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Tone Robbers - by Gary "Sarge" Gistinger

Time to face the Tone Robbers.  They are many.  They are insidious.  They don’t give a second thought about your tone. They are ever ready to rip you off. Many of them are so subtle that you may not even notice their strangling effects.

 How many can you name and defeat?

Well, we need to start at the start. This lecture may get a bit lengthy, but follow along anyway. To get a grasp of how the tone robbers get away with their antics we need to look at the “math equation” that is set up by the instrument, cable, pedals and amp.

We will be referencing electric guitars with passive pickups throughout this lesson, and this applies to any instrument with pickups. When you get into active pickup situations, the problem gets much more complicated. So for the purpose of keeping this in perspective we shall focus on how passive instrument components fit in to the theme. Any time an instrument is “plugged in” a vast array of things begin to happen to the signal quality.

First off, most guitar pickups range in impedances of about 4-5K ohms with the single coils found in guitars like Teles upwards to about 16K ohms on hot wound humbuckers. The second number in the equation is the value of the volume pot….typically 250K or 500K. You all know that when you “roll back” your volume the high end treble gets duller. This is because with the volume pot all the way up it acts like straight wire. Roll it back and the 250/500K ohm resistance starts combining with the cable capacitance setting up a frequency dependant RC filter which saws into your signal level and the frequency response of the instrument! Volume pots = rip your tone off! Bad guy volume pot!

Next we focus on the deadly effect of the cable capacitance. This is a BIG ROBBER! There have been 500 million cable debates and most of it ends up being just another debate. ALL instrument cables have capacitance…the key is to find cable with a very low capacitance value. There is a lot of quality cable out there, but you have to think of it in terms of how it fits into the “math problem” rather than how it looks, feels, or blabs about its “greatness.” We have shot out every kind of cable we could and our pick is the .155 George L’s. Check them out on the web. We have tested the various “lift the shield at one end” and every other type of custom cable situations. Bottom line is this…you need two conductors to carry signal. Between the two conductors is some kind of insulating material, which equals capacitance. The longer the cable the more effect on the signal…just plain old physics! Cable is the #1 tone killer, and not necessarily because it is bad cable! The plot thickens when you look closer at the “math problem!”

So far, so good? Catch your breath….more “lecture” to follow!

After the cable comes pedals, more cable, and somewhere, an amp or two or three! Sound like it gets bad? Indeed it can, but there is hope with the right understanding. Watch this!

Pedals range all over the map on how they “jack” with your tone…of course we can’t say “effect” your tone because that is what they are supposed to do. Big difference between purposely dealing with the guitar signal and tone robbing it! Some pedals are very thoughtfully designed and are great at what they do, while others have no real consciousness of the damage they can do because of their inherent electronic component configurations. We all have heard about the “true bypass” legends and fables…I’m sure you get the point. As the pedal board grows, so does the interaction of all the electronics. Add to the problem poor quality power supplies for the pedals and things get really out of hand!

More cable and finally the AMP! The good news here is that most amps have a fairly high impedance of 1-2M ohms, and that is what we need to negate the tone robber effect. BUT, it still can be problematic as it too must be considered to be part of the “math.”

All right, now to review:

PICK UPS + VOLUME POT + CABLE + PEDALS / POWER SUPPLIES + CABLE + AMP =

A VERY COMPLEX MATH PROBLEM INDEED!

Now dig this! Electricity is basically “dumb.” It can’t tell the difference between left or right and quite frankly doesn’t care about “logical” signal flow. Signal flows from the guitar to the amp as we understand it, BUT we need to keep in mind the ENTIRE electronic circuit (THE MATH EQUATION!).  With all of the components hooked together a situation arises that produces COUNTER ELECTRO-MAGNETIC FORCE. Electricity is also very lazy…you know, the path of least resistance thing. The counter EMF that arises out of the equation is THE TONE KILLER EXTRAORDINAIRE! What happens is the instrument is “loaded” by the EMF created by the rest of the signal chain, and a corresponding frequency roll off specified by the “math” of the circuit results. This leads to muddy and dull tone, and usually a very pronounced high frequency loss. The higher the frequency the more roll off!  The tone is usually pretty good even from mediocre pickups…  The problem is that the tone is shot in the foot before it gets “out” of the guitar.  Most of the other stuff in the chain is ‘cloaking and choking’ the pickups, and correspondingly, the strings as they vibrate. You know that more times than not, guitars and amps just don’t sing out as well as we know they can.

Still with me?  What can we do about this?

USE THE BEST LOW-CAPACITANCE CABLE YOU CAN for starters! Keep your strings clean and changed often! Pay attention to TONE and not just volume. With due care and concern you can get great tone. And we can help…in a BIG WAY.

OK, here comes the pitch.

CREATION AUDIO LABS (that would be us), has developed a very special circuit that not only deals with the counter EMF, but is totally transparent and ultra linear as well. The REDEEMER gives you back what has been robbed for all this time…..most likely, we have never REALLY heard what our guitars sounded like until now. You will be surprised! TheREDEEMER INSTALL UNIT is a very small but extremely powerful device that was born out of necessity on a bigger, upcoming guitar product. The specs surprised even us! (And we are PRO AUDIO donkeys!) The REDEEMER, in conjunction with George L’s cable provides the best in killer tone. See more information about the REDEEMER INSTALL at www.creationaudiolabs.com for the rest of the story and take a look at who has them.

Don’t be like the LAZY electricity!  Keep your stuff clean and PAY ATTENTION!  Be a “jack amp” about your tone, or just be a “dumb amp”.  TONE DONKEYS blow it out their amp, will kick you in the amp, and have BIG……….Ears! (You WEREN’T thinking something else were you? Remember to keep it clean!)

Sarge