Suggestions: Humbucker Cleans?

:) This is a angle that I'd not considered! :) Problem is that I own a single coil instrument. I'm trying to get a nice humbucker clean and not a tone match of a single coil.
Cool. Sorry misread the question as the reverse.
 
I got closer to what I wanted by lower in the volume

That's where you're losing your highs.
Unless you have a treble bleed mod on your guitar, when you turn the guitar's vol down you're also losing highs.
The Fletcher-Munson effect affects this too, making it even more pronounced if you're playing at gig levels.

If the amp breaks up too much with the guitar's volume on full, then lower the Input Trim and/or the Drive.
Try using a Volume Block (controlled by a pedal) in front of the Amp Block to control your level instead of the guitar's vol pot.
Or install a treble bleed circuit in the guitar.
My preference is to have my terble bleed circuits on a switch so I can use it or not depending on the situation.
E.g. For dark jazz playing, I actually prefer the loss of highs that happens when the guit vol is below maximum.
But for a gainy sounds, with the treble bleed engaged I can lower the guit's vol pot to get less gain but it won't get muddy.
 
That's where you're losing your highs.
Unless you have a treble bleed mod on your guitar, when you turn the guitar's vol down you're also losing highs.
The Fletcher-Munson effect affects this too, making it even more pronounced if you're playing at gig levels

Learned something today. Thanx for taking the time to post. What you highlighted makes perfect sense now that I think about it.

I'll try to mess less with the volume pot once I get a tone that I like. In the AMP block I typically just use drive and trim to get the breakup I want and level to balance the volume across my presets. I do have a VOL block controlled by an expression pedal but I always put the block near the end of the chain so that I can tweak the final output level without changing the sound.

Am I taking the wrong approach?
 
Learned something today. Thanx for taking the time to post. What you highlighted makes perfect sense now that I think about it.

I'll try to mess less with the volume pot once I get a tone that I like. In the AMP block I typically just use drive and trim to get the breakup I want and level to balance the volume across my presets. I do have a VOL block controlled by an expression pedal but I always put the block near the end of the chain so that I can tweak the final output level without changing the sound.

Am I taking the wrong approach?

Not necessarily.

For not-quite-totally-clean, I like the Vol Block in front of an Amp Block that's set to just start breaking up at full on the pedal.

For gains, I like to have the vol block post Amp Block so I can have the same amount of gain at any level.
But I can still use the guitar's vol pot to get less gain and that works better if I also have a treble bleed circuit on the guitar.

If you tweak for the tone you like while a passive guitar's vol pot is not at maximum, then when you turn the pot up full you'll probably have too much top end.
That's all I'm saying.
 
Also...
If you don't want your reverb and/or delay trails to be silenced by peddling the Vol Block down to minimum, then place the Vol Block between the Amp Block (or pre-Amp Block as discussed above) and those time-based Blocks.

Ideal Layout (for me at least, most of the time) is:
Wah > Cmp > Drv > Amp > Vol > Pit/Chr > Dly(Slap) > Dly (Echo) > Rev > Cab (in parallel with the FXL Block for my pwr amp + cabs rig)
[Note: I do it like that most of the time even for hyper-clean tones.
I.e. Instead of putting the Vol Block in front of the Amp Block.
I just set the Amp Block up so that it will not breakup at full vol on the guitar and on the vol pedal.]
It's not very a sophisticated Layout, but it gets most jobs done.
It's predicated on the way I used to work with pedals and rack gear and cables.
But with the Axe, I don't have to worry at all about signal degradation because of all the series connections (for the time-based effects) like I would with real rack gear.

One thing to watch out for though is that when you switch between Presets that have the Vol Block pre-Amp Block and Presets that have the Vol Block post-Amp block, you might generate an audible pop under certain circumstances, especially if you play continuously through the Preset change.

Note: My Vol Blocks are always attached to one of the Axe's EXT CTRLs too, so the pedal position updates prior to any new Preset that is Recalled that also has a Vol Block programmed the same way.
I also use a single Global Vol Block in all my Presets.

Hope that helps.
 
With super-clean tones, "muddy" means too much low mids. Try dialing some of that out.

By low mids, I assume you mean 250-500Hz range. I have been using a PEQ block to try to remove the mud but I don't want to fiddle too much. Part of this journey for me is to learn but also to keep the "character" of the amp and HB pickups.
 
By low mids, I assume you mean 250-500Hz range. I have been using a PEQ block to try to remove the mud but I don't want to fiddle too much. Part of this journey for me is to learn but also to keep the "character" of the amp and HB pickups.
If mud is a character you want, go for it! :)
 
By low mids, I assume you mean 250-500Hz range. I have been using a PEQ block to try to remove the mud but I don't want to fiddle too much. Part of this journey for me is to learn but also to keep the "character" of the amp and HB pickups.

If you use a PEQ with a high Q, e.g. 3.6, you can cut the mud without losing your balls.
 
If mud is a character you want, go for it! :)

Ha! I deserved that! :) My comment was intended to highlight that I wanted the mud out without eviscerating the tone and/or destroying the element of that amp model which makes it interesting.
 
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Suggested setting appreciated. I'll give that a whirl as I don't think I pushed the Q up that high in my previous attempts.

I usually start with the default wide Q, and a big cut. Then sweep the frequency until I find where I want the cut; using my ears to tell when I'm in the right spot.

Then I raise the Q up and reduce the cut by ear to taste. Basically cutting out less and less until I find the sweet spot of enough cut and little or no damage to my tone.
 
Ha! I deserved that! :) My comment was intended to highlight that I wanted the mud out without eviscerating the tone and/or destroying the element of that amp model which makes it interesting.
Understood. But I couldn't help myself. :)
 
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