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Archive for the ‘amps’ Category

Plug: Tone Merhants, Orange, CA

Posted in amps, guitar, Guitars on April 13, 2007| 7 Comments »

In search of boutique tone? There’s no better place than Tone Merchants in Orange, CA. I found this excellent shop online while surfing the web for a boutique tube amp, and recently had the fortune to visit the shop while I was on vacation.

Why is it so special? First off, Noel Evangelista, who runs the place is just a great guy. Very warm and good-natured – and definitely not someone who tries to be a salesman. In fact, when I was first searching for a tube amp, it was Noel who recommended that I buy a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe to get introduced to tube amps. Paraphrasing our conversation a few months ago, “If you’re new to tube amps, then you can’t go wrong with a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. It’s a great starter amp – plus you get that distinctive Fender clean sound.” Based upon that conversation, that’s exactly what I did, and after a few mods, I’m absolutely lovin’ it!

Secondly, the shop is set up for hanging out. The main amp room is spacious with a couple of comfy couches in the center, so you can relax while you twiddle with the amps. The unsaid sales pitch is simply this: Let the equipment speak for itself. For serious tone freaks, that’s a powerful pitch. Words can’t convey what an amp or guitar does. You have to hear it.

Furthermore, unlike most music shops, Tone Merchants has a very select, very limited inventory of amps and guitars. You won’t find name brands like Fender, Gibson, Marshall, Vox, Bad Cat, Buddha, or any boutique amps that you might read about in Guitar Player mag. The stuff here is all boutique. I played two amps from Cornford and Faustine. Loved both, but really dug the Faustine which has a built-in reactive speaker load attenuator. That’s a very useful addition as well as being a fantastic-sounding amp. For guitars, I played a Heritage 535 classic made by some of the original Gibson guys, which was an even better-sounding ES-335. Real clean, deep tones. But the guitar that I absolutely fell in love with was a Suhr Classic. From a distance, it looks like a Strat with a dual-coil humbucker in the bridge position. But what sets it apart is the absolutely gorgeous, silky-smooth tones it produces. The one I played had an alder body with a maple neck like my own Strat, but the fret board was rosewood, which really smoothed out the tone (I love rosewood fretboards). Ahh… I want this guitar!!!

Anyway, I digress. Tone Merchants also gives clinics and small concerts in their sound stage at the back of the shop. It’s a great place for showcasing local guitarists. If you’re in the area, check out their concert and clinic schedule.

All in all, this is a must-see shop if you’re looking for boutique equipment. Also, if you want to play a Faustine amp, this is the ONLY place to go as they have an exclusive deal with Faustine amps.

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I’ve Got GAS – And I’ve Got It Bad!!!

Posted in amps, Effects, Guitars, Music on March 21, 2007| 9 Comments »

No, I’m not talking about the gastrointestinal waste product, I’m talking about Guitar Acquisition Syndrome. It’s an affliction that plagues guitar players the world over, forcing them to buy more and more equipment so they can achieve the perfect tone. Wonder why guitar players are always broke? Look no further. It’s because they’ve sunk all their money into their gear.

Some people have likened GAS to obsessive compulsive disorder; considering the amount of money some people spend, it could be highly likely that it comes close, but really, it’s not that bad. It’s just that in the quest for attaining the ideal sound, you need to get equipment – and that costs money.

Is there a cure? Not as long as you’re trying to tweak your tone. But it goes away once you get close to your ideal. For instance, I’ve pretty much stopped buying gear since I’ve achieved my ideal – at least for now; and that’s the catch. GAS comes back when you want to change your tone, and the amount of GAS you get is in direct proportion to how big of a change you want to make. For me, last year was a year of complete re-invention. I went from being a primarily acoustic-electric guitar player, to being almost entirely electric, and the equipment I had just didn’t suffice. So, two electric guitars, three amps, and a set of stomp boxes later, not to mention a new PA and recording equipment, I’m pretty much over my GASeous period. I’m pretty satisfied… at least for now… 🙂

