Amp up high, guitar down low?

koneguitarist · August 2013

I think with certain amps especially you have to play them as much as you play the guitar, as they also become an instrument. Old non master volume Marshalls for instance. But as ICBM said, it depends on the setup you use. I love using my volume and tone control on my Esquire, but struggle like hell with Gibsons( partly down to pot placement), but have allways thought Fender guitars had better controls to start with than Gibson, now I know how to tweak things to suit me, I don't have so many issues. Surprised how many people still just use effects or boost switch on amp to get their change.

ICBM · August 2013

Dave_Mc said:

sounds good. I think I've heard before (correct me if I'm wrong) that as well as helping with keeping treble as the volume control is turned down, it makes the tone control have a smaller sweep (or something like that)?

Not quite - it makes the volume and tone controls much more interactive as Adam said - so sometimes you need to readjust one when you've changed the other. Some people find this annoying - I would guess this is why Gibson changed it.

It also depends to an extent on your guitar cable - which is the actual cause of the treble loss because it has a capacitance itself just like the tone cap (but smaller). The lower the capacitance of the cable, the less difference there is between modern and 50s.

RocknRollDave · August 2013

EricTheWeary said:

For some reason I was thinking about a guy I used to know who was a really good blues-rock guitarist (he had played with John Mayall amongst others) and he used to have his amp (some kind of Vox head he had or whatever was to hand) wacked up stupidly loud but then his guitar volume knobs (he used Guilds with buckers IIRC) always down at about 5. I first twigged to this when he borrowed my stuff for a jam and then set it up like that. I played my strat through my little Mustang with the guitar on about 4 earlier today with the amp turned up fairly loud and it sounded really good, if maybe lacking bite on the top strings.
Anybody here routinely play like this? That is with the guitar on about 5, never turning up anywhere near 10.

I've always been an "everything on 10 on the guitar" person, myself, but very recently watched a Warren Haynes video where he was demonstrating the exact thing you talk about here - and the tone he was producing with both the vol and tone knobs of his LP down as far as 5 was exactly the tone I have been after, so I tried it with my PRS yesterday, which has 2 x Tonerider humbuckers in...and it sounded glorious! Trying it out live on Friday for the first time.....

mike_l · August 2013

I believe David Gilmour uses low-output pup's for similar reasons, Ie he lets the amp, and outboard gear set the tone, rather than having the pup's set the tone and not be able to vary it as much.

Incidentally, I like to roll back the volume, but usually set things at somewhere between 6-7 or full up. I also like to tweak the tone pots.

Depending on the guitar.

Dave_Mc · August 2013

Adam_MD said:

I found it has a much better taper than when it was modern. With modern wiring I turned it down a little and the treble rolled off very quickly. The 50s wiring is usable all the way down, the change being much more gradual. It also interacts with the volume control really nicely. Sometimes with the volume down when I roll the tone back up you get more volume, its hard to describe but on my les Paul I really like it.
I did, however, try it on my tele and changed it back pretty quick I preferred the sweep better with modern. How much is down to the pickups and how much to the guitar I don't know. I keep meaning to try it on my strat to see which I prefer with it (master tone with dummy tone pot not wired to anything).

Thanks- that sounds like I'd like it. That's the thing I'm not too keen on tone knobs, as you say, often they're all or nothing very quickly. Even better quality pots etc. suffer (though normally not just as much). I normally only really use the tone knob on guitars that really need them (like teles) for that reason.

You make a good point about the style of guitar maybe playing a part, too- you hear about 50s wiring a lot on Gibson-style guitars, but not so much on Fender-style guitars...

RocknRollDave · August 2013

RocknRollDave said:

EricTheWeary said:

For some reason I was thinking about a guy I used to know who was a really good blues-rock guitarist (he had played with John Mayall amongst others) and he used to have his amp (some kind of Vox head he had or whatever was to hand) wacked up stupidly loud but then his guitar volume knobs (he used Guilds with buckers IIRC) always down at about 5. I first twigged to this when he borrowed my stuff for a jam and then set it up like that. I played my strat through my little Mustang with the guitar on about 4 earlier today with the amp turned up fairly loud and it sounded really good, if maybe lacking bite on the top strings.
Anybody here routinely play like this? That is with the guitar on about 5, never turning up anywhere near 10.

I've always been an "everything on 10 on the guitar" person, myself, but very recently watched a Warren Haynes video where he was demonstrating the exact thing you talk about here - and the tone he was producing with both the vol and tone knobs of his LP down as far as 5 was exactly the tone I have been after, so I tried it with my PRS yesterday, which has 2 x Tonerider humbuckers in...and it sounded glorious! Trying it out live on Friday for the first time.....

