Amp Techniques - Am I doing it all wrong?

[goroth]

I love preamp distortion (in the form of peds) I hate power tube distortion. I love good ear plugs (with close to linear frequency reduction). Otherwise, I totally could have written every word of backwards' post.

[Boxbie]

I run a loud clean amp with an od and a fuzz.

Cranked amp distortion sounds the best by far, but the easiest compromise is to have the amp clean(ish) and add pedals, as all these folks have said.
Because running supreme cranked amp toanz, then running out of volume at a particularly loud gig is truly demoralizing.
Also, jumping on a a pedal to add level and distortion, but having the amp just get more saturated instead of louder, is shitty too.

In a perfect world of rock stardom, you'd have a clean amp and a dirty amp. And someone to carry them around for you.

PJ amps.gif (834.17 KiB) Viewed 749 times

[rfurtkamp]

Hate power tube distortion.

Hate speaker breakup.

Loud and clean until the amp explodes.

Then push that clean loudness with a dozen fuzzes and a Space Echo preamp.

[Maton]

Thanks so much for all your suggestions guys, has completely changed my way of looking at amp and pedal usage. Being in Brisbane, Australia, vintage fenders are a little harder to come by, in fact even the resissues are hard to find (and pricier over here) - they can be ordered in but keen to try things out before pulling the trigger.

Tried a Deville which to my ears sounded amazing in comparison to a bunch of other amps they had in store when run clean (the reverb is beautiful in those things). Think it will probably break up too early in a loud venue setting though so looking at trying the a Fender '65 Deluxe Reverb and a '65 Twin Reverb. My understanding is the twin is pretty much the same as the deluxe reverb except the rectifier is solid state on the Twin, it's 85W vs 22W and is 2x12 vs 1x12.

Looking forward to it out! Thanks again!

[rfurtkamp]

Ton of differences between all three. Twin and Deville use 6L6s, which will not break up at any sane volume if you get the right tubes.

DRRI is 6V6 and will have limited clean headroom.

I hate power tube distortion, hate, hate it. 6L6s in everything, high efficiency speakers, backed up with solid state stuff in stereo if I can help it.

I assume your larger venues there have a house PA.

[Maton]

Spot on rfurkamp, I missed the fact the Deluxe has 6V6's in it. I was under the impression the Deville would break up earlier than the Twin but that may not be the case. Is the Twin overkill when you're mostly going to be running fuzz and OD pedals in it? The $1000 I save will happily go to more fuzz pedals, one can never have too many right?!

Oh and we do have PA systems here, its just generally the 'soundie' is at the bar

[sonidero]

Oh and we do have PA systems here, its just generally the 'soundie' is at the bar

Soundie is sweet... That's the Strayan version of Sonidero...

[D.o.S.]

I run a loud clean amp with an od and a fuzz.

Cranked amp distortion sounds the best by far, but the easiest compromise is to have the amp clean(ish) and add pedals, as all these folks have said.
Because running supreme cranked amp toanz, then running out of volume at a particularly loud gig is truly demoralizing.
Also, jumping on a a pedal to add level and distortion, but having the amp just get more saturated instead of louder, is shitty too.

In a perfect world of rock stardom, you'd have a clean amp and a dirty amp. And someone to carry them around for you.

PJ amps.gif

PJ....

[rfurtkamp]

Twin is overkill most of the time, but if you want it, you want it.

For anything sane, I'd bring my Hot Rod Deluxe and Jazz Chorus to if I wanted tubes, but realistically I don't care enough about having them live to matter.

I'd play with both and see if you need the Twin or not. The Deville is going to be stupid heavy too.

It all depends on the size of clubs you're looking at, and if I needed a 2x12 in one amp, I'd go head/cab all day long first.

[friendship]

I played really loud rock music with my Twin for years and at no point would a sound person allow me to turn it up past 2 on the volume knob. I'm not exaggerating.

Unless you're playing a really big music hall, your Twin will hold you back, regardless of how stunningly beautiful they sound.

I don't get the super loud clean thing even when I have my pedals do the dirt for me. When it's so loud you can't get a little compression/saturation from the amp without the sound person vowing to slay you, it's too loud. Running an awesome fuzz pedal full bore into an amp that has barely started to amplify sounds bad to me and usually moreso to others. That's my particular experience.

[Maton]

That makes sense to me re the Twin guys. The hearings already starting to go, no need to speed up the process - I'll probably say the same for my back in a couple of years so the idea of keeping the weight down is probably not a bad thing either, I just found have a head and cab meant another back and forth when loading in/out (while the drummer drinks a beer because kit is provided , must admit it was an Orange PPC212 which I'm assuming the English put cement in the bottom of for us Aussies).

I guess my concern was that anything that is 1x12 and 20-30 watt will break up too early and potentially not have as fuller sound. I am playing in a 3 piece so maybe that is more reason (or less) reason to go for a 1x12? If not the big brother's of the fender line up then whats a more practical option? Having a beautiful amp that sits at 2 sounds pointless to me.

You happy with your Hot Rod Deluxe rfurtkamp? 40Watts with 6L6's sounds like it would cover the clean headroom well to take OD and fuzz pedals.

[rfurtkamp]

Yea, I'm happy with my Deluxe. Prefer the older ones with the Emis versus Celestions for clean, but it's not a dealbreaker on the new ones.

I'd be ok with it as my only amp, but I prefer to have other options onboard because I run a convoluted stereo rig that only a mother can love if I get to choose.

[echodeluxe]

i usually run clean amp with not much room left until it starts breaking up, and then i either have my micro amp going all the time, and then i use overdrive to varying degrees. usually at around noon on the gain (right now using an Escape Velocity) and using my volume knob to change the gain. fuzz is just full bore, fuck it. make that shit blow up.

[goroth]

Mic'd up 30 watts is nice. You can push it a bit before the sound guy yells at you. Not much but a bit. In a rehearsal room with a loud drummer I like 60 watts. Not much more volume just a little later breakup. In a 3 piece 30 watts could work I reckon.

[rfurtkamp]

I'm happy with about 200, of which I use about 20.

I want to be able to peel the paint off of anything, if I needed to.

Then again, I realized recently that a 4x12 in the living room was a great idea.

Now I need a 1x15 to go with it.