Hey everyone! Ben Fargen here from Fargen Custom Amps & Mods. I was asked to write a post for MyRareGuitars.com, so I thought I’d write about some famous songs and amplifiers. I’m really looking forward to your comments, so let me know which songs and amps you would include in this list. Thanks!

10. Fender Showman (Blonde Brownface)

Song: Miserlou
Artist: Dick Dale
The unmistakable sound of surf guitar was created by Dick Dale’s Fender stratocaster and a Fender Showman amp. One of the most important pieces of his signature sound was a custom Fender reverb unit (built by Leo Fender and given to Dick Dale as a prototype) driving a cranked up dual showman into 2 X 15-inch JBL D1 30 speakers. On the opening low E run from Dick Dale’s version of Miserlou you knew surf guitar was born, and that super cool reverb-laden sound would change the history of instrumental guitar music.

Dick Dale's 1965 Fender Showman Amp at the Musical Instrument Museum in Phoenix, AZ

9. Marshall JTM 45 Combo (Series 2, Model #1962)

Song: Hideaway
Artist: Eric Clapton (John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers)
In the mid 60′s – after Eric Clapton left the Yardbirds – he joined with the John Mayall Bluesbreakers. Within one year earned a huge reputation and the nickname “Slowhand”. The Bluesbreakers recorded the Beano album in April 1966 and Clapton used a Marshall Series 2 1962 JTM 45 combo with KT 66 tubes. This amp coupled with the Les Paul guitar created a new kind of sound no one had ever heard before in blues. Some dubbed this the “woman” tone, and players have been chasing it for decades.

The Marshall Bluesbreaker: The Story of Marshall's First Combo

8. Fender Deluxe Reverb

Song: Sweet Dreams
Artist: Roy Buchanan
Roy Buchanan and his trusty, well-weathered 50′s telecaster never abused a finer vintage amp than the Fender Deluxe Reverb. Roy was known for cranking his Fender Deluxe Reverb full blast and facing it toward the back of the stage to cut the stage volume. Roy gave his fans one screaming note after another and some of the sweetest tear-jerking blues you’ve ever heard. If there was ever a player that could wring blood, sweat and tears from a guitar, it was the late, great Roy Buchanan.

1960's Blackface Fender Deluxe Reverb Amp

7. Fender Bassman (Blonde Brownface)

Song: Rock This Town
Artist: Brian Setzer

Brian setzer is the king of cool when it come to rockabilly guitar style. He brought 50′s style blues/jazz guitar back in a time when AOR rock and new wave ruled the airwaves. One of the secret weapons in his tone is a Roland RE-201 Space Echo between his Gretsch guitar and two blonde Fender Bassman amps. That setup creates a great rowdy slap back echo which has become part of his signature tone.

Brian Setzer's Blonde Brownface Fender Bassman 6G6-B Amps setup with Roland Space Echo

6. Fender Tweed Deluxe

Song: Like A Hurricane
Artist: Neil Young
Neil Young is the godfather of grunge. bands like Pearl Jam and Nirvana pay tribute to Neil’s wild, unleashed crunchy chords and ruckus feedback swirls in many of their songs. Neil sports his worn black beauty Les Paul, feeding his 1959 Tweed Deluxe on many of his classic tunes live and in the studio. One amazing part of Neil’s rig is the Whizzer. In order to access the Deluxe’s varying degrees of overdrive and gain, Young uses a custom