My Dream Pedal Board, Comments/Advice Please ... Options

[Andrew Cockburn]

Thanks a lot Tony and MickeM for your detailed posts - I am starting to get the picture (and I think this thread deserves to go in the Gear sticky!

This isn't a rush for me as I don;t have space yet, but I obviously need to get out and listen to some different valve sounds and decide what my overall philosophy is ...

At the moment, the JVM410 really appeals - I like the idea of different voivings, after all an Amp is just as importnant an effect as anything else, but I also want to build an external pedal board, as I have always used all in one effects processors before and wanted a change. I like the idea of distortion pedals acting more to drive the amp into distortion - if I got the right amp, and high output pickups (like on the Jem) maybe I could dispanse with the distortion pedal, or use one just for high gain antics.

Very thought provoking guys, thanks!

EDIT: Listening to the samples on the Bogner page - wow, what amazing tone!

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This post has been edited by Andrew Cockburn: Jul 22 2007, 02:13 PM

[Andrew Cockburn]

Thanks a lot Tony and MickeM for your detailed posts - I am starting to get the picture (and I think this thread deserves to go in the Gear sticky!

This isn't a rush for me as I don;t have space yet, but I obviously need to get out and listen to some different valve sounds and decide what my overall philosophy is ...

At the moment, the JVM410 really appeals - I like the idea of different voivings, after all an Amp is just as importnant an effect as anything else, but I also want to build an external pedal board, as I have always used all in one effects processors before and wanted a change. I like the idea of distortion pedals acting more to drive the amp into distortion - if I got the right amp, and high output pickups (like on the Jem) maybe I could dispanse with the distortion pedal, or use one just for high gain antics.

Very thought provoking guys, thanks!

EDIT: Listening to the samples on the Bogner page - wow, what amazing tone!

I'm in love with these sounds ...

My Fave was :

http://www.bogneramplification.com/XtcCLRedMS2.mp3

With this as aclose second,

http://www.bogneramplification.com/XtcCLBlueMS2.mp3

and this for a clean sound:

http://www.bogneramplification.com/XtcCleanMS.mp3

All Bogner Ecstacy Standard ...

MickeM - the 2 links you gave were both the same, but I bet those were your picks too, if that was the case you are spot on - a total mind reader

So another couple of questions, I feel like I am really homing in on a (expensive) sound here ..

1. Why didn't you tell me ???? I have never heard anything approaching this kind of tone out of my Pod

Ok, so you did tell me, and the Pod definately has its uses so I'm not writing it off, but I need this kind of sound, I have been dreaming of it for years ...

2. Less rhetorically, I find it interesting that in these sounds there is less nasty intermodulation - even highly distorted chords sound very musical, is this a feature of tube amps too?

3. Given that I do appear to really like the EL34 tone, what cheaper options are available that give a somewhat similar sound so that I can take my time to save up $5000 for a Bogner head + Cab ?

4. Has anyone used a power soak and/or a speaker simulator for recording? How well do they work? Looks like my simple days of pod recording would be over if I had one of these. I could use the pod for an initial clean recording (with pod effects to monitor) then re-amp through the bogner to get the final tone ... sounds like a plan!

Thanks for all your help so far guys - I feel like I am making a journey back into the light from the dark side ...

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[Pavel]

Andrew make sure you check the sound samples for Carvin Amps! They are not that expensive but the sound is also amazing!

Here - scroll to the bottom and check the mp3s:

http://www.carvin.com/vai/


EDIT: i just listened to Vai's demo again - man i am in love with that amp again

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This post has been edited by Pavel: Jul 22 2007, 03:30 PM

[Saoirse O'Shea]

Hi Andrew
if you like the sound from the EL34s and its a Marshall then also look at their hand wired series that hark back to the old J Mayall/Clapton Bluesbreaker era (sometimes referred to as a plexiglass if I remember rightly) - ie 1954X hand wired amp head or their Vintage Modern series ie 2266 (though neither of these actually uses an el34 if I remember ). Classic British hard rock territory. If you go with a Bogner and want the Marshall voicing make sure you go for the EL34 version (theres also a 6l6) albeit as MickeM says you can always retube and selfbias at a later stage. There's a very small custom builder called Voodoo amps that do a really good take on the plexi as well - (Voodoo Amplification, Inc.
45 Atwater Road
Lansing, NY 14882
Phone: (607) 256-0465
fax: (607) 330-0272 - voodoo homepage.

