A couple of things worth adding here:
1) It does take a while to get your ear attunded to what the various EQ settings do to your signal, so be patient with yourself while you tweak and play, tweak and play.
2) Luckily, the EQ settings on the Artist are fairly simply, only affecting the levels of the frequencies around 3 fixed points. The frequency settings on the amp's EQ controls are are as follows:
Low: ±12.5dB @ 50Hz (mostly affecting boomy sounds below the fundamental of your low E string)
Mid: ±10.5dB @ 750Hz (very much a low midrange control--this is an area of the frequency range that many--but not all--pickups don't reproduce very naturally, and so it's common for people to cut at least a little here)
High: ±12.5dB @ 15kHz (will affect the brightness and "airiness" of your sound)
When the knobs are at 12:00 ("0"), nothing is cut or boosted. The levels of the frequencies around those points will be raised or lowered depending on how far to either the right or left you turn the knobs.
3) Don't forget that your Artist has a tweeter level control in addition to the EQ. It can cut up to 6bd from the sound of the tweeter, which covers the frequencies above 3.5 kHz. So, it can have a powerful effect on how the upper and upper mid frequencies sound (in fact on the balance of your whole sound). So, be aware of where it's set and don't forget to play around with it, too. I found for example that I had to set that control around 11:00 to get the balance of high and low that sounded best to me--particularly for vocals. Having the the control all the way to the right sends the tweeter the full part of the power it's supposed to get for whatever the master volume setting is. Full left drops that down 6db, which takes away a lot of brightness. Some people use that setting for a mellow "jazz box" sort of sound on guitar.
4) There's also a an anti-feedback control, which is essentially a cut across a very narrow range of frequencies that can be moved around in the lower range to stop low-frequency feedback. Make sure that control is off when you're working on your EQ. It can affect the lower end of your sound. You might need it in a gigging situation to get more gain before feedback, but it's a compromise you don't want to make until you have to, and you should arrive at your base-line settings with that control off. Later, you can play around with it to see how it affects things. Some people actually use it for tone shaping when they don't need it for feedback control.
5) The sound of the amp will be affected by whether it's flat on the floor, tilted up on the floor, on a stand or table, near a wall or corner, etc.. So, keep that in mind, too. General rule of thumb: on the floor and near walls--and especially corners--will increase the bass. Tilting it up--and especially putting it up on a stand--will reduce the bass. This can be a good thing or a bad thing depending on the sound you're trying to achieve and the space you're trying to cover. Corners, especially, can increase the bass to the point at which feedback becomes a problem.
Hope all that helps!
Louis
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