Tone control
The knob that shunts high frequencies from the pickups to ground through a capacitor, making the sound darker as it is turned down.
It is a passive low-pass filter: capacitor value sets which frequencies start to be removed and the pot's resistance decides how much of that removal happens at each setting. Because it works by throwing away signal, turning the tone down also reduces the output slightly, though the effect is subtle. Players use it less as a tone adjustment and more as a continuous shift between two characters, especially on a neck pickup under distortion.
Example: rolling a bridge humbucker's tone control back a third of the way thickens a lead sound without touching the amplifier.
See also
Related
- PageTreble bleed
- PageCapacitor
- PageActive pickup
- PageAlnico
- PageBlade pickup
- PageAaron Dessner
- PageAce Frehley
- PageAd-Rock