Also Koch, Orange, Engl Richie Blackmore amp, and Hiwatt amps may be worth a look for el34 sounds but much cheaper than the Bogner. Also amps can be tweaked and modded to improve their tone. (Changing the stock supplied valves for really good ones can often make a world of difference .)

Sad to say Bogner are expensive because they are amazing amps - once heard never forgotten . You end up having to pay for this sort of tone though. One thing about the Bogner clips (most mp3s) the amp sounds even better in real life. Mps are not a lossless format and are a bit compressed so you loose some of the definition and 'quality' plus a Bogner ecstacy going through a good 4x12 cab at full lilt is in a different league to an mp3 through computer speakers (or even monitors) - different cab resonance and response, different amount of mass of air moved physically by the speaker cone/s and so on. Pro amp territory is a league away from most of the amps we routinely get to play and own. Expensive but as someone once said to me - look at how much a violinist has to pay for a good violin .

I use a THD powersoak routinely (Lightening is v loud in my office .) One thing I do find is that it does affect the tone, takes off some of the top end shimmer/treble so I eq it a bit to give the sound a lift. At the end of the day for home recording there probably will always be some trade off. Direct out in to a desk (and I also do this) would lose the speaker/cab resonance and response, powersoak drops the treble and so on. But its the only way I can really get into saturated territory at a level that doesn't deafen everyone.

Hope this helps,
Cheers,
Tony

ps MickeM - as ever great post.

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[Rock]

There is the argument from HiFi bods that a good (clean) amplifier is straight line with gain (and no distortion).

Because of this, to a great extent, a lot of high end hifi put very little into the signal path ie no bass boost switches, minimal tone controls (if any), no un-necessary flashing lights. Also there is a tendency to 'over' specify components - Burr Brown capacitors hugh heavy torroidal transformers etc. Some also isolate the pre and power stages in to separate amp boxes to minimise rf intereference between them. Some end up with multi box power amp setups in order to go monoblock. Indeed very often there is just a volume and input source selector on the pre amp and nothing apart from the pre amp in and speaker/s out on the power.

Bringing this back to a clean guitar amp. Some amp manufacturers follow much the same reasoning and minimise anything that may add unwanted noise, or which might leech the original guitar signal, from the amp circuit. Hence some high end 'boutique' amps have input, a few tone controls, master and drive and little else. No effects loop, no reverb, no amp emulation, no digital effects, etc. Components are again 'over' specified and often point to point hand soldered. This often means that the cost of the amp goes up against a more 'mass market' amp and ostensibly fewer 'bangs per buck'. The focus though is on tone and little, if anything, else. I'm not saying this is right (though you can probably guess given my main amp is a Matchless ) it's a viewpoint.

Unlike Hi-fis distortion is seen as good with regard to guitar amps. The high end 'boutique' amps (Matchless, Bogner, TopHat, Bad Cat etc) are often valve amps and also often pure class A (as opposed to class a/b etc). The focus I think is to deliver as good a clean tone as possible that may then be pushed into OD or distortion (caveat to this, IMO, is a transistor amp - see below). (Logic being if you start with a rubbish clean sound, distorting it isn't going to make it better.) With the non 'boutique' but good valve amps (ie Mesa, Rivera, Engl, Framus, Vox, Marshall, Soldano etc) one thing that they all tend to have in common is that they can produce a good clean channel as well. Whether it is as 'good' as a 'boutique' is subjective and debatable. What the non-boutique amps do offer is usually more features, for less money whilst still giving a good overall clean tone.

