the Trouble with Treble

[Donner]

I have always valued clear treble and for along really wanted it just shy of icepicky.....

But this week in playin the DRD and some others Ive really come to appreciate how treble can actually mask really nice midrange - and Id never thought of treble as anything other than postive ...

Im appreciating how detailed and dynamic the MIDRANGE is on the DRD ,SYOD and some others......... and how when your tone is built this way it just sounds better the louder you crank it .....

this is what I always loved about Van Halen and ZZTop records is you could never get them too loud ( well maybe as the Police are pulling into the driveway )

The SBEQ also facilitates this kind of dynamic mid EQ.....

just musing

[DocRock]

Makes sense, and if you think about it, guitar technically IS a midrange instrument, so.....

Useful musing, Donner!

Doc

[EyeFly]

I've known for some time that I was a "treble" junkie and hadn't really thought much about it. Your comments really hit home as I recently acquired a Mountain Dew EQ. (at a very reasonable price from a highly reputable seller) and have been experimenting with it. Had no prior experience with an EQ but have been amazed at the "shaping" capability especially with the mids. Found myself turning"down" the treble, which has never happened, and increasing the mids with both the HoneyBee and Model R; alone, and in combination.
I am now running it at the end of the chain. Seems to me that if I put it at the beginning, it influences the "signal" while, at the end, it influences the "sound" Does that make any sense?
Anway, hope one day to give the SBEQ a try as well. I will always have an EQ control on my board now. Seems much more functional than the controls on the amp.

cork

[cabo]

interesting,,,for the longest time I favored a clear midrange, less treble, I love the many different voices available in the mids. Now Im liking more and more treble.

for example before I would have the treble set almost all the way down on the DRD . Now my DRD treble needs to be above or around 12:00 to sound right in my rig.

Funny how the way we hear things can change over time and,,especially when your able to compare sounds side by side..

[racktifier]

this week in playin the DRD and some others Ive really come to appreciate how treble can actually mask really nice midrange - and Id never thought of treble as anything other than postive ...

Interesting post. When I was looking for a high gain pedal and had to choose between the MRD and the DRD, I chose the DRD because I felt there was a different midrange focus. The DRD had a push in the low mids which I thought made it sound more aggressive/beefier. Now whenever I watched Donner's videos, I realised that he would crank the treble on his DRD. But I was never satisfied with those settings on my own rig. So for the last few months, I've had the treble at about 8 or 9 o'clock. Great rock rhythm tones.

[ken]

I wonder if with "middle age hearing" we hear a little less of the highs, and
can mistakenly bring them a little higher than we need to - possibly to the detriment of the audience. In mixing my bands CD, my professional recording friend advised that I should bring down the high-mids (low-highs?) all the way around, as most recordings are really fairly subdued in that area for the younger audience.

[EyeFly]

Ken,

I have wondered that myself especially since younger members of my family and those not subjected to hazardous noise (amplified guitar music certainly qualifies as hazardous noise especially the way I play) hear all sorts of high pitched noises that go totally undetected by my ear

Both presbycucia (age related hearing loss) and loss due to noise generally start in the higher frequencies then march their way down to the range of the spoken voice.

Many women are frustrated that their husbands can hear other men but not them. Although it can be a case of "selective hearing", the male voice is lower and therefore more easlily understood by us old guys.

You have a very valid point and it may well explain why everything I own ends up with the bass setting at 10:00 and the treble setting at 2:00.

It would be a good experiment to have someone mix some tunes at age 25 then go back 25 years later and mix them again to see how perception changes.

cork

[Donner]

this week in playin the DRD and some others Ive really come to appreciate how treble can actually mask really nice midrange - and Id never thought of treble as anything other than postive ...

Interesting post. When I was looking for a high gain pedal and had to choose between the MRD and the DRD, I chose the DRD because I felt there was a different midrange focus. The DRD had a push in the low mids which I thought made it sound more aggressive/beefier. Now whenever I watched Donner's videos, I realised that he would crank the treble on his DRD. But I was never satisfied with those settings on my own rig. So for the last few months, I've had the treble at about 8 or 9 o'clock. Great rock rhythm tones.

Yes, actually this is kind of what brought this up to me........

Turns out I had accidently turned down the presence control on my amp a few months when I turned down the reverb (both are on the back next to each other) to use some verbs on the board rather than ampverb.... and have made a number of videos that way, (usually marked by when I started cranking the trebles ; ] thought I was going deaf)

I guess my ears adjusted and I really was enjoying those tones, and even after I figured out the presence control difference.... it was a revelation that the returned treble was covering the mids I had come to love - it was an odd realization and feeling - that the treble was getting in the way of enjoying t he mids for what they are............