Amp Talk

rcaz

In my guitar-playing career, I've devoted most of my gear-related interest to Fender offset guitars and pedals in general. I know very little about amps. When I bought my current amp (Marshall AVT100) I was a blissfully ignorant 15-year-old playing Clash and Green Day songs on a Squier strat.

Now I'm much more interested in leaning about valve amps and how they work. My knowledge at the moment is pretty patchy. I understand the idea of the vacuum tube and thermionic emission and all that, negative feedback loops, but I don't understand relating all that to sound.

Things like British- and American- style, the sounds of different tubes, the stuff all the proper amp heads know about, I don't know any of that.

I thought maybe we could have one thread for amp talk? I was thinking of starting a "what amp should I get" thread, but I thought that would die as soon as I've got a new amp, this thread might hang around for a while and help a few other people too.

To get things started; I'm looking for a new amp. The simplicity of a low-powered one- or two-channel valve amp appeals to me. Gain, bass, middle, treble, master. That's all you need, I reckon. Hell, you don't even need a master. Reverb and tremolo are lovely extras. I really like the idea of going out and getting a Vibro Champ and really learning how the basics work. Play it a lot, learn about repairing, servicing and modding it. But that isn't feasible because I want to get a new amp that I can use for band practice.

Re: 'British' and 'American' amps - 'British' amps = middly and little clean headroom, 'American' amps = more scoopy and more headroom. Right?

For that reason, I've decided an 'American' amp would be about right for me. Now, if I had all the money in the world, I'd go and get a vintage Twin Reverb or Bandmaster. But I don't have that kind of money, so I'm looking at a Peavey Classic 30. I want something with good headroom so I can get loud and stay clean, play distortion pedals into it and still have them sound nice. And I'd LOVE a real spring reverb.

I think a lot of the music I listen to is done with American style amps, except for some notable exceptions like Radiohead and Blur type guitar work, with Vox AC30s. I'd love one of these too, but I think the Peavey would allow me to cover more ground with one amp. Until I can afford to get a few more amps

Paolo_M

You're spot on with your American vs Brittish tone thoughts.

This come from three key areas:

Power valves
Despite myth the power valve selection back in the day had nothing to do with tone and everything with price, availability and reliability.
This guided Fender down the 6L6 type route and Marshall, after some misadventure, down the EL34 route.

6L6 type valves have thick/flubby bottom end and sparkling/harsh highs, depending on your taste. Their mid are balanced or weak, again depending on your taste.
EL34 are well known for their crunchy mid range and tighter bottom. Again that can translate to brash mids and no bottom depending on your taste.

The headroom thing comes from here also. Marshall copied Fender as everyone knows. They changed to EL34 vlaves. However they did not alter the phase inverter design. A 6L6 requires over 60V from the phase inverter to drive it to full output. The EL34 requires around 35V. If Marshall had understood the circuit properly the PI would have been redesigned, luckily for us they didn't on both counts.
This thing with PI gives rise to people thinking that 6L6s have more clean headroom (when in fact they don't, they just require a different set of circuit paramters) and also why vintage Marshalls seem to get abnoxiously loud when just going from 1-2 on the volume.

Tone stack
The classic Fender Blackface tone stack was designed for surf and country music. It is quite scopped sounding and dips more than 15dB in the mid range.
The Marshall tone stack was copied from the Fender Bassman which, shock :eek:, was designed for bass. This tone stack has quite pronounced lows and mids. The mids are within 5dB of the lows and highs.

Speakers
Again the availability lead the two amp kings either side of the water to opt for Jensenn and Celestion respectively. Both speaker type have unique voicings.

It's interesting to note that many modern American voiced amps sound best with Celestion speakers like the V30, which have a heavy mid emphasis.


The combination of the three things give rise to the American/Brittish tone thing.



An old twin would be lovely. I've an old Vox and a couple of old Marshalls but don't have a Fender. I found those vintage amps to be an excellent learning ground. They are simple but are still the foundation of all good, modern amps.

Sandvich

The older AVTs are actually decent amps(Death used to use them). You'd need something good to realistically be a step up from them, and of course a full tube amp in many cases won't sound as good at lower volumes.

An Egnater Tweaker would be a good suggestion, I think, since you can switch between a lot of the different sounds and get a good feel for them. About the same as a Classic 30 new I think.

landsleaving

I'm in a similar situation to El Pr0n, looking to get a new amp with a certain sound, but what I want is far out of my price range. I have pretty much the same tastes too :pac:

I was planning on a blues jr, since my favourite sound is the classic fender style, but found it leaned too much towards classic rock/muddyish blues for me. I want clean tones more than driven, I prefer pedals for that, that way I can change up the sound without having to buy a new amp and it just seemed less clear and bright than a champion 600, which I learned a bit about tube amps with, and had a great clean tone. I had a solid state marshall too, and it was surpisingly good, and wonderfully versatile, but not the sound I was after. What it did though, it did well.

I like the brighter, surf style sound of, I suppose a twin, but that's a long way out of my price range, so its a super champ xd for me. What is it about the different fender style amps that change the tone? The Blues Jr. was ok, but it lacked the brightness I was looking for, is that slightly more British/Marshall styled? What would be the best amp for a really bright clean sound?

nialldabass

landsleaving wrote: »

I'm in a similar situation to El Pr0n, looking to get a new amp with a certain sound, but what I want is far out of my price range. I have pretty much the same tastes too :pac:

I was planning on a blues jr, since my favourite sound is the classic fender style, but found it leaned too much towards classic rock/muddyish blues for me. I want clean tones more than driven, I prefer pedals for that, that way I can change up the sound without having to buy a new amp and it just seemed less clear and bright than a champion 600, which I learned a bit about tube amps with, and had a great clean tone. I had a solid state marshall too, and it was surpisingly good, and wonderfully versatile, but not the sound I was after. What it did though, it did well.

I like the brighter, surf style sound of, I suppose a twin, but that's a long way out of my price range, so its a super champ xd for me. What is it about the different fender style amps that change the tone? The Blues Jr. was ok, but it lacked the brightness I was looking for, is that slightly more British/Marshall styled? What would be the best amp for a really bright clean sound?

I'd have a look at the Laney cub range, great value and alot more versatile than the champion 600 for not much more money, I have a cub 10 2 6v6 and 2 83
Celestion 10 inch tube 10, 30 watt speaker not the greatest but pretty good overall for its size, and very loud, sperate gain so you can get a nice crunch when needed. They have started doing a 15 watt combo and head with reverb and a 1watt input aswell, not seen them yet but again they look like great value

Miklos

What's your budget? I love the Fender sound, the only amps I have are Fender (well one's a Deluxe Reverb clone).

landsleaving

I'm not really looking to get it now, I was more thinking in the future, and just looking to know what was best for that sound. So no budget, but I'm not really going to ever spend *that* much on an amp, so I wouldn't touch anything vintage.

For now I'm getting a super champ xd, I have neither the budget, nor the space for much else. After playing one I found it better than both a pro and blues junior for getting the sound I want, and there wasn't much else in my price range.

The Laney Cubs look nice though. I'd love to try out the 15w version, but they seem hard to find even online.

nialldabass

I'd like to try the new Laney 15w, but they are brand new so I'm sure there will be more around soon. Still the Champs a great little amp so you wont be dissapointed. And much easier to buy online, not quite a scarey as buying a guitar you've never played:D