What's the Tone Control For?

Most players seem to have either questions or a misunderstanding on why and how to use their guitar and amp tone controls, so don't feel bad if you do too. Sure they're the place that you shape your overall guitar tone (amp tone too), but tone controls can be so much more.  

First of all, you want to adjust the tone controls so that all the notes of your instrument speak evenly.  That is, no note or group of notes are way louder or softer than any other.    On a guitar this might sound something like the low end is really too boomy when you play a Les Paul or something with humbucking pickups through your amp setup, but it's nice and even with a Strat or something that has single coil pickups.  Or the other way around where the Paul sounds balanced while the Strat sounds light on the low end.  In this case, adjusting either the bass or mid controls on the amp will make sure that all notes are equal in level.  

Another situation might be where the mid-range is so bright and strident that it tears your head off, but it's close to the sound you like.  In this case, it's great to have the flexibility of a parametric tone control if available.  Sweep the frequency until you find the band of frequencies that's too loud, narrow the bandwidth until just that frequency is affected, then lower it.  You're tone will remain pretty much the same but the offending frequency will be lowered so it's balanced with the rest.  This is also a big thing with basses, where one note on the neck is so much louder than everything else.  

But where these controls really shine is in the context of the band (either live or in the studio).  You want to be sure that every instrument is distinctly heard and the only way to do that is to be sure that each one has it's own frequency space.  It's especially important with two guitar players with similar instruments and amps (something like two Les Pauls and two Marshalls would be the worse case scenario).  Then you have to shape you sounds so that one guitar occupies a higher frequency register and the other is in a lower register.  This might mean that the lead guitar is has more high end while the rhythm guitar is fatter sounding.  Or both guitars might have different mid-range peaks.   Plus, the guitars have to sit in a different frequency space than the bass and drums (and keys, percussion, horns, etc. if you have them), so you alter your tone controls to make this happen.  

This all takes a while to dial in, so don't get discouraged if it doesn't happen right away.  Listen closely to some big selling CD/mp3s and you'll hear how everything is layered and you'll get the idea.  

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A long-time veteran of the music industry, Bobby Owsinski has produced and composed for records, motion pictures and television shows along the way. Currently a principle in the DVD production house Surround Associates and content creator 2B Media, Bobby has also penned hundreds of articles for many popular industry trade publications and has authored several books that are now staples in recording programs in colleges around the world including "The Mixing Engineer's Handbook", "The Recording Engineer's Handbook", "The Audio Mastering Handbook", "The Drum Recording Handbook", and "How To Make Your Band Sound Great".   A frequent moderator, panelist and program producer of a variety of industry conferences, Bobby has served as the longtime producer of the annual Surround Music Awards, and is one of the executive producers for the "Guitar Universe" and "Favorite Music of the Stars" television programs. Visit Bobby's Blog at http://bobbyowsinski.blogspot.com/ and his website at http://bobbyowsinski.com