Originally Posted by: joesize

Thanks, JeffS65, for the info. I had heard somewhere a few years back that the volume on the guitar should always be turned all the way up, so as to get all of the guitar’s potential. I think it was from Scott Grove on one of his Youtube videos. I don’t always do it, though, and I just saw your post, and watched the video through a couple of times. Those guys have an incredible knowledge. I haven’t bought the tremolo pedal yet, because another GT member loaned me a processor to play around with. It’s an older POD xt Live, and I’m going to see in the manual if I can get Delay and Tremolo from it, and just use the spring reverb in my amp. There are also some preset downloads available for the Bo Diddley sounds for the processor, that I guess somebody figured out and posted on the internet. I am going to try to check those out, too. All this should be fun to explore, but with all that, it’s going to hard to master the rhythm to be able to play the Bo Diddley stuff right. You mentioned pickups. I think they are Humbuckers. I bought the guitar new in 1967. It’s a Trini Lopez model. The sound holes are diamond instead of the usual f shape.

Ok, I'll just start with this; a 1967 Trini Lopez? I am jealous. Great guitar.

So the pickups you have I assume are orginal to the guitar and that's a good thing. Over the years and mostly starting in the 70's, aftermarket pickup makers were just starting to come around. In order to get cutomers interested, the aftermarket guys had to make a product that differentiated itself from that pickups that guitar builders like Gibson put in their guitars. That meant that the aftermarket guys started making all kinds of versions of pickups making them 'hotter' or twangier or any number of things. All good stuff too.

But, when you're looking to get a more vintage sound, thathotter pickup not always desirable. With the Trini, you have the 60's version of PAFs that are not overwound and overly hot. Good. You don't want too hot. For the tone you seek, you want a pickup that isn't too pushy. The Trini has that kind of pickup; not too pushy.

I do think the advice from Scott Grove is not good. Think of it this way; if you have a manual four speed in your car, will it always be in 4th gear? Nope. You use the other gears too.

I'm long guilty of keeping the volume knob full up to 10. My harping on this is from mistakenly thinking like Scott does; why mute the full potential?

If you think of it as 'full potential', you might be missing the point.

You're actually missing the full potential of the volume knob's power. There are lots of ways to explore at volume nine below on the volume knob. It took me years to get that through my head. Granted, when I started playing in '81, I was more hard rock and metal and the volume knob wasn't all that important. However, over the years, my jones to play more bluesy and Americana has led me to explore a more refined approach to looking for tone. That includes the kind of control you have in how much signal you push to the amp.

That's actually kind of the point; your amp reacts to what you push through the volume knob on your guitar. You may not always want that to be full throttle. It might be that you want the push to be just below breaking up the signal to give you a sweet little bit of dirt and then, say for a solo, spin the volume knob up to make it sing.

It's a journey for all of us and we all find our way on different paths. God know I did. But from a long time player, and mistakes I made, don't run with just one opinion but explore the different bits of advice and find what works for you. I'd say just don't exclude a techique or a thing another guitar player does without giving it a try.