Grateful Dead Music Forum

Why is the MuTron so hard to control, touchy, and generally hard to set up? Jer made the thing sound so good! Any tips, suggestions, ideas...
Thanks

I run mine through the GCX buffer and it sounds great. Jerry also had a switching system. The buffer makes mine much more even and easy to control, its permantly installed in the rack and is set and forget.

You are right about Jerry's MuTron sounding so good. It worked so well. Always had a deep "wah" effect on every note it seemed. I'm impressed by his MuTron sound and don't really know how to get it so good.

Jim

Are you using the GCX Audio switcher? And are you using the Ground control as well? I'm using a TC electronics that has analog loops built in. It all works and sounds great, except the MuTron! I have a guitar with a effects loop built in, so I can loop in or go direct to the amp.
How do you like the Ground Control?

roll guitar tone back a little (or a lot)

I think that a lot of it is just in getting used to how it reacts to your playing style and adjusting accordingly. It definitely takes a bit of time to learn how to "play" a mutron correctly.

As mentioned also - rolling down the tone a bit helps get it sounding warmer too. Another thing - the effects loop... that's what makes the mutron easier to control. You'll notice that you might get a good sound out of it but if you touch your guitar volume then it blows that good sound out of the water. The effects loop eliminates that problem all together.

Overall it's just a matter of learning how to set the mutron controls, tone and playing style.

Some nights are really good, some nights it just wants to blow out! Overall volume seems to have a lot to do with it. Love having to "work" on it though!!!

davidham wrote:Why is the MuTron so hard to control, touchy, and generally hard to set up? Jer made the thing sound so good! Any tips, suggestions, ideas...
Thanks

One thing I have noted about old MuTrons is that sometimes it might look like the Range switch is set to "Low" but it is in "High" mode. You might gently toggle that switch, and all knobs and switches for that matter, to make sure all settings are in fact making contacts as they are supposed to be.
Mode=LP, Range=Low, Drive=Up... Other than that I would say just set both Peak and Gain around "11-12 o'clock" and work on your right hand MuTron technique (opening/closing the envelope with picking dynamics), to get your "Blurp" factor dialed in.
If it is too touchy with a pick try using just your bare fingers.

myoung6923 wrote:I think that a lot of it is just in getting used to how it reacts to your playing style and adjusting accordingly. It definitely takes a bit of time to learn how to "play" a mutron correctly.
...
Overall it's just a matter of learning how to set the mutron controls, tone and playing style.

Bingo! Seems that is the way with most envelopes. I think folks really need a few hours over a few days to really nail down using it.

There are lots of tones you can get from subtle to insane in your settings and approach.

it's very important that the mutron is first in the chain. I believe jerry used the low pass with low range with the peak at 50% with gain between 10 o' clock and 12 O'clock . although some times early in his use I swear he uses the Bass Pass setting. and of course the up wah sound on catfish john and Cornell 77 . and unless you have a buffer your volume must be all the way open.

strumminsix wrote:

myoung6923 wrote:I think that a lot of it is just in getting used to how it reacts to your playing style and adjusting accordingly. It definitely takes a bit of time to learn how to "play" a mutron correctly.
...
Overall it's just a matter of learning how to set the mutron controls, tone and playing style.

Bingo! Seems that is the way with most envelopes. I think folks really need a few hours over a few days to really nail down using it.

There are lots of tones you can get from subtle to insane in your settings and approach.

+1
I think this is certainly an area where Jerry's banjo background helped - being right over the strings and getting clean, articulate notes is what a Mutron craves as does controlling your right hand's touch as noted above.

For me, The on board effects loop trapped the monster with a rope around its collar then tied to a tree. The GCX put it in a cage and fed it XANAX. Now it does what I tell it to. All of the above mentioned is where its at, have fun gettin' funky!

softmachine72 wrote:some times early in his use I swear he uses the Bass Pass setting. and of course the up wah sound on catfish john and Cornell 77 . and unless you have a buffer your volume must be all the way open.

"BP" stands for Band Pass, which could also be described as "mid pass". "Bass Pass" would be the same thing as Low Pass or "LP", which of course is what JG used. Your volume must be at 100% unless you use an OBEL, a buffer by itself will not remove that requirement, and the gain stage of the MuTron actually serves as a buffer. JG originally had the OBEL w/o a buffer.