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Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 19 2007, 12:34 AM

Ok, I'm very hapopy with my PodXTL, but at the same time I want to see what kind of a setup I can build using old fashioned stomp boxes and a decent Amp to complement my Jem (The PodXTL goes great with the Variax with ita automatic patch switching).

I am starting a list, and was hoping for people to tell me if I am on the right track. At this point in time, Steve Vai is my inspiration, and I am looking for a kind of "For the love of god" sound, coupled with a great clean sound. From my pod experiments I know which effects interest me, I'd like to figure out the best of breed for each.

This is a paper exercise at the moment, and I will fo course try all suggestions before I buy this stuff - particularly the AMP!

1. Amp - I have no idea here, seomthing with an awesome clean channel and no built in effects. Also, if I have a distortion pedal (see later) do I need to worry about overdriving the amp as well?

2. Distortion - Robert Keeley modded Boss BD-2 - I imagine this will give me a clean and useable sound with decent sustain

3. Chorus - Something subtle to add some stereo width, and to help with a good clean sound - Boss CE2?

4. Delay - Digital Stereo Delay - Boss DD6?

5. Wah - Morley bad horsie 2

6. Expression Pedal - Ernie Ball Volume pedal?

7. Compressor - Keeley compressor?

I welcome your thoughts ...

Posted by: ZakkWylde Jul 19 2007, 01:36 AM

You better try out some amps because some (tube) amps have a very "dirty" clean channel, meaning there is always a little overdrive left. Chorus and Delay from Boss are a good choice, whawha i would personnaly go for a Crybaby or a Vox Wah. My advices:
An overdrive to boost your lead sound, a real distortion pedal for heavier stuff, a floor tuner, WahWah, Chorus, delay and an octaver.
Volume Pedals are senseless to my mind because you have you volume potis and your dynamic amp, I also think compression sucks because you loose your amp's dynamic.

Posted by: tonymiro Jul 19 2007, 01:40 AM

Hi Andrew,
I use the Keeley compressor and the Keeley modded Boss Blues Driver. Both are wonderful pedals -and love the blue lights .

I play into a Matchless Lightning 15 that gives, to me, a lovely organic, almost liquid, singing response. Great sustain and breakup. With the compressor the sustain goes on for ever without tiping over into the sort of harsh 'zippered' type sound you can get at the end of some sampler keyboard long sample patches. It remains musical all the way. It also seems to have lots of open, natural harmonics. I'm probably very lazy as I tend to leave it set and switched on. I have the two rotary one - there's a more expensive and versatile four know one available which (I think) lets you play with the fine tuning for different guitars/pick-up combinations.

In my experience a (good) distortion pedal can easily take a clean valve amp into OD/Blues distortion territory (I can get Led Zep/AcDc territory from my Matchless, what is essentially a clean valve amp that has some od with the BD). The Keeley BD is sufficient to push the Lightning from OD to distortion, but its not a fierce or hard type of distortion - find it hard to explain but the closest I can think of is Jeff Beck Blow by Blow type territory. Again the sustain is wonderful. Its also one of those sorts of pedals that really does interact with you and your guitar. Voicings are very musical and react beautifully to changes in volume from the guitar, picking attack etc. The one thing the BD ain't going to give you is hi-gain from a clean setting on my amp. It's aimed at blues type distortion. I had a Boss BD years ago and the Keeley is way way better. (The Boss was good but...) Other possiblities here though - Keeley modded Ibanez TS9 Tube Scream - more distortion/gain, Fulltone Distortion Pro (I use an OCD) - again great pedal though different tone and distortion band (?) to the Keeley.

Neither Keeley pedal are ones (arguably) to suffer bad playing. If your technique is sloppy they will make that crystal clear. All Keeley's are true bypass so if turned off they won't degrade your tone - turned on I've never had an issue. On a side note Rob Keeley is a great guy and really helpful in my experience. The pedals are built like tanks, very high quality and very reliable. Downside - as with most boutique pedals - finding anywhere where you can try them before buying.