On the 'bang for bucks' end. In part this perhaps comes back to 'straight line with gain'. On a straight, clean path my signal pretty much only gets amplified with a minimum of interactive tone control from my amp. On a clean signal all I want basically is my guitar amplified according to a valve voicing that I like. My main amp adds very little to the signal and takes very little away apart from the overall amp voicing because the signal path is simple. In a Mesa, for instance, you have a high quality signal path but one that also starts to include more tone controls, a reverb, an effects loop, pentode/triode switching, hi-gain drive, ultra hi gain drive and so on. None of this is necessarily bad BUT and to me its a big but, all the extra bells and whistles are there largely in circuit whether you want them or not. An advantage of a minimal circuit is that you can choose whether or not to add an effect via a rack or stomp box. If you don't want it, and just to labour this point, you leave it out and it doesn't degrade your signal. The downside is perhaps a lack of versatility without adding some stomp boxes. (I say perhaps because I use my guitar's volume knob to move through clean and od as well.) Unlike a Triple Rec I won't ever get clean, od/distortion, hi gain/scooped from my amp without adding pedals. My amp does clean into OD without any stompbox and only really this. A good distortion pedal then takes it into distortion territory and adds tonal colouration (and gives me 2 channels on a single channel amp). I doubt that I could get it into hi gain scooped territory regardless of what pedal I put in front - it's just not that sort of amp. If I want ultra hi-gain then the solution for me would be to buy an amp that does hi gain (Triple Rec, Marshall JVM, Engl Powerball, Framus Cobra and so on).

A second issue, though it doesn't bother me too much, is that my overall rig is pretty complicated just so that I can get versatility. I have more than one distortion pedal to achieve different types and levels of overdrive and so on. My recording studio floor looks like a snake pit of wires and it costs an arm and a leg buying decent quality leads to interface them. I could probably loose a lot of the pedals by going with a multi-channel amp (or maybe all of them with digital modelling). I suppose the issue here is what someone really values and wants from their amp - inbuilt versatility or 'pureness'. I've gone with the latter but it's personal choice.

To my knowledge, and in my opinion, a valve will give a much more musical overdrive/distortion than a solid state/transistor/digital emulation. The clipping isn't as harsh, you get much nicer - and more - 2nd and higher order harmonics, the decay is smoother and less likely to abruptly finish, sustain is sweet and natural rather than hard (transistor) or zippered and processed (digital).

Basically a valve waveform is extremely complex and perhaps beyond the capacity of a digital amp to reproduce perfectly. I've nothing digital emulator amps - I think they offer amazing value for money. However, IMHO, if you place any digital emulation up against the original valve amp being emulated then I am willing to bet that most people will prefer the original amp. The valve amp will sound, to most people more natural, more musical, have more tonal depth. That they can not and that the waveform produced often ends too abruptly leads to zippering - put a digital emulation on a long decay wave and you will almost certainly hear this effect...) In the case of a transistor amp they have a tendency to 'simplify' waveforms, thus you get a more basic rather than the harmonically rich waveform you'd get from a valve. A clean, undistorted guitar sound is a much 'simpler' wave form and so you often find that tranny amps do 'clean' well (ie the Roland JC 120) - where they often come unstuck is when the wave has to become complicated. (I'm not saying that no tranny can do good distortion - the Yamaha D1000 can give a v good distortion. Similarly I'm not saying that any emulation is bad - they're not but they are emulations...) (I should by the way say that I do at times use emulation - via a Roland/Boss GT8 with COSM and I also have and use a transistor amp - a JC55. They do what they do well and I like them. I just prefer my valve amp.)

