Wah question...

HAL9000

At a blues jam night I go to fairly regularly, I normally set my amp with lots of mid, and not too much treble or bass. Now when I took along a wah pedal the other week, I noticed it wasn't giving as much effect as normal which at the time I assumed (without really thinking about it) was down to the battery getting a bit low on juice. However, giving it some thought, I'm guessing that the wah pedal was doing its job, but that turning the bass and treble down on the amp was preventing the full effect of the wah getting through. 

Now, I've found that lots of mids seems to be the way to go in a large room, but is probably not best suited to using a wah. 

Is this something you've noticed? And do you get round it by whacking up the treble and bass? Or something else? Thanks.

Guitarse

Have you got it set up in a chain with distortion? I find putting the wah before distortion gives a more 'up front' wah. 

ICBM

I find the way to go in a large room is just to use a bigger amp, and keep the bass and treble turned up. That "turn up the mids to cut through the mix" thing is the kiss of death for good guitar tone.

Seriously… too much mid and your amp does 'cut through', but at the expense of sounding small and boxy even if loud enough to be heard. If you add a wah as well there will be almost nothing left, it will sound like playing down a telephone line.

Or if a bigger amp isn't an option, keep the small one turned down to the point it can still produce enough bass and treble, and mic it up.

In my opinion… (with a 100W amp with the bass turned up full and the mid turned right down .)

Sassafras

Completely agree ICBM.

Roland

HAL9000 said:

... Is this something you've noticed? And do you get round it by whacking up the treble and bass? Or something else? 

Firstly, I always like to have some spare volume on hand so that the amp's not straining. However there is also an EQ difference as the volume increases. To some extent I can compensate by EQing what I send to the pa. 

It also depends on what sound you're using. For many years I've used different wah settings for clean and overdriven wah. My crunchy sound is quite mid heavy, and works well with a standard Cry Baby. With a more overdriven this can sound a bit harsh, so I use a Coloursound emulation which has a smoother EQ curve with less top end.

mike_l

For a jam night, you'd be better having a little of the mids pulled back, and when soloing have a lead boost kicked in.

Something like an SD-1, which will boost the mids, gain and volume. If you want to use a wah as well, then put this in front of the boost for the full effect.

viz

It's odd though becuase a wah, well my bad horsie anyway, seems to add quite a lot of gain to the signal, so unless you're on full compressed distortion, I'm surprised you're not hearing an increase in volume, especially through the boosted eq range as it sweeps.

One thing's for sure though, you know how when you're standing close to your amp, it doesn't sound the same as how it does to the audience? Particular frequencies seem lost, others seem boosted. Well that mismatch is amplified when you're using a wah.

Roland

A wah needs to add a bit of volume to compensate for what it's filtering out

mike_l

viz said:

It's odd though becuase a wah, well my bad horsie anyway, seems to add quite a lot of gain to the signal, so unless you're on full compressed distortion, I'm surprised you're not hearing an increase in volume, especially through the boosted eq range as it sweeps.

One thing's for sure though, you know how when you're standing close to your amp, it doesn't sound the same as how it does to the audience? Particular frequencies seem lost, others seem boosted. Well that mismatch is amplified when you're using a wah.

That maybe why I didn't like the BH and got shot of mine.

Wiz'd for the second paragraph.