On the wish list - consider going a bit more up market for the delay (dream wish list after all ). DD6 is good but I'd go with an eventide or lexicon rack delay. Alternatively, if you can find a 2nd hand one, a Roland Space Echo or WEM copycat. To me the DD6 (and DD3 and 5) are a bit too digital. That of course is subjective.

To try to kill 2 birds with one stone - chorus and a clean amp - sounds a bit like a Roland JC120... (Other possible amps for clean - Matchless Lightning, Fender Twin or perhaps a Bad Cat. For clean and (some) od/distortion - Matchless DC30, Elmwood Modena, Bogner Shiva, Tophat Royale.) On the subject of amps - worth discussing with MickeM regarding his possible purchase of an Elmwood Modena or similar.) However if you want a chorus pedal Boss are great but for a money's no object wish list try a Maxon CS9 or CS550.



Wah pedal - seriously suggest you try a Geoff Tease Real McCoy - unless you can get an original Cry Baby. (Never tried the Vai Bad Horsie though.) Had a Dunlop Cry Baby and the Teese is much better, not as harsh at the extremes of range. My one has dip switches that let you alter the wah voicing so it can change between Cry Baby Vox etc - sadly the switches are internal though there might be one that isn't. If you are after a more autowah type effect there's a Keeley one (don't know what it is like though) and the Zvex Seekwahs/Probewahs are great. Also, but haven't seen or heard - Bob Moog has several autofilter pedals out.

No comment on expression pedals - never used one, I rely on violining when I remember...

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: rokchik Jul 19 2007, 04:01 AM

Hey Andrew,

I can't give you much advice about the amps or most of the pedals as the only amp I ever had is the Vox AD30VT and that has built in effects, and the only pedals I have are the Whammy and a Zakk Wylde Wah...which i love both.

But if I can I'd like to recommend you look at the Vox AC30CC or AC30BM amps.(not sure what wattage your going for). Vox makes a very high quality amp in my opinion and should at least warrant a look.

http://www.voxamps.co.uk/acseries/ac30cc.asp

About the only other thing I can suggest is to make sure your Wah has "true bypass" or else it will suck the tone right out of your amp. The original crybaby wah is great or a Vox. The Zakk Wylde I have is a great wah as well, but it's a bit more "crunchy" and fatter in the tone than the original and I don't know if that's what your looking for. Its a very "metal" wah.

Posted by: Sircraigery Jul 19 2007, 08:03 AM

Hey Andrew,

As far as an awesome clean sounding amp, I would start looking for a Roland Jazz Chorus 120. It's 120W rms solid state dual 12" speaker amp. This amp is pretty much the standard as far as a clean channel. The best I've ever heard, and the best to anyone who has had time to play around with it. I've never heard one bad thing about them from anyone, no matter that style they play. (It's a solid state amp, so no dirty tube amp "clean" channel haha)

A pawn shop near here has a couple for $700, and they aren't in bad shape....again Cdn dollars.



As for pedals, I really only use my snarling dogs. it's a wah/dist in one. Separate volumes for each. And I paid $100 US on ebay for it. Really at that price you can't go wrong.

Hope this helps you out.

Posted by: MickeM Jul 19 2007, 10:50 AM

First about all those pedals, too many (if they don't bypass the signal... but even then, I'm not sure I trust all that "true bypass" talk) will alter the sound from your guitar. I'm having a hard time myself keeping it down to EQ, delay and a Wah, for my Peavey I have to use a distortion for the heavier songs and I'm also very fond of the overdrive pedal. I only run it on the clean channel to get it to crack up earlier.
The ideal for me is to have an amp with so great sound I won't be needing any pedals except for a delay and a wah. Meaning the amp has a good EQ for each channel, so I could use the same settings on two channes only eq the solo channel differently, or have a good solo boost.