Further to my post above, I played the entire gig like this last night and it was a total revelation! Best live tone I've ever had but moreover such a HUGE difference in picking dynamics just by altering my attack. Really widened the parameters, it's totally shocked me.

This was, admittedly, a humbucking guitar in a trio format so tonight I'm trying the same thing with my Tele in my regular two-guitar line-up and I'm not expecting quite such marked results...but fingers crossed...

EricTheWeary · August 2013

There is a Haynes interview in the new Guitarist and it is mentioned. Just with my bit of experimentation and gorilla fist style playing there is definitely a difference in the dynamics, although it wouldn't suit every style.

axisus · August 2013

I like to use volume and tone all the time, and often have vol at 5ish. I don't go for effects at all other than reverb and delay, I prefer to get one sound I like and alter it with vol and tone.

rockmonster · August 2013

I'm a heathen I use the volume pots on all my guitars flat out and use the amp channels to give me the boosts I need. I don't have much time to bugger about with volume pots in my band. Occasionally I turn the guitar vol down for a bit of slide!

PolarityMan · August 2013

Im another vol and tone on full guy. Everything else just sounds worse.

jaygtr · August 2013

PolarityMan;21644" said:
Im another vol and tone on full guy. Everything else just sounds worse.

Me too, I've been trying it for the last wek or so and I can't get it to work.

The only thing that works for me is half volume for rhythm and flat out for lead.

Although I haven't tried any of this at gigging volumes yet, which might be why.

markjwgraham · September 2013

This is a great way to learn how to use the controls on your guitar to 'remotely control' tonal aspects of the amp. It takes time to get an understanding of this, but with great single channel amps this really works a treat.

I have a love affair with great single channel amps, and I love how you can get so many different tones out of just one, single channel amp... but most people don't bother to learn how to do this. They just buy a basic amp and loads of pedals. It's allegedly easier, but I think you just end up in this cycle of 'it doesn't sound right.. must buy more gear to fix it!'... and without the amp and guitar combination working together WITHOUT pedals, then it's fighting a losing battle.

Such is my love affair for single channel amps, I'm actually setting up a website dedicated to getting great tone out of single channel amps - www.singlechannelamp.com - the site is not 100% ready yet, but there is already content available (free of course!) that you can get just for signing up. I want to create a resource for people going over and demystifying that mentality of 'all you need is a great single channel amp' ... while this is true, I think it is oversimplistic and makes the idea of a single channel amp being 'all you need' a bit of a mystery to many.

If you love single channel amps or want to learn more about them, please do sign up at www.singlechannelamp.com - the more people get involved, the more I can create content tailored to what people want. If you love amps, just sign up, you'll be really glad that you did!

ICBM · September 2013

Some single-channel amps look like channel-switching amps. I'm not trying to be funny, this is a serious point

.

There are some channel-switchers which genuinely use two different audio paths - this has the advantage that each can be optimised for the type of sound you're going for, typically some sort of Fendery clean channel with few gain stages and the EQ near the beginning, and some sort of Marshally overdrive channel with more gain stages and the EQ near the end. I used to think this was better because it's close to "two amps in the same box", so you can dial in the sound you want on each with the minimum compromise. The downside is that the amp can sometimes seem to have too little character of its own.

But there are other "channel switchers" which use basically the same audio path, with extra boost stages and controls switched in to give the dirty 'channel'. These usually involve more compromises in the design and often in the way you use them, but they sound more characterful and distinctive, to me.

And then there are some (rare) amps which use exactly the same audio path and number of gain stages for both channels, but simply allow you to switch between two different sets of control networks and preset voicing adjustments - essentially, you're using a single channel amp but you can set it in two different ways with a footswitch. To me this gives you almost as much flexibility as the independent-channel amps, but with as much character as a single-channel amp... because it really is one.

The difficulty is that unless you can see the schematic it can sometimes be very hard to tell them apart - even stuff like separate EQ doesn't give it away, it depends how it's done inside. And do you count a switchable single-channel amp as a channel-switcher or not? (I suspect you do, but is it right to?)

EricTheWeary · September 2013

And, sort of conversely,switchable channel amps that get used as single channel amps. In lots and lots of interviews I have read guitarists who only use one channel of a two or multi channel amp. There is a desire to make two channel amps sound like two different amps but they often end up sounding like one decent sounding amp and one not so decent sounding amp. So in the low to mid budget range there are very few single channel amps because channel switching is seen as such a desirable feature. Yet a single channel amp made for the same money might be more focused and actually sound better.My case in point would be the Orange TT - okay it had the lunchbox thing going on but basically a single channel, relatively affordable valve amp that did one thing well and these sold by the shedload.

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Amp up high, guitar down low?

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