With regard to the voicing of an amp. Well whether someone wants/prefers a 'British' or an 'American' type voicing is up to them. It's really subjective opinion as to whether you prefer Vox, Marshall, Fender or Mesa Boogie type voicing. What is important here though is that the valves in your amp need to be the right type. Check out a Vox and any good Vox clone - they will share similar valve types. Same goes for Marshall and Marshall clones, and so on. Some valve amp manufacturers imply that their particular amp is able to cover significantly different voicings. The extent to which a valve amp can emulate more than one WITHOUT fundamentally having a change of valves is, IMO, open to question. Noticably here Randall make an amp where you can hot swop valve stages, THD also do something similar, back in the late '80s Seymour Duncan made a valve amp where you could also swop out the pre amp valve stage specifically to allow these amps to get different major voicings. Similarly its perhaps worth noting that to get a Marshall voicing that Mesa use different valves in their Stiletto then, for instance, their Lonestar. Perhaps this is part of the dilemma that MickeM faces in his search for an ultimate amp, whether to have a single particular voicing and indeed which. Not an easy question and no easy answers...

Ultimately guitar amp tone is a very subjective thing. What is wonderful to one player may not be to another. At the end of the day at the >1500USD level of performance I would strongly recommend that anyone should test out as many amps as possible and think about what features they want and the voicing/s they prefer.

Cheers,
Tony
ps sorry it's a bit of a long and rambling post

Tony,

Great post!

I have not been playing very long but have similar opinions when it comes to tone. IMO, tube amps provide the cleanest sound and are much more musical than solid state. I purchased a ValveKing VK112. I thought for the money $430USD that it was a very good sounding combo for the money. I spent a few extra dollars and upgraded the tubes to JJ high gain for the preamp EC83Ss and JJ 6L6GCs for the power amp section. I also swapped out the stock Peavey speaker for a Weber Alnico Silver Bell. So for about $600USD, I have what I think is an incredible sounding combo for a what I think is a very reasonable price. To get some of the sounds I like, I picked up some Boss pedals and I can pretty much configure just about any sound I want. To add to that I experimented a bit to see if I could improve on the pedal sounds to see if I was getting the sounds they are capable of achieving. I had read quite a bit about pedal mods, so I thought I would give it a try. Not too difficult, and I was amazed at how much better I could make them sound for under $10 in components. I modified my Boss CS3, DS2, and MT2. They sound a bit more musical and the modifications quieted the background hiss quite a bit. Well worth the little time and money. Plus, I had some fun tinkering.

Well, I had some friends over yesterday to jam. Most have quite a bit of experience. In fact, one friend is an extremely good player and has been playing seriously for close to 40 years. He can play most Hendrix perfectly, no mistakes, every detail. He has all the expensive equipment. Custom PRS, Marshall JVM2000, top of the line wireless system. His sound is great, but I have to say my sound is pretty awesome in comparison. He was pretty amazed at how good my setup sounded. Especially when you looked at his half stack compared to my little combo amp.

Anyway, IMO I found that the best way to go is start with the best sound possible or affordable in the way of a tube amp and then drive it with pedals.

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[Andrew Cockburn]

Rock, do you have a link for details on the pedal mods? I am onto electronics and this sounds like fun

Andrew make sure you check the sound samples for Carvin Amps! They are not that expensive but the sound is also amazing!

Here - scroll to the bottom and check the mp3s:

http://www.carvin.com/vai/
EDIT: i just listened to Vai's demo again - man i am in love with that amp again

Listening now

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[Saoirse O'Shea]

Hi Rock,
and thanks for the feedback .

Completely agree about replacing the stock tubes that many valve amps come with. Simple but hugely effective upgrade. Can you give more details about the speaker upgrade please- I've not come across the Weber that you mention? I've gone with Celestion Vintage in the past. With you all the way on get the best sound possible first before you do anything to do it. I still tend to work off the idea of garbage in....

Andrew - sorry don't have the details to hand but there is a book about modding pedals btw I think it was written by Carl Martin and/or Chas Chandler. You might also be able to get the schematics of some mods off the internet.

Cheers,
Tony

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[MickeM]

MickeM - the 2 links you gave were both the same, but I bet those were your picks too, if that was the case you are spot on - a total mind reader

I knew you would say that! Sorry about that, a copy&paste error obviously. I belive they were the same, one clean distortion and the other a little more brutal.