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 19 2007, 01:34 AM)

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 19 2007, 11:55 PM

Ok, great input so far

Keeley compressor + Modded BD2 sounds like it is in. I might need another distortion pedal as well to get a high gain sound if I need it ... but I need to be careful not to put too many pedals in series, and true bypass is a must.

I have my heart set on the Vai bad horsie 2, I had a Vox before and know what that sounds like, I want to try something different.

Delay/Chorus, still thinking about, I wont jump straight into the Boss pedals and may look at rack stuff.

I need to add a floor tuner to my list (good one!)

Amps So far I am looking at:

1. Roland Jazz Chorus - does it OD, or would I need to get all of that from pedals?
2. Vox
3. Matchless
4. Bogner

Thanks! Any more advice welcomed

Posted by: Sircraigery Jul 20 2007, 02:18 AM

http://ultimate-guitar.com/reviews/guitar_amplifiers/roland/jc-120/index.html

According to this, the distortion isn't so great haha. I'm glad I'm the only one to think so.

This guy's review is similar to my thought on this amp too.

http://ultimate-guitar.com/reviews/guitar_amplifiers/roland/jc-120/index.html

According to this, the distortion isn't so great haha. I'm glad I'm the only one to think so.

This guy's review is similar to my thought on this amp too.

Posted by: tonymiro Jul 20 2007, 02:41 AM

Tend to agree with Sircraigery- I have a JC as a backup amp. Clean it's wonderful and the chorus is a lovely shimmering one. Distortion though is the achillies heel: poor early 80s transistor amp type. I stick a distortion pedal through the clean amp rather than use the amp's od.

Price wise btw Bogner ecstacy>= MatchlessDC30>>>Fender Twin>=Vox AC30> JC120
at a guess 3500 3500 for combo 1500ish 1000ish 500 2nd hand (UK sterling)
inc speaker decent cab.

Sure you can get much better prices in the states though Andrew.

IF (and its a big if) I had bucket loads of cash I'd probably go with the Bogner as it's a bit more versatile then the matchless (ecstacy has 3 channels, DC30 is 2) and gives better tube saturation then the other remaining 3 amps (IMO) but it is v. expensive (and way too good an amp for my abilities - I'd still sound rubbish, but with a great tone )

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 22 2007, 12:15 AM

Interesting, thanks guys -

On another thread I saw a suggestion that its best to go for an awesome clean valve sounding rig, and just use pedals for distortion/overdrive - any other views on that as a streategy, it kind of makes sense to me? Is valve overdrive an essential part of the whole experience, or is it about the overall sound from an amp?

What about Vox for clean sounds?

Also, I did a quick search for Bogners, found some second hand ones - don't they make them any more?

Regards,

Andrew

Posted by: Mer-V Jul 22 2007, 12:22 AM

You might already know my view on this topic, but VOX's for the clean amp is certainly a go for me. Best clean amps in the bizz IMO.

Once you swing VOX, you'll never go back haha .

OR offcourse, you have a lot of cash to spare, and I mean A LOT, you could go for a Hughes and Kettner. Their Duotone/Puretone amps are just midbogglingly good (provided you have a good guitar... Eeuhm, did I hear you mention JEM? Yeah, I though so... ) haha.

Posted by: ZakkWylde Jul 22 2007, 12:23 AM

The point is: if youre amp has no overdrive itself, you have to put another stompbox in the line which will alter your amp's sound even more. My advise would be an amp with a good clean channel and at least two overdrive channels, for example an Engl.

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 22 2007, 12:40 AM

QUOTE (ZakkWylde @ Jul 21 2007, 07:23 PM)

Posted by: Pavel Jul 22 2007, 12:41 AM

Or a new Marshall JVM series! Check out the JVM series demonstration on Marshall official website! That amp is amazing!

