Originally Posted by: michaelwharrisI have a Mesa Boogie Fillmore 50 and today I finally got my hands on my dream Strat, the Eric Clapton Arist Edition. Admittedly, I haven't ever spent a lot of time fiddling with knobs on a guitar, but I'd really like to get that warm, mellow, slow blues sound that Clapton is know for on songs like Driftin'.
Any tips you can provide on where I should position the knobs on the guitar to get close to that sound would be appreciated. I will test and try out some things myself, but given that the toggle switch can also affect tone I'd hoped that someone here might've already found some great settings.
Thanks.
I see this went unanswered for a few days but if you return to this, a few things that will help.
Here's a great guide to Fender pickups, switch and knob controls: Link >>
For Driftin' Blues, a lot of this is played solely on the neck pickup (position 5) or the combination of the neck/middle (position 4). The 'closer' to the neck you get, the more mellow tone you'll get and it has that slightly hollow-y vibe. As far as Tone controls, Clapton tended to roll off the tone control (from being at 10) to ssomewhere between 2 and 3. He likes to roll out the brightness coming from the guitar.
Though we all know how volume knobs work on a guitar, there's a lot of confusion on tone knobs and their power. When a tone knob is set at 10, all frequencies from the pickup are coming through and is generally letting through a brighter sound. By rolling off (turning down) the tone knob, you are removing high frequencies. This nets a smoother tone and sounds.
Granted, that also must match up with your amp tone too as it's kind of an ecosystem of electronic things (guitar/amp/effects/various knobs) that make the sum total of the sound.
If tried to figure out that tone for Clapton, I'd set the pick slector to position 5 (neck only) and dial in the amp with only a little bit of overdrive. First fiddle with your amp. That's where you're going to net the most of your tone/sound. It will take some messing around but fool around with the amount of overdrive but this number is not very distorted. Depending on the amp, set all the tone controls at 5 (12 o'clock) and start adjusting. If you have a 3 knob tone control set up on the amp, roll the mid back to about 3 and then roll up the high and bass above 5 (spice to taste). This messing about might get you close.
The guitar tone control is a fine tuner for tone. It's like when you see a finished, decorated cake, after all the work to bake and decorate, that one knife that smooths it all out and makes it look perfect? That's the guitar's tone control.
That's my two cents. I hope that helps.
