Learn what your guitar tone controls actually do, and how understanding EQ and frequencies helps you shape a better sound!
View the full lesson at justinguitar.com/guitar-lessons/guitar-amp-pedal-tone-controls-finally-explained-gtq-0001
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This is perfect! Just what Iāve needed. Too many times Iāve just fiddled with the controls not really understanding what they do and how they work together to control my sound.
FAFO ? Never heard about that very technical method, but I was definitely using itā¦ 
On a serious note, thanks ! My amp sounds better now.
Next step : how to go up to level 11 ? 
Thatās been my method. Iām hoping to have time on Sunday to go through this video and see if I can make my relatively inexpensive amp (Fender Champion 20) sound better. I think one problem is that it only has treble and bass controls. No mids. Another problem is the guitarist!
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Great discussion and explanation! I appreciate you emphasizing that some adjustments make a subtle difference, I just thought I was tone deaf!
What are your guitar tone and volume knob settings? I try to keep mine at about 8; however, the guitar volume knob can vary widely based on my Katana Artist Preset, especially if itās a downloaded preset.
Oops! Should have waited until the end of the lessonā¦
I could never quite get the tone on my Fender Champion 40 where I wanted it. I could get close, but it always felt a little thin/anemic to me, even using settings that provided more gain or crunch. SO MUCH time adjusting things (and too many things at that) and never quite being happy.
I changed it out for a Fender Blues Jr. and couldnāt be happier. It just has more fullness and complexity to the tone and is more responsive to my own picking/strumming dynamics. Iāve mostly settled on my tone controls in a similar range as what Justin illustrates. Recently got my first OD pedal and am going through the process of getting a grasp on how the tone and other controls affect tone. And having that pedal is also convincing me to change my amp controls a bit. Cleaner base tone on the amp and add dirt with the pedal.
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Come on people, own upā¦ I canāt be the only person who just has all the dials set to max!
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I look forward to learning more about effects using distortion, gain, and drive in an effort to duplicate tones used by the Doors and others.
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Great lesson, really helpful, and just in time when I am exploring this a lot. 
One question from me:
We learnt in theory course that the guitar open stringsā frequencies range from 82Hz (low E) to 330Hz (high E). It was never clear to me how can these strings produce 4000Hz, 5000Hz, 6000Hz etc. frequencies which Justin explained are only start of treble frequencies. Would anyone have explanation how native guitar string frequencies relate to EQ frequencies? Is it amp/gear that somehow changes these?
I think you missed a digit. High E on a guitar (E6) is approx. 1318 Hz.
Justin briefly covers it in this video.
The 1318 Hz of high E is just the āfundamentalā, which is the main, and loudest, frequency.
Unless you are talking about pure sine wave generators, which guitar strings are not, you will always have other frequencies present. These are known as āovertonesā or āharmonicsā and are multiples of the fundamental frequency.
So, if you play a āconcert Aā (A4) which, with standard tuning, is on fret 5 of the high E string, that creates a fundamental note at 440Hz. But it will also create a harmonic at 880Hz (2x), 1320 Hz (3x), 1760 Hz (4x), 2200Hz (5x) and so on.
If you look at E6, the 5th harmonic is around 6593 Hz.
These frequencies will be at a lower level and, as they are mixed with the other notes, they wonāt be individually detectable. But, instead, they change the ātimbreā of the note.
It is these overtones that shape the tone of the guitar and which make it sound different from the same note played on a piano, or a flute.
Cheers,
Keith
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Thank you very much Keith!
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I enjoyed this lesson too.
I would greatly appreciate a lesson (series) about signal chains. I.e. how to combine different pedals (or their digital emulations) in a sequence.
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+1 for a great lesson! I hope Justin covers some āapplied tone shapingā e.g. get close to the tone of a particular song using his guitar and amp. I know our kit will be different, but I think I can learn a lot from seeing what he changes and why e.g. less/more mid; more gain etc.
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Yes @Beatup6String , I exactly had the same request after watching the video. āApplied tone shapingā would be so useful. To get this tone, we would need to add more bass etc.
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Boris is right Keith. The open high-e string is 329Hz. Boris specified the open string frequencies.
In the video at 2:00 Justin says "a standard guitar covers a really wide range from about 80Hz to up around 5kHz. And up to 15kHz when you include harmonics".
Heās right about the harmonics, but wrong about the guitar going up to 5kHz. No guitar is producing fundamentals anywhere near 5kHz. For example, the highest note playable on my 22 fret Strat is D6 (1174Hz).
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Ah, I missed the āopen stringsā bit. Fair enough.
Yes, I was working on E6 being about the highest note you could play on most guitars which, as you say, is well under 5kHz.
Cheers,
Keith
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I didnāt want to correct as it was obvious Keith was talking about E6, not E4.
That confused me, I didnāt understand that part in respect of native string frequencies. Keithās explanation clarified everything.
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On an applied tone standpoint, I care less about āto get so-and-soās tone, do thisā and more about what to expect from different pedal types.
as a beginner, this was a challenge to wrap my head around. I have a rough idea about what a few different types can do. but the rest? absolutely clueless. would be handy to lump them into groups and then look at some specific differences
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Iām wondering how you are producing the audio of the guitar for the video if you are listening through headphones? Thx!