Btw. the only thing i think is really important is the AMP so i think getting a decent amp will solve 80% of your sound problems/goals. I aim for Mesa Boogie or Diamond - unfortunately - too expensive but i'll wait.

Posted by: Mer-V Jul 22 2007, 12:43 AM

QUOTE (ZakkWylde @ Jul 22 2007, 01:23 AM)

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 22 2007, 01:06 AM

QUOTE (Pavel @ Jul 21 2007, 07:41 PM)

Posted by: tonymiro Jul 22 2007, 07:11 AM

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

Posted by: Pavel Jul 22 2007, 11:11 AM

QUOTE (Mer-V @ Jul 22 2007, 01:43 AM)

Posted by: ezravdb Jul 22 2007, 11:34 AM

LOL I thought the marshall JVM was a Yngwie Malmsteen signature xD
Till I checked the website.

Posted by: MickeM Jul 22 2007, 12:53 PM

Andrew, have a lok at http://www.bogneramplification.com/

The reason I only suggested one amp is because I think this is the one that should give you the tone you were looking for.

But since you seem to have a broader interest in various brands and models I could give you my view on a few things.

And I won't cover solid state amps, I don't know much about thir kind.

For starters, you should figure out which tube characteristics you should go for. If we stick to EL34 and 6L6GC which are the most common ones though there are more.
If you want to be albe to switch between different sorts Carvin Legacy supports EL34, 6L6GC and 5881 (it comes with a bias switch)
Pre amp tubes like ECC83 (12AX7) (in slightly different variations) provides a good range of low, mids and high and are most common. there are other pre amp tubes that can be used for f.ex a vintage tone where ECC83 would work but for the true seeker of tone.
EL34 comes with a sound that "breaks up", for simplicity and lack of words from my side say - marshall.
6L6GC is more, in comparance with EL34, full and thick. Read Fender and Mesa.

EL34 is a moth full of grovels to chew on, 6L6GC is marshmallows. I prefer the sound from EL34's.

Question: Which tubes would you prefer?

Next, what kind of amp? Do you like bells and whistles or just the nessessary knobs? I for one am cut between the two, the reason is my Hughes and Kettner which is a small computer (well, it weighs in around 20 kg). If you had asked me one year ago I would have said go for less knobs! Now all I can say is I love the numerous channels and knobs and the built in effects board in my Switchblade.
I only use a Wah with it. I havn't come to it yet but I will try organising the MIDI board so I have a solo sound next to the rhythm sound. Same channel only the solo channel is a bit boosted. So if I'm at bank 1 sound 1 I just move over to sound 2 in the same bank for soloing. But, havn't done it yet so I don't know how well that works. What I do today is just to switch between clean and lead sound and what's so great is that the clean sound can have say a flanger effect while the lead sound has a delay. So instead of pressing a termolo pedal off, stomping a delay and a distortion (or changing channel) all I do is press one knob on the MIDI board. (I could use a noice gate for the higain sounds since our rehearsal room has flourocent lights *grmbl*)
Same with the amps I'm searching now, Elmwood modena60 lacks the knobs while the ENGL invader100 has em all. So I'm a bit split here... Going from my old view on things to keep it simple into complicating things... knobs are fun
Well, back on track. Do you want simplicity or a complex amp?

How many watts? 100W and above is a bit much, though I've got a 100W myself and it sounds very good at turned up at 0.5 it only gets better and better the more I raise the volume. But a power sponge can solve all that. I havn't got one though.
5-15W is enough for the bedroom, 30-50 for pubrock. But as said, get a power soak if you happen to get a +50W amp.

So, for different brands and models I'm a bit hesitating on the Vox range now since the production moved to china. But having seen british enginering with MG cars and Norton motorcycles maybe the move was a good thing
The only amp from Marshall that I would concider these days is the JVM410. They advertise is as a journey between JMP, Plexi, JCM etc.
Mesa Boogie, not what I'm looking for. Doesn't do it for me. I must be crazy, right?
ENGL, I'm split, some 6L6 does sound great but the Invader with EL34 is theeeee best amp around. I'l keep it sofisticated and clean by using Latin stating these amps got scrotum. Rex scrotum

Effects loop and external speaker connection. A must have!

