[jonesy]

Originally Posted by littlekenny

hey jonesy, can a capacitor change brighten the sound of my guitar?

Well it depends how you look at it. A capacitor is a filter that cuts off high frequencies as you roll off tone control and blend it into you circuit. Your guitar itself(the wood etc.)and pickups will have certain Tonal characteristics. The correct capacitor will enhance those qualities but does not make it brighter. A good PIO cap will "Open" up your Tone and make it clearer, fuller and more warm sounding.

An .022 cap is not as dark sounding as an .047 cap and so it may appear to brighten up sound, but it is just letting through more highs that were already there to begin with.

The trend lately in Les Paul's is to run a .015 cap on the neck and a .022 on the bridge. Your neck pickup is darker sounding than the bridge because of it's placement. By using an .015 on the neck it gives you more useful room to roll off your tone control before your Tone gets to muddy.

Changing out your pickups and pots, or using the 50's style wiring will add more brightness but the cap really doesn't. Does that make sense to you?

Hope that answered your question...??