Amp Envy

[mullyman]

To be fair to your amp I'm going to have to say that, as you told the story, it was your brother playing. I'm assuming from that it was his guitar too. Not only will a different guitar get a different tone out of an amp, it all boils back to the person in the drivers seat.

Great story to go along with this, as an example. Ted Nugent was touring with Van Halen back in the early 80's. Ted was in love with Eddie's "brown sound". One day while they were doing sound check Ted asked Eddie if he could play through his rig. He took Ed's guitar and started playing and sounded nothing like him. Ed's guitar, Ed's rig, Ted's tone. Eddie jumped on Ted's rig and there it was. It really does come down to the player at hand. You may get a Blues Jr. and it may not sound anything like you were hoping.

When it comes to amps you really need to go through a ton of them until the one that stands out to you shows up. I have a Blues Jr. Good story here too. The guy that owned the guitar shop I always went to had that Blues Jr. on the floor for quite a while. One day I went in and he was sitting there messing around playing through it and it sounded awesome. That was the bluesy sound I had been looking for. I asked him how much he wanted for the amp and he said flat out "It's not for sale". I've known this guy more than 10 years at this point. I worked in his shop doing repairs. We hung out together. Anyway, later that afternoon when I was leaving he came out just as I was getting in my car and he said "Hey, Jim, take the amp." I looked back and said "How much is it? I don't have a whole lot of money right now." and he said "Take it, it's yours". He gave me the damn thing for free. About 2 weeks later he died of a heart attack at the age of 49. Now, I don't believe in all that mystical bullcrap but something about that, to this day, seemed/seems really odd to me. In some way I think he subconsciously knew the end was near.
MULLY
and to this day I have never been able to get the sound out of that amp that he was getting

 

[mayfly]

I would look real hard for a AB763 Super Reverb right now.

I've got one from 1966:

I suggest to all that you take Tonar's advice and buy my amp:

http://www.spacemanmusic.com/Amps/Tube+Amps/Fender+Super+Reverb+1966

Mayfly

 

[TJD]

To be fair to your amp I'm going to have to say that, as you told the story, it was your brother playing. I'm assuming from that it was his guitar too. Not only will a different guitar get a different tone out of an amp, it all boils back to the person in the drivers seat.

Great story to go along with this, as an example. Ted Nugent was touring with Van Halen back in the early 80's. Ted was in love with Eddie's "brown sound". One day while they were doing sound check Ted asked Eddie if he could play through his rig. He took Ed's guitar and started playing and sounded nothing like him. Ed's guitar, Ed's rig, Ted's tone. Eddie jumped on Ted's rig and there it was. It really does come down to the player at hand. You may get a Blues Jr. and it may not sound anything like you were hoping.

When it comes to amps you really need to go through a ton of them until the one that stands out to you shows up. I have a Blues Jr. Good story here too. The guy that owned the guitar shop I always went to had that Blues Jr. on the floor for quite a while. One day I went in and he was sitting there messing around playing through it and it sounded awesome. That was the bluesy sound I had been looking for. I asked him how much he wanted for the amp and he said flat out "It's not for sale". I've known this guy more than 10 years at this point. I worked in his shop doing repairs. We hung out together. Anyway, later that afternoon when I was leaving he came out just as I was getting in my car and he said "Hey, Jim, take the amp." I looked back and said "How much is it? I don't have a whole lot of money right now." and he said "Take it, it's yours". He gave me the damn thing for free. About 2 weeks later he died of a heart attack at the age of 49. Now, I don't believe in all that mystical bullcrap but something about that, to this day, seemed/seems really odd to me. In some way I think he subconsciously knew the end was near.
MULLY
and to this day I have never been able to get the sound out of that amp that he was getting

Mully that is a terribly sadstory. If you want to pay it forward and give ME the ampfor free I would be happy to unburden you...you could never sell that amp in good conscience. Actually to respond to your post, it WAS my warmoth strat and I did play thru it..still sounded awesome. But you're right about different players and their rigs. That VH story is similar to one I    heard about somebody trying Yngwie's rig and not being able to control the wild feedback enough to play a note while YJM had no problems and sounded great..                                                       

 

[Superlizard]

RE: original post

There is a point whereupon too much clipping and compression robs a player of touch-sensitivity (where your fingers play a part in the tone).

And at that point, all the player sounds like is too much clipping and compression... instead of themselves.

 

[Mor Paul]

Mully, that's just bizarre.

 

[mullyman]

Mully that is a terribly sadstory. If you want to pay it forward and give ME the ampfor free I would be happy to unburden you...you could never sell that amp in good conscience. Actually to respond to your post, it WAS my warmoth strat and I did play thru it..still sounded awesome. But you're right about different players and their rigs. That VH story is similar to one I    heard about somebody trying Yngwie's rig and not being able to control the wild feedback enough to play a note while YJM had no problems and sounded great.. 