There are so many amps out there that are good in different price ranges. Wether an amp is over priced or good value for they money can be discussed for an eternity but what it all comes down to is wether this amp has got what your looking for or not.
After you have put down the criterias you're looking for you select a range of models that fit and then it's just to head out and test play em. And be sure to crank it since that's when a tube amp is at its best.

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 22 2007, 02:04 PM

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!

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 22 2007, 02:58 PM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 22 2007, 09:04 AM)

Posted by: Pavel Jul 22 2007, 03:22 PM

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

Posted by: tonymiro Jul 22 2007, 03:40 PM

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 - http://www.voodooamps.com/.

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.

Posted by: Rock Jul 22 2007, 03:56 PM

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Jul 22 2007, 07:11 AM)

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

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 22 2007, 04:27 PM

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

QUOTE (Pavel @ Jul 22 2007, 10:22 AM)

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

Posted by: tonymiro Jul 22 2007, 08:36 PM

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

Posted by: MickeM Jul 22 2007, 11:01 PM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 22 2007, 03:58 PM)

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

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 22 2007, 03:58 PM)

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

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 22 2007, 03:58 PM)

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 22 2007, 03:58 PM)

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 22 2007, 03:58 PM)

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 22 2007, 03:58 PM)

Posted by: MickeM Jul 22 2007, 11:16 PM

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Jul 22 2007, 04:40 PM)

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Jul 22 2007, 04:40 PM)

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Jul 22 2007, 04:40 PM)

Posted by: tonymiro Jul 22 2007, 11:50 PM

QUOTE (MickeM @ Jul 23 2007, 12:16 AM)

...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. ...

Posted by: MickeM Jul 23 2007, 09:38 AM

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Jul 23 2007, 12:50 AM)

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...

Posted by: MickeM Jul 23 2007, 12:41 PM

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.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmVupUndwXU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPVmb2NXTCY

Random clips
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ox4unZvE98
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dRAaAAWR4OI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mhMcU-q2fg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fsx4uFm1Yxc

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

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 23 2007, 08:08 PM

QUOTE (MickeM @ Jul 23 2007, 07:41 AM)

Posted by: Miguel_Sanchez Jul 23 2007, 08:48 PM

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

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 23 2007, 09:13 PM

QUOTE (Miguel_Sanchez @ Jul 23 2007, 03:48 PM)

Posted by: MickeM Jul 23 2007, 09:18 PM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 23 2007, 09:08 PM)

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 23 2007, 09:08 PM)

Posted by: MickeM Jul 24 2007, 08:40 PM

H&K Trilogy http://www.guitarworld.com/article/hughes_kettner_trilogy_half_stack mid page. When I watched it it was out of synch but that doesn't matter so much.

Posted by: Hardtail Jul 25 2007, 06:17 AM

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.

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 25 2007, 11:26 PM

QUOTE (Hardtail @ Jul 25 2007, 01:17 AM)

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.

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 25 2007, 11:52 PM

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?

Posted by: tonymiro Jul 26 2007, 01:15 AM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 26 2007, 12:26 AM)

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 26 2007, 02:08 AM

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Jul 25 2007, 08:15 PM)

If ever our wives meet and compare notes Andrew we are going to be in soooo much trouble .

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: Rock Jul 26 2007, 04:21 AM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 22 2007, 04:27 PM)

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

Posted by: Rock Jul 26 2007, 04:36 AM

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Jul 22 2007, 08:36 PM)

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

Posted by: tonymiro Jul 26 2007, 12:45 PM

Thanks for the links Rock - much appreciated.

