Tone control rants

[rockhorst]

I'm getting more and more into 'no tone control' pedals/amps. My TS pedal has an internal trimpot as tone control, find a good spot and leave it there. For me, the less options, the better. Give me level/volume and drive/gain and I'm usually pretty happy. I do like Baxandall circuits sometimes. Tone controls sometimes seem like a marketing thing to me.

I was at a 65 Amps demo a year ago and their 'bump switch' basically is a tone stack bypass. Full, warm sweetness. I read somewhere that 'treble and bass all the way down, mids all the way up' essentially gives you the amps own sound. Since then, I've tried that on every amp I play on, and I've been happy ever since. I do a lot of jam sessions, and its remarkable to see what happens when you switch guitarists: next player plugs in, walks to the amp and start tweeking the EQ knobs, without having played a single note! Pavlov all the way. Why not have all the pedals/amps just put out their unattenuated signal and have one single master EQ pedal, if you really must? All that filtering, can't be good for your signal.

Anyway, share your tone control rants if you feel like it. I'm curious.

Edit: this being a rant, don't flame me if I do put in a tone control in my next pedal  

[amptramp]

Some circuits create harmonics that may sound shrill without some bandwidth restriction at the top end or muddy without some restriction at the low end.  Tone controls are added to permit the user to customize the amount of shrillness and get a unique sound.  You may find that if a particular pedal does not have some sort of tone control, the result may be acceptable with one guitar but not another or may acceptable with the pedal in one location in the series string of pedals but not another.  The manufacturer has to take all of this into account in the design.  Plus, the more controls you have, the more valuable some guitarists think it is and they have to cater to the customers.  At least, the tone control allows you to have a unique setting.  You mention a trimpot for the TS tone, so you still have a tone control set to where you like it - you just don't have manual control without taking it apart.

You have to take a systems approach with your pedal chain and determine whether all the combinations of pedals on or bypassed, do you have the amount of control over bandpass without adding any excess controls?

[Mark Hammer]

Not everybody plays their amp full tilt for always-on grind.  Many players have their amp set for clean, for rhythm playing, and then kick in an overdrive for solos.  Since the clean amp setting likely has nice bright tone, and the overdrive adds harmonic content, you probably want a tone control to "prepare" the overdrive tone so that it sounds decent into the amp.

My little 5F2-A Princeton has a volume and tone, and when the volume is near full tilt, the treble accentuation of the tone control doesn't function, so its just volume.  Sounds great, but its not exactly amenable to all kinds of material.  That's why you want a tone control...sometimes.

And as a side-note, yeah, if you download the Duncan tonestack calculator, and look at the spectrum as you diddle with the virtual controls, treble and bass down flat, with the mids up most of the way is pretty close to flat, at least as far as the tone controls are concerned.   The amp may well introduce some other tone-shaping elsewhere, but you've effectively negated what the tone controls are doing, at least.

I've mentioned this mod before, but it bears repeating.  If you look at a standard Fender-type T/M/B tonestack, you will see that the Middle pot is essentially a variable resistance between ground and the rest of the network.  As the resistance is decreased, you bleed off more mids.  Increase the resistance, and the signal becomes primarily lower mids.  But resistances don't have to stop at 25k.  If you lift the ground connection of the mid-pot (or the fixed resistor in those instances where only a treble and bass control are provided), you essentially cancel the entire tone network (though a little bit of control over the treble remains, but vastly reduced).  Eliminating the bleed-off also increases the overall signal amplitude, too, providing more drive to subsequent stages.

I did the mod to an old blackface Tremolux I had years ago.  Easy to do, and sounded great.  The md will work for any Fender-style tonestack in a pedal, too.  Doesn't have to be an amp.

[rockhorst]

Cool info Mark, thanks. I can see why tone stacks can be useful and how it adds some tweakability, but very little consumers realize that not every tone stack is the same, in combination with any given amp (and it took me a couple of years to find that out as well).

I couldn't figure out how to bypass the tone control on my TS, otherwise I would've tried it. Someday 

[liquids]

I'd love to see you try an old Ampeg, especially something like a V4/V2.  the EQ is passive baxandall/flat at noon, with active mid cut/boost at 1 of 3 frequencies (tube driven) and they're about as clean as you can take it.  IF you Set all three EQ knobs midway and see if THAT is your tone.  I bet not...but maybe.  

Not all amps are 'flattest' EQ set 1-10-1 either.  That's a blackface fender 'thing'/semi-myth and it's not even entirely true...not to mention that no guitar speaker is flat by any means, so put that in the mix and you'll never have a colorless tonality....  Even My 'flat' car stereo sounds like poop without EQ/panning/etc.  

I supposed I both agree and disagree with you - in that I think most tone controls are poor at being much more than a compromise and often not too well understood or thought out, but I don't think eliminating them is always the ideal solution.  Sometimes removing the tone control(s) IS a percieved tonal improvement, however, I think improving and understanding them is the ideal solution.  

I have an amp that I've modded to have a tone stack bypass...and....well.....I basically never use the bypass except for 'that sound' which I personally don't consider the 'best' sound the amp has to offer. 

I've never played a 'harmonics enhancing' (OD, Fuzz, Distortion, whatever you call it) pedal that I liked with no EQ...unless I designed it and tweaked it myself, for myself.     It's quite hard for a piece of gear that affects frequencies etc, to seamlessly work alongside other sounds (over time) without some control over said piece of gears texture, tonality, and frequencies.  But if you have nothing to compare it to (i.e. other instruments to mesh with, or another pedal to stomp on afterward in your practice room) than who needs a tone control? Then, it either sounds 'good' or 'bad;' you can keep the former, scrap the latter.  As a counterpoint, some of us like to adjust continually between the two.    There's no right or wrong here persay...it's highly relative to what it's compared to.