1. Why didn't you tell me ???? I have never heard anything approaching this kind of tone out of my Pod

Didn't want to upset you

2. Less rhetorically, I find it interesting that in these sounds there is less nasty intermodulation - even highly distorted chords sound very musical, is this a feature of tube amps too?

There are good and bad tube amps of course. I'm sure there are words to discribe every sound, like there is wine tasting. But sure there's a certain crisp, fullness, sparkling, glow, punch whatever you like to a sound that's coming from a well tweaked tube amp. Good pickups help too but you already have that.

3. Given that I do appear to really like the EL34 tone, what cheaper options are available that give a somewhat similar sound so that I can take my time to save up $5000 for a Bogner head + Cab ?

About half the price - Carvin Legacy, Marshall JVM410
Here's a real cool suggestion, a Laney Lionheart 5W combo amp (it's got EL84). That's a real amp!
Or for a real cheap Laney the LC15R (only got a 10" speaker though) to play around with while waiting and daydreaming.

4. Has anyone used a power soak and/or a speaker simulator for recording? How well do they work? Looks like my simple days of pod recording would be over if I had one of these. I could use the pod for an initial clean recording (with pod effects to monitor) then re-amp through the bogner to get the final tone ... sounds like a plan!

not me.

Thanks for all your help so far guys - I feel like I am making a journey back into the light from the dark side ...

I'd rather see I'm on the dark side... if dark means evil.. too much sci-fi.
Am too tired now, probably the last few sentences makes no sence. Off to bed now.

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[MickeM]

Engl Richie Blackmore amp may be worth a look for el34

Just to add for Andrews sake that it's the old Blackmore that has EL34's. It's great sounding and inexpensive. The new model got 5881 tubes, not so bad either.

look at their hand wired series that hark back to the old J Mayall/Clapton Bluesbreaker era (sometimes referred to as a plexiglass if I remember rightly) - ie 1954X hand wired amp head or their Vintage Modern series ie 2266

Mmm, wouldn't that be something. The older I get the more I tend to appreciate a vintage tone.
I will read up tomorrow on wether the JVM410 can manage their sound (I mean as good as it can get). May be a good compromise amp.

ps MickeM - as ever great post.

Thanks mate! And I'm reading yours with great interest. And I agree on that while mp3's sound good to actually be there in front of a 412 hearing and feeling the sound is something else. An experience that can turn out expensive.

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[Saoirse O'Shea]

...And I agree on that while mp3's sound good to actually be there in front of a 412 hearing and feeling the sound is something else. An experience that can turn out expensive. ...

Now just where has my wife hidden our credit card ?

Cheers,
Tony

ps All this talk of new amps for you MickeM and Andrew has got me to thinking - aarrgh noooo I mustn't but what the hell...

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[MickeM]

Now just where has my wife hidden our credit card ?

Cheers,
Tony

ps All this talk of new amps for you MickeM and Andrew has got me to thinking - aarrgh noooo I mustn't but what the hell...

be sure to tell us what you get

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[MickeM]

Marshall JVM410 was mentioned.. I think the Combo would be fairly intereseting here, it's got a mix of elements, one Celection Vintage 30 and one Heritage G12 (dunno exactly which G12) but should be a neat mix of speakers.

Got to add this to my wishlist, it will be an interesting amp to get for like 1500E it's still a little bit too expensive, the combo. Maybe. Maybe a head is better since it's cheaper.

Some clips a guy at harmony-central posted. The sound is appealing.
Mikelivesley-part1
Mikelivesley-part2

Random clips
Bedroom playing
Live song
another live song
Blues(ish)

And btw, Paul Gilbert has started on Marshall, he's got a new favourite amp. his own words "The recent G3 tour gave me the opportunity to jam with Joe Satriani and John Petrucci every night for a month. Both Joe and John have amazing tones, and playing with them inspired me to take a closer look at my own guitar sound. My search led me to my new favorite amp: The Marshall Vintage Modern. I'll be playing a pair of Vintage Modern 2266c combo amps on my European tour. If you want real rock tone, try one now!"