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 26 2007, 04:05 PM

Bump - I'm amazed that MickeM doesn't have an opinion on this one

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 25 2007, 06:52 PM)

Posted by: MickeM Jul 26 2007, 10:16 PM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 26 2007, 05:05 PM)

Bump - I'm amazed that MickeM doesn't have an opinion on this one

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Jul 27 2007, 12:21 AM

Interesting, thanks. hey are a little scarce in the USA so I don't know if I can try one, but it seems like a great first tube amp, and I like the samples on the laney site.

Posted by: tonymiro Jul 27 2007, 11:59 AM

Read a review of the Laney LH in a UK guitar mag that was very positive and very in line with MickeM's comments. However despite Laney advertising them for a few months there were none in any of the 5 guitar shops that me and my little girl went in to early July. That included 1 Laney dealer. I suspect that they are probably only just hitting the shops in the UK about now so I'd be surprised if any have surfaced elsewhere around the world just yet.

Agree by the way that a lot of people can't see beyond a badge name (whether Marshall or whatever). It's a real shame as a lot of very good kit goes begging whilst people buy yet another whatever as all their mates play it. One culprit though is the service you (or maybe just me) get in a lot of guitar shops. Go in and ask to try out amps and they think you mean only one amp and can get terse when you say you want to try others. This just doesn't work for me as I want to try out and hear the difference between several amps not just goof about on one.

Same is true of guitars. Worst service I ever came across was a guitar shop in Liverpool (better not name it ). Asked to try out a Gibson and the response was 'only if you put the cash on the counter'. Now I know that it can be annoying when the shops deal with kids demanding to play the Jems etcs everyday resulting in scratches on the guitars finish and its devaluation. BUT it's not an excuse for rudeness and downright poor service. BTW I did have the cash on me but I turned around and went to a different shop for the Gibson model I was interested in and have never been back to that shop.

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Aug 3 2007, 10:05 PM

Thanks for the info Tony ...

I came across this recently:

http://www.carvin.com/products/single.php?ItemNumber=VINTAGE16

Anyone have any views on it? What would be the difference in tone between the pentode and triode modes? Looks sweet and pretty cheap too ...

Posted by: MickeM Aug 3 2007, 10:54 PM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Aug 3 2007, 11:05 PM)

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Aug 4 2007, 12:28 AM

QUOTE (MickeM @ Aug 3 2007, 05:54 PM)

I don't know the amp itself. And pentode and triode is also a bit dim to me. Looking at the amp it has two EL84 which sums up to 25W. Pentonde and triode is a way of steering the tubes differently, maybe overdrive em with voltage or put in less, I don't know how it's done but I think it's all about getting early distortion but how the tone differs, don't know. I'm guessing the triode distort at lower volumes than the pentode. But chanses are I'm all wrong.
Pentode gives 16W and triode gives 5W. Does it cut that much? It's not the same things as a power soak though.
I'm sure someone can explain it to us

Here's a sweet competitor to that one, a recording amp oh so wonderful (adding options)
http://www.koch-amps.com/

Posted by: tonymiro Aug 4 2007, 12:56 AM

Apologies all this is going to be technical but it's the only way I can explain it at the moment (too tried and too much beer - hic.)

Think we're talking about the power amp stage here - if so the pentode is generally more efficient than a triode and so can produce more power and less total harmonic distortion. Oddly pentode power amps are often subjectively seen as harder/harsher tone wise then a triode - maybe because when it does distort it goes into hard clipping and produces a harder high end distortion that is less musical than a triode (at least to me).

So a triode will produce less watts for the same amount of voltage applied but may subjectively sound more musical than a pentode where all other aspects of the amp are the same.

Triode/pentode is btw a way of describing the 'wiring' of the tube - three elements in a triode (anode, cathode, control grid) and five in the pentode (anode, cathode, control grid, screen and supressor). Similarly there are diodes (two elements) and tetrodes (four). There's also a thing called ultralinear which is a specific way of using a pentode which is cheaper to manufacture than a straight up pentode circuit.