As a soundman etc...just try to find the 'flat' mic position for that 'flat frequencied' mic you're using.  

I can see why tone stacks can be useful and how it adds some tweakability, but very little consumers realize that not every tone stack is the same, in combination with any given amp (and it took me a couple of years to find that out as well).

Totally.  

[slacker]

I couldn't figure out how to bypass the tone control on my TS, otherwise I would've tried it. Someday  

Just remove the tone pot.
Worth bearing in mind that there's a lot of tone shaping in a TS before you even get to the tone control.

[bluesman1218]

Just for the record, a tube amp is SUPPOSED to color your sound. Fender amps are/were actually designed to be played with Fender guitars. Almost everything in the amp contributes to its specific sound. Just taking it down to the really bare essence. 

[rockhorst]

Just removing the tone pot sorta left the pedal defective.
I just felt the need to rant Nice to see some discussion.  And I'm actually learning from it too!

[sault]

Well, you do need some degree of versatility. The maxim I've heard repeated is that every step in your signal chain is EQ... everything from pickups to picks, pedals to speakers, it's all going to affect your final tone. Having the ability to tweak to some degree, to compensate for changes in gear or style is important, I think, even if I'm not wild about the way its done sometimes.

I like the FMV stack because its familiar. What I don't like about it is that it doesn't give me much actual control - I don't know where the corner frequencies are necessarily as I go from amp to amp, I can't control the degree of insertion loss, and I can't bypass it if that's what I'd prefer!

In an ideal world, I'd want tone controls on my tubes and at least a 7-band active EQ on the amp. But since those are as much pipe dreams as guitars coming stock with onboard buffer preamps, then I'd have to settle for...

... a "deluxe" version of the FMV tone stack. Stay with me on this.

The Bass, Mid, and Treble knobs still function as a normal FMV tone, but the Bass knob and Treble knob are concentric... the "outer" Bass knob is a high-pass filter, the "outer" Treble knob is a low-pass filter, and the Middle knob can be pulled out to bypass the whole tone stack.

Now THAT, my friends, would be one hell of a tone stack! Even with just the Middle knob doubling as a bypass, man, even just that would be killer... Hmmm... now that I mention it, it wouldn't necessarily be that hard to wire up, I think...



Sault

[slacker]

Just removing the tone pot sorta left the pedal defective.

It shouldn't do, simply removing the pot should sound pretty much the same as setting the tone pot to 12 o'clock.

[R.G.]

Tone controls are part of the musical instrument in guitar amplifier setups. It's important not to get too carried away with any one setting, even if that setting is "no tone controls".

For a really eye-opening session with tone controls, locate two of the graphic EQ pedals or one of the home hifi stereo graphic EQ units. Plug one EQ in front of a distortion, another after it and play with it. The EQ ahead of the distortion sets up what frequencies get distorted, the one after shapes the distortion. Most guitar players will get utterly fascinated with all the magic sounds they can get out.

[sault]

RG +1.

One of my favorite things about having a rackmount setup is that the EQ units are a lot better, dollar for dollar, than any pedal EQ you can buy. For under 200$ you can get a stereo 13-band EQ... which makes for easy pre- and post-distortion experimentation. Can't build that into a guitar amp, and I suppose you probably wouldn't want to... but still, pretty freakin' sweet to have that kind of control.

EQ is a lot of fun. I can still remember how happy I was when I got a respectable "Metal Zone"-ish tone out of a Behringer Fab Tone, just by putting a Boss GE-7 (7 band graphic EQ) after it. Fuzz pedals are good like that, if they aren't already drastically EQ'd, like the Big Muff.

I'm always conscious of the larger mix and how to fit each instrument together (from from a recording and live music standpoint, I've done both) that I consistently keep wishing that guitar amps had better tone controls... ie, more precise tone controls.

I keep day-dreaming of a solid-state tube replacement that *would* have EQ built in! I would love to have a simple switch where I could toggle a 150hz-ish highpass for instance, right from the power tubes. Would make mixing soooo much easier! Between that and a switchable 400 hz "contour" cut to keep the guitar from mudding up the whole mix.... heaven.... *sigh*

Mmm... solid-state tube replacement...


Sault

[rockhorst]

I'm always conscious of the larger mix and how to fit each instrument together (from from a recording and live music standpoint, I've done both) that I consistently keep wishing that guitar amps had better tone controls... ie, more precise tone controls.

Sidestepping: one of my biggest revelations was yanking out the tone controls in a MIM stratocaster. Like taking a blanket of you guitar.
Back to amps/fx: I guess I'm gonna spent a couple of afternoons breadboarding tone controls soon.

[JDoyle]

Just removing the tone pot sorta left the pedal defective.

It shouldn't do, simply removing the pot should sound pretty much the same as setting the tone pot to 12 o'clock.

Actually - it isn't the same. For this to even kinda-sorta work you will need a DPDT to 'true bypass' the tone control, leaving it connected at either of the pot's outer lugs will keep it in circuit and turn it into a passive tone control or a sort of control for gain. And even if you DO true bypass it with a DPDT, when it is out of circuit the input impedence to the opamp goes to 10k from 6k7 reducing loading and slightly boosting the signal.

To properly bypass the tone control insert a SPST switch in series with the wiper of the pot; where it is in the string doesn't matter, all that matters is that you lift the connection from the tone pot's wiper to ground - somewhere - putting the switch before, after or in between the 0.22uF/220 cap/resistor will all create the same end result.

Regards,

Jay Doyle

[slacker]

Yeah you're right I hadn't thought it through properly. Removing it shouldn't break the pedal though which is what rockhorst said had happened.