On my amp-list I have
Elmwood Modena60
ENGL Invader 100 (or 50 when/if it's released)
Marshall JVM410

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[Andrew Cockburn]

On my amp-list I have
Elmwood Modena60
ENGL Invader 100 (or 50 when/if it's released)
Marshall JVM410

What about Huhges and Kettner - have you gone off them? Curious why you aren;t recomending them any more?

Oh, and here is a real naive question I have been wondering about for a long time ... what is the "Brown Sound" ? I know it is a Marshall thing, but what is it supposed to describe?

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[Miguel_Sanchez]

1. i'd probably go with a laney amp... you wouldn't need anything to crazy i'd imagine maybe even just a 15W'r like the VC15-110

2. diamond pedals are absolutely amazing, i'd give them a check for both your distortion and chorus... they're true by pass and sound incredibly clean, there website has dozens of samples for your listening pleasure as well

4. the boss dd6 is a pretty good pedal actually, but if you want complete control, i'd go with a Line 6 DL4...

5. i'd personally avoid Dunlop Crybabys... they're incredibly overrated, they have no range, and they're a pain in that ass to stomp into... the bad horsie 2 would be my second choice however... my personal favorite is the Ernie Ball wah (same for expression) they pretty much the same concept as the bad horsie just with a much lareger range.

7. i really don't know much about compressors so sorry mate


here's the link the diamond pedals by the way www.diamondpedals.com

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[Andrew Cockburn]

1. i'd probably go with a laney amp... you wouldn't need anything to crazy i'd imagine maybe even just a 15W'r like the VC15-110

2. diamond pedals are absolutely amazing, i'd give them a check for both your distortion and chorus... they're true by pass and sound incredibly clean, there website has dozens of samples for your listening pleasure as well

4. the boss dd6 is a pretty good pedal actually, but if you want complete control, i'd go with a Line 6 DL4...

5. i'd personally avoid Dunlop Crybabys... they're incredibly overrated, they have no range, and they're a pain in that ass to stomp into... the bad horsie 2 would be my second choice however... my personal favorite is the Ernie Ball wah (same for expression) they pretty much the same concept as the bad horsie just with a much lareger range.

7. i really don't know much about compressors so sorry mate
here's the link the diamond pedals by the way www.diamondpedals.com

Thanks - I'll check out diamond and Ernie Ball -had heard good things about their expression pedals, will check out the Wah too ..

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[MickeM]

What about Huhges and Kettner - have you gone off them? Curious why you aren;t recomending them any more?

Oh but I am, any day of the year, any time. I'm rating a Hughes and Kettner Switchblade way way up there, I'm so happy with that amp which can deliver a clean tone, crunch and british lead/hi-gain and american hi-gain. Everything! Built in effects, MIDI pedal board. It's the sweetest amp. I just didn't say anything since I though I made my point about the H&K Switchblade already and didn't want to become a nag
Hey, I even concidered buying a second Switchblade so it must be good huh? But I've come to the conclusion that another brand/model would be more fun in the end.

Oh, and here is a real naive question I have been wondering about for a long time ... what is the "Brown Sound" ? I know it is a Marshall thing, but what is it supposed to describe?

EVH used Marshall Plexi's in the beginning, listen to the sound he achived on the first few records. That's it.


EDIT: For a Wah I'd settle for a simple Dunlop pedal. Simple and no battery drainer. I've had a Morley before and wasn't too happy with it, bad sounding and bad quality. It was 10 years ago though.
I've got an Ibanez Weeping Demon, absolutely great sounding but it drains a battery in notime which is quite bad. Today if I was choosing between it and a Dunlop I'd take a simple nothing special Dunlop Crybaby. It's good sounding.

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This post has been edited by MickeM: Jul 23 2007, 09:24 PM

[MickeM]

H&K Trilogy demo mid page. When I watched it it was out of synch but that doesn't matter so much.