After this you're then into class A vs class AB (i and ii) vs class B vs class C mode of operation.

Short answer most of us want though is that subjectively most people regard triode full class A as the most musical sound.

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Aug 4 2007, 01:06 AM

Great response, thanks Tony - I understand the physics of valves but I am totally ignorant about how they respond in a guitar amp, so that was useful

I'm back at Bogners site looking at the Duende now ...

Posted by: tonymiro Aug 4 2007, 01:43 AM

MP3s of the Duende sound good Andrew - did you check out the metropolis samples as well? They sound good also.

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Aug 4 2007, 01:52 AM

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Aug 3 2007, 08:43 PM)

Posted by: Chaz Aug 4 2007, 01:53 AM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Jul 21 2007, 07:06 PM)

Posted by: tonymiro Aug 4 2007, 01:56 AM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Aug 4 2007, 02:52 AM)

Posted by: MickeM Aug 4 2007, 09:53 AM

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Aug 4 2007, 01:56 AM)

Posted by: MickeM Aug 4 2007, 10:21 AM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Aug 4 2007, 01:28 AM)

Choices choices - that Koch is sweet

I am definately gravitating towards a low output recording/practice amp, and I'll maybe add a monster later on.

Posted by: tonymiro Aug 5 2007, 01:05 AM

Have a look at the Bivalve as well MickeM - similar to the Uni but maybe a bit moer versatile. Both though are great amps.

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Aug 10 2007, 04:21 PM

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Aug 4 2007, 08:05 PM)

Posted by: MickeM Aug 10 2007, 06:00 PM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Aug 10 2007, 05:21 PM)

Posted by: tonymiro Aug 12 2007, 01:10 AM

Very nice sounding clips Andrew, very 3 dimensional and organic though to me neither sounded vintage, more modern (but without drifting into ultra high gain metal territory) with a lot of saturated gain. Both sounded quite high gain to me - red particularly but not the sort of MB rectifier high gain which, to me, can be a bit harsh.

As with MickeM noone's an expert, we've just have opinions on what we like . Ultimately if the Bogner flips your trigger then go for it - it certainly sounds good to me .

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Aug 12 2007, 01:54 AM

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Aug 11 2007, 08:10 PM)

Very nice sounding clips Andrew, very 3 dimensional and organic though to me neither sounded vintage, more modern (but without drifting into ultra high gain metal territory) with a lot of saturated gain. Both sounded quite high gain to me - red particularly but not the sort of MB rectifier high gain which, to me, can be a bit harsh.

As with MickeM noone's an expert, we've just have opinions on what we like . Ultimately if the Bogner flips your trigger then go for it - it certainly sounds good to me .

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: MickeM Aug 12 2007, 02:02 AM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Aug 12 2007, 02:54 AM)

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Aug 14 2007, 07:42 AM

Well, I ordered some parts already I'll start another thread and make it a kind of amp building blog if people are interested. My head is full of EL34/6V6, Cathode bias, coupling capacitors, output transformers ...

Now, onto the next question ...

Speakers!

What is the deal? Why is a 10" better than a 12", why build a stack of 2 or 4 (is it for power handling or are there other benefits besides?)

Is the Celestion Alnico Blue truly the holy grail of guitar amp speakers? (I certainly hope so cos I just ordered one for my new Amp ...

Please oh Amplifier Gods, give me your speaker knowledge!

Posted by: MickeM Aug 14 2007, 04:59 PM

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Aug 14 2007, 08:42 AM)

Well, I ordered some parts already I'll start another thread and make it a kind of amp building blog if people are interested. My head is full of EL34/6V6, Cathode bias, coupling capacitors, output transformers ...

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Aug 14 2007, 08:42 AM)

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Aug 14 2007, 08:42 AM)

Is the Celestion Alnico Blue truly the holy grail of guitar amp speakers? (I certainly hope so cos I just ordered one for my new Amp ...