Yeah, there's no way I'll ever sell that amp. Along with that, I used to hang out there all the time. More often than not I was there from opening until closing. He had this drum chair in the shop that I would sit on all the time. It used to be in the studio but it got broken one day so he put it out in the shop. Whenever you would pick it up by the seat, the seat would come right off. Of course for years I knew that chair was broken but it never failed, almost every single time I went to get that chair I'd grab the seat, lift and it would come right off. Pissed me off all the time. Well, the day that he died I was at home sitting on the sofa and a friend called me and told me what happened. I jumped in my car and ran over to the guitar shop. A bunch of the regular customers had gathered there. We sat around for a few hours and then when we were leaving I grabbed the drum chair and put it in my car. Hell, it was going to get thrown away anyway. That drum chair is in my guitar room to this day. Another thing I'll never get rid of.


Back to the topic at hand though, if you yourself were getting those tones then by all means, you should step up and get the Blues Jr. It really is a good little amp.
MULLY

 

[TJD]

Hey more questions. How about the Fender Hot rod Deville 2x12. Any thoughts on this --how does a 1x12 compare to 2x12 or the Deville 4x10? I like the straightforward design of the amp, no effects ( excp reverb 'course) but 3 channels. Any thoughts?

 

[bagman67]

Hey more questions. How about the Fender Hot rod Deville 2x12. Any thoughts on this --how does a 1x12 compare to 2x12 or the Deville 4x10? I like the straightforward design of the amp, no effects ( excp reverb 'course) but 3 channels. Any thoughts?

I've played the HR DeVille 2x12 and AB'd it next to the 4x10,and to my ear, the 4x10 wins hands down.  I think the 2x12 sounds flabby and farty - the 4x10 (again, in my hands) is much crisper and more sensitive to touch.  Your mileage may vary.

My own amp is a Mesa Boogie F30 1x12 combo, which I really love  for slightly dirty broken-up clean channel, to heavily distorted stuff, but I find the clean tones less satisfying, albeit still quite serviceable. The amp is pretty much bulletproof, construction-wise, and can be had for $500-$600 USD on Craigslist or eBay.

Another bad-ass 1x12 combo is the Soldano-designed Yamaha T-50C and T100C - they go between 450 and 600 on eBay, if you can find one.  They're not very common and were only built for a couple years in the early 90's, I think. But they perform extremely well.  I wish I had kept mine...

Both the Boogie and the Yamaha have double speaker outs, so you could use them to drive a pair of cabinets.  Also, they have separate reverb controls for both clean and dirty channels, so you don't have to lose your crisp rhythm tone in the huge wash of reverb you were thickening your lead part with if you don't want it.

Hope this helps -

Bagman

 

[mullyman]

I've played the HR DeVille 2x12 and AB'd it next to the 4x10,and to my ear, the 4x10 wins hands down. 

The 4x10 better win. More speakers are going to open the sound right up. I'm willing to bet a 4x12 even does better than that. My only problem with these things, at my age, is that I no longer want to carry heavy stuff around.
MULLY

 

[Cagey]

My only problem with these things, at my age, is that I no longer want to carry heavy stuff around.

You got that right. I've got a 4x12 bottom taking up space in the basement right now that's essentially brand new that I can't use because I can't move it. I don't know what in the hell I was thinking about when I bought it. Can't really use it here, and can't take it anywhere.

 

[RU36]

This may go against what everyone in this thread thinks but............

I am using a rocktron prophecy 2 rack pre and a solid state power amp and it is amazing.
It is super adjustable and clean sounding.

Look at there website and listen to some of the tones.
Its top notch

 

[kboman]

Someone else on the board has an AxeFx Ultra + powered monitor for a setup. Those things are just getting better every year.

 

[TRG]

I use to have a devile 2x12 it was alright. the clean chanel was very good. The other two drive and more drive sucked. I replaced it with a Super Sonic. Which is an amazing amp. I have the combo and when I need to move more air. I have one of the deluxe ent. cabnits. all three channels are great. Really great fender tone plus a nice drive chanel. Very fleable amp. Check out the greg koch demos of the amp on utube.  PS I also have one of the hand wired Vox ac15 s it has great tone also and because of the ablitie to run either 7.5 or 15 watts work great for different size venues.

 

[TJD]

The other day I went into a nice little non chain store in Manchester NH..called the Music MIl...not a bright shiny place like the chains but nice piles of used quality and obscure amps and guitars..great resource if you live close...I played the blues deluxe, deville, hot rod deluxe and a blues jr red texas model with the vintage 30 celestion. Even brought my warmoth in so I could be sure. The blues jr was hands down best tone of them all. Awesome clean all the way to smooth overdrive with the master volume. Not a metal machine like I'm used to but I'm maturing. Wish I could find something as good with a little more power but I'll probably buy it. A couple comments on the Ht rod deluxe and similar models..wow are they LOUD. But the last poster was right..what's up with fender's drive and more drive channels?  More like sucky and more sucky. Not looking for Mesa style metal..but not even a nice smooth overdrive--just kinda crusty and dirty. Good for slide I suppose. Feel free to rip me once again..

 

[bagman67]

. Wish I could find something as good with a little more power but I'll probably buy it...

Mic it?  Mod it so it's got a speaker out and drive a cab with it?

 

[TJD]

Aaaaaaaaahh...just picked up a Blues Jr Red "Texas Special"...used for $325..traded the Marshall and took a bit of a bath on that...just between us ok? Hoping my wife won't notice the difference OR missing funds. It will all be worth it in the end.