4 Ways to Use Tremolo
Tremolo is a great effect for anyone seeking to add some retro vibe to their tone. If you’re a vintage tone chaser, you’ll no double be familiar with tremolo and it’s many uses. The Amped 2 has two types of tremolo built in, a regular tremolo and a harmonic tremolo.
Tremolo works by modulating the volume of your guitar signal in a rhythmic way. You can use it for very subtle volume dips, or you can create choppy, rhythmic riffs using a more extreme tremolo setting.
On the Amped 2, the Depth control functions as a regular tremolo up to the midnight position then a harmonic tremolo after that. The regular tremolo effect has a more pronounced chop to the notes and is more extreme, the harmonic tremolo is less choppy and more pulsating and sits closer to a rotary speaker style effect and can be used to emulate this sort of sound.
In this video we will be discovering some great ways to use Tremolo in your own sound.
All the Tremolo tones are coming from the Amped 2.
There are 3 controls you can use to affect your Phaser tone:
- Time – The speed of the tremolo effect
- Depth – The intensity of the effect.
- Level – The output level of the effect
Choppy Rhythms
A tremolo in it’s most extreme function can create huge volume cuts in your guitar sound. This can be used to create some really interesting choppy, rhythmic sounds.
If you set the depth full and the level full you get the maximum amount of movement in volume. The time is then used to set the speed at which the tremolo modulates between full volume and the depth you choose.
The higher the depth, the lower the volume drops.
60s Uni-Vibe Tones
Using the harmonic tremolo setting you can create some 60s uni-vibe style sounds. A harmonic tremolo does not have the same harsh cut points of a regular tremolo, it pulses a little more and has more movement to the volume changes.
If you set this with a low depth, you get an almost phaser style sound with a bit more volume movement. This is a really useful way to create a fake rotary speaker style sound or a 60s Hendrix vibe.
Subtle Clean Tremolo
Tremolo also works great when used very subtly with a clean tone. Keep the depth very low so you only get a slight pulse to your cleans and the time you want to match to the speed of whatever you’re playing. The level is used to blend the tremolo effect in, but you don’t want to set this too high because it’s just to create a subtle pulse to the riff.
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About the Author
This article on how to use tremolo in your guitar tone was written by Leigh Fuge. Leigh is a professional guitarist and content creator and also works alongside musicteacher.com to create guitar focused, educational and entertainment content.
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