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[Hardtail]

I agree with a lot of what MickeM is saying. Try everything. Seriously, what others may LOVE you may not. My friend just got the JSX Joe Satriani signature Head from Peavey and he sent me some demo's of his new bands work and the intricacy and cleans he gets are really unique and beautiful.

I recently left the Line6 world and reentered tube heaven. I snagged a Fender Blues Junior Lacquered Tweed special edition and the abilities of this 31 lb single channel 15 watt amp are amazing. The amp responds like butter to guitar volume and a clean overdrive pedal like the TS9 or TS808RI. I can get every sound I like from jazz to blues to rock. I'm sure I could get metal too but I haven't tried.

I don't know if anyone answered but you asked about a tuner pedal. The Boss TU-2 is the professionals choice with true physical bypass when off. I have 2 of them... one for the acoustic and one for the electric guitar.

I now dream at work of coming home to play, and whatever amp you get make sure it blows your mind and then don't spend all your time comparing it to others

OH! BTW I am playing again on a weekly basis at my Local Church. I play modern worship (a blend of blues/rock/country all at once) and I was really surprised when I brought my new baby to the main sanctuary and it filled the entire place without needing mic'ed (at volume 3). The place seats about 400+ people. I will mic it when I perform so the audio guys can control the mix but it was surprising how loud she gets.

So long story short... my only REAL piece of advice is play it and decide for yourself... and don't worry about having a 100w+ head and full stack to melt faces because at home you'll never get it loud enough to work the tubes and get performance quality sounds.

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[Andrew Cockburn]

I agree with a lot of what MickeM is saying. Try everything. Seriously, what others may LOVE you may not. My friend just got the JSX Joe Satriani signature Head from Peavey and he sent me some demo's of his new bands work and the intricacy and cleans he gets are really unique and beautiful.

I recently left the Line6 world and reentered tube heaven. I snagged a Fender Blues Junior Lacquered Tweed special edition and the abilities of this 31 lb single channel 15 watt amp are amazing. The amp responds like butter to guitar volume and a clean overdrive pedal like the TS9 or TS808RI. I can get every sound I like from jazz to blues to rock. I'm sure I could get metal too but I haven't tried.

I don't know if anyone answered but you asked about a tuner pedal. The Boss TU-2 is the professionals choice with true physical bypass when off. I have 2 of them... one for the acoustic and one for the electric guitar.

I now dream at work of coming home to play, and whatever amp you get make sure it blows your mind and then don't spend all your time comparing it to others

OH! BTW I am playing again on a weekly basis at my Local Church. I play modern worship (a blend of blues/rock/country all at once) and I was really surprised when I brought my new baby to the main sanctuary and it filled the entire place without needing mic'ed (at volume 3). The place seats about 400+ people. I will mic it when I perform so the audio guys can control the mix but it was surprising how loud she gets.

So long story short... my only REAL piece of advice is play it and decide for yourself... and don't worry about having a 100w+ head and full stack to melt faces because at home you'll never get it loud enough to work the tubes and get performance quality sounds.

Ok, thanks for all your advice guys, I just re-read the intire thread and it all makes sense to me now.

I like the weeping demon idea despite its power consumption (i'll use a power supply), then its a question of what little else I can get away with if the Amp has a good tone (I see that now, I was blinded by multi effects before).

For an Amp, i'm thinking that maybe I'll get a smaller combo like a laney or Vox for decent practice levels, and to find my feet tube wise, and lust after the Bogner until my wife isn't looking ...

"Whats this new thing you have?"

"Oh that? It was real cheap, look, its so old it has tubes in it ..."

It might just work ...

You are at GuitarMasterClass.net

Don't miss today's free lick. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

Don't miss today's free blues, jazz & country licks. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

[Andrew Cockburn]

BTW, what can antone tell me about the Laney L5T-112 - MickeM mentioned it in one of his posts - any idea how it might stack up against ab AC15?

You are at GuitarMasterClass.net

Don't miss today's free lick. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

Don't miss today's free blues, jazz & country licks. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!