Posted by: tonymiro Aug 14 2007, 06:25 PM

Curiously enough both my Roland and my Lightening are 2x10s. I guess I prefer the slightly brighter sound then a 12''. Because I use Gibson type guitars with humbuckers there is already a lot of middle in my sound so. for me, a single 12'' was just too much. I think you'd need to try with your Jem though Andrew.

At the times when I tried each of them I compared them against similar/same amps but set as 1x12s. Apart from the tone I sort of remember also preferring the slightly wider stereo of the 2x10. On the Roland it made a big difference to the chorus.

As to the difference between a cab and a combo mounted speaker. As MickeM says - you will get a lot more air pushed by a 4x12 and therefore a much louder rig both in terms of watts and spl. A 4x12 is supposed to give more bottom end then a 2x12 (or 4x10 or 1x12) as well and many say is part and parcel of the whole 'Marshall sound'.

Also Andrew you might want to note that most guitar amps and cabs use lower wattage rated speakers then you would find in the equivalent output hifi or even bass guitar rig. A high efficiency 100watt rated speaker will not give as much speaker distortion at 50 watts out as 4x12's of 30watts.

Have a look at http://professional.celestion.com/guitar/ and also http://bellsouthpwp.net/r/i/ricjohns/Rivera%20Speaker%20Guide.htm for some general info on speakers. Rivera is great for describing different types and manufacturers - celestion site is, not surprising focused only on celestion...

Also you will need to think about the cab - sealed, half open or open - tuned or not...

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: MickeM Aug 14 2007, 06:37 PM

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Aug 14 2007, 07:25 PM)

Posted by: tonymiro Aug 14 2007, 06:47 PM

Don't think so MickeM - tuned is where the cabinet is constructed - internal bracing, type of wood used, profile of the cabinet and so on - so that certain frequencies are accented and others attenuated due to ability of the cab to resonate or dampen frequencies. Slanting only does this to a limited extent .

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Aug 14 2007, 07:05 PM

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Aug 14 2007, 01:47 PM)

Don't think so MickeM - tuned is where the cabinet is constructed - internal bracing, type of wood used, profile of the cabinet and so on - so that certain frequencies are accented and others attenuated due to ability of the cab to resonate or dampen frequencies. Slanting only does this to a limited extent .

Cheers,
Tony

Posted by: MickeM Aug 14 2007, 07:33 PM

QUOTE (tonymiro @ Aug 14 2007, 07:47 PM)

Don't think so MickeM - tuned is where the cabinet is constructed - internal bracing, type of wood used, profile of the cabinet and so on - so that certain frequencies are accented and others attenuated due to ability of the cab to resonate or dampen frequencies. Slanting only does this to a limited extent .

Cheers,
Tony

QUOTE (Andrew Cockburn @ Aug 14 2007, 08:05 PM)

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Aug 25 2007, 01:40 AM

Well, as discussed way back at the top of this thread, I just hought the following to complement my new Amp:

Ibanez Weeping Demon Wah
Keeley 4 knob comnpressor
Keeley Modded BD-2
Pedal board w/Power supply

I figure that depending on mood, eother the BD-2 or Keeley can provide enough boost to keep the tube amp in saturation/compression, and of course everyone needs a Wah pedal and I wanted a change from the Vox which was my last Wah.

My analogue signal path is well on the way

Posted by: Rain Oct 4 2009, 01:16 PM

I don't know if this has been posted yet or not - but here is the link to Steve talking about some of his gear:

His very own distortion pedal:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrBLnB3ze5Y&feature=channel_page

Everything else:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b58Xil8RfRY


I hope this helps - most of his gear is explained in the video. Some of it you'll just have to pause the feed and check out the gear yourself.

Happy hunting

Posted by: audiopaal Oct 4 2009, 06:52 PM

Edit... Nevermind