Can you control GAS? Actually, yes. I have a very supporting wife who sang for me in a music group before we started dating, so she was pretty familiar with my need for more equipment. Once we got married, we had several debates about me getting equipment, since the money was coming out of our family budget. So after going back and forth, and not getting any resolution, she one day said she’d like to make a deal. Since my regular job provided enough money to support the family and pay the mortgage, I could set up a separate account and deposit all my gig money into it to use as I pleased. But a huge part of the deal was that I couldn’t buy anything on credit or financing. I had to use the cash I had. That was a very fair deal, and it was also a way to curb my GASeous urges.

Anyone else have GAS? Share your thoughts!

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Do Solid State Amps Really Suck?

Posted in amps, Guitars, Music, recording on March 8, 2007| 5 Comments »

A lot of tube amp purists seem to think so, and for the most part, I’d have to agree. But on the flip side, solid state amps have their uses. For instance, under some conditions, a solid state amp actually makes more sense to use than a tube amp. When I gig, I bring two amps with me: A re-tubed and modified Fender Hot Rod Deluxe, and a Roland Cube 60. I play my electrics (ES-335 and Strat with Tex Mex pickups) through the Hot Rod, while I play my Ovation Elite acoustic/electric through the Roland Cube. There’s a practical reason for this in addition to a more personal reason. The practical reason is that I have effect boxes that are specifically geared towards shaping my electric guitars’ tones on the Hot Rod. Having to dial in the effects for a third is just too impractical.

On the personal side of things, I found that my Ovation actually sounded better (to my ears) on the clean channel of the Cube. I wasn’t expecting it, but I think the brightness and high touch sensitivity of the Hot Rod actually made my ovation too bright – it’s already a bright-sound guitar unplugged. With the Roland, I could dial back the brightness of the amp to bring out the Ovation’s natural brightness, and with the built-in chorus, add some subtle overtones that was very pleasing to my ears. I also “cheat” a bit by running a Presonus TubePre right before the amp, and that really warms up my signal. And by the way, the Cube 60 is a VERY LOUD amp; so loud, in fact, that I actually use the tube pre-amp as a gain limiter to control the amp’s volume – otherwise, I’d have to play the amp at around 2.

I also own a Line 6 Flextone III Plus that I use extensively in my recording work. Why? With its controllable direct out, I can get a nice even signal coming from my amp and go directly in to my recording unit. Furthermore, because it’s a modeling amp, I can tweak a lot of different things to create a unique patch that I couldn’t achieve without a lot of signal processing (read: effect boxes) on my tube amp. Note however, that the guitar parts that I play through the Flextone III typically play a supporting role in my songs, but even as support, they play a valuable part.

Another important point that I’d like to make is that with a modeling amp, you get a very consistent tone. In a lot of cases that consistency can equate to “boringness,” but for my uses, I can create a background guitar part knowing that I won’t have to do much with it in my recording software. Also with respect to consistency, once I’ve dialed in a tone on my Flextone, it sounds pretty much the same throughout a wide range of volumes. That’s very useful.

The downside of a modeling amp is that, well, your sounds are models. While modeling technology has certainly come a long way, you can get close to a particular tone from a tube amp, but it’s not quite the same. Another thing that I found is that with a full-blown modeling amp like the Flextone III, it actually sounds horrible on stage; especially if you’ve introduced distortion into the patch. There’s a lot to be said about the interplay between pre-amp and power amp tubes in producing a distorted signal. Modeling amps just can’t capture that 100%. But I will say that played clean, it’s tough to distinguish between the two types of amps, especially if you put a tube pre before a modeling amp, like I did with my Cube 60.

So the moral of the story boys and girls is that modeling amps don’t suck. For me, they’re very useful for specific purposes. In all others, I’ll take a tube amp any day.

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Turn that F&%kin’ Thing Down!!!

Posted in amps, Effects, gear reviews, guitar, Guitars, Music on March 6, 2007| 3 Comments »

The Dr. Z Air BrakeAfter many years of using solid state amps, I finally started looking at tube amps; specifically, boutique tube amps. I’ve looked at and played several from folks like Dr. Z, Mesa, King Amplification and a bunch of others. But boutique amps are VERY EXPENSIVE. And upon the recommendation of a very knowledgeable acquaintaintance (mentioned previously), I purchased a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe to tide me over until I could afford the $2500-$3500 for a boutique amp.

But no matter what boutique tube amp I decide to buy, one thing that struck me about about tube amps is that they’re LOUD!!! Yeah, I know, a lot of that comes from the types of volume pots installed on many amps, but irrespective of that little issue, tube amps just rock the house with their tonal clarity and their ability to punch through a mix. Unfortunately, they can get so loud that they squash the rest of your band (let alone shatter the eardrums of your audience), and that’s the bad part because most tube amps, especially Mesas and Marshalls just don’t sound right until they’re cranked and really pushing their power tubes. But in small to medium-sized venues, you’ll have people running for the door!

So I went looking for a solution where I could push my power tubes but not break windows (or in a specific personal instance, not have the next-door-neighbor calling me at 1 am to “turn my f&*king amp down”). In any case, the answer lay in a box called a power attenuator. There are several types, and I won’t bore you with technical details, but the gist of a power attenuator is just that: it attenuates the signal coming from your amp. You simply place it between your amp and your speakers and it outputs a lower signal – thus lower volume. What this means is that you can crank your amp to the level that you’d like and achieve an overdriven tone, but do it at a significantly reduced volume level.

The hot ticket right now seems to be the THD Hot Plate. But there are others out there as well. Personally, I like the Dr. Z Air Brake because it has a very simple set up (just two knobs), and is much more versatile right out of the box than the Hot Plate. This is because it automatically adjusts to the proper impedance of your amp; whereas you have to get a specific Hot Plate model that matches your amp’s impedance level. Choose the wrong one and you could be in a world of hurt! So I’ll be going with the Air Brake.

However, since I have a home studio, I will also be purchasing the Weber Mass 100 because it has a EQ’d DI direct output that I can run directly into my MBox 2. That’s very useful for studio work, but way too complicated for stage work. Besides, even though I only play with 4 effect pedals (BBE Sonic Stomp [you gotta get this – or better yet, get a rackmount sonic maximizer], Ibanez TS-808 Tube Screamer, Boss DD-3 delay, and Boss CE-5 chorus), I have more than enough knobs to twiddle with, and the Air Brake is simple enough to use on stage – two knobs. I tend to be a set it and forget it kind of guy and only like to channel switch to my gain stage or switch the TS-808, so the less I have to play around with, the better.

Anyway, if you’re a guitar player who’s in search of maintaining your tone but saving your eardrums – as well as those in your audience – then a power attenuator is the thing for you.

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If you’re thinking about buying a tube amp…

Posted in amps, guitar, Guitars, Music on February 14, 2007| 1 Comment »

…then you’ve got to read this article about tube amplification written by the president of Mesa Engineering, Randall Smith. Beware, you should have a good hour or so on hand to go through it (I read it in two sittings, myself). In any case, it’s just about the best article I’ve ever read on how tube amps work, and what it means when someone says, “Class A” or “Class AB” configuration. And if you’re someone like me who is currently in the market for a good tube amp, this article completely demystifies all that stuff a salesman will bandy about to get you excited about an amp.

As they say, information is power. With this article, you should be able to make a really good, informed decision on what kind of tube amp will suit your needs best. For me, after reading through this article (I actually re-read several sections just to make sure I understood what he was talking about), I’m going to be looking for a two-channel setup that’ll give me Class A and Class AB operation, so I have maximum versatility. But I’ll let you read the article – I understand the concept, but I don’t think I could explain it any more clearly than what Randall did.

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