amp progressivly breaks up. As the amp breaks up it doesn't get appreciably louder because the clipped amp tone gets steadily more compressed and the amp is already at it's clean limit. Of course this applys to live dynamics better than bedroom solo noodling although it does work in that context to a degree.

pintspiller

If Joe Bonnamassa says it's true, then it must be true.

Sassafras

We'll be seeing 'Joe Bonamassa tone & volume pots' any day now.

markblack

Rave said:

Garthy said:

This place stuns me sometimes.

Funny isn't it. People banging on about tonewoods, arguing over the slightest things affecting tone....but don't actually know how to use a guitar!

I think there's a stage where once you get good enough at playing you get to move onto other parts of the guitar. I've played for years, but only recently got into electrics more recently. Now that I feel I can 'play a bit' I've got more into the sound of the guitar, what it's really doing etc.

Yes I did go through a pedal stage because lets be honest PEDALS LOOK COOL! But I'm out the other side of that and curiosity has got me thinking about doing more with less.

I'd guess most people stay at 'all on ten' for a while as when your playing sounds s$%t who cares what a tone knob does

markblack

NEW! Joe Bonamassa fingers...

guitarfishbay

I disconnect my Tone pots. I know what they do and I know I don't need them with my setup - actually the extra high end from removing them helps and I'd rather not be able to accidentally run them lower. I also use a volume pedal as it is more convenient than a volume pot (but I don't want to give up an option to silence at the guitar). I set my gain so volume pedal on full is my rhythm and volume pedal low is my gritty clean. I use my clean channel for proper clean.

On bass I use Tone pots as sometimes less highs at source is helpful, though they're no load pots so on 10 they're essentially off. The Fender 250k no load pots have a click for full up which I think is useful, I'm not aware of equivalent 500k pots

mixolyd

I think part of the reason many don't use tone pots - or even volume - is that we learned to play on guitars with crap electronics.  As a lefty I have NEVER played a guitar with both tone and volume pots that work well.  Most volume pots are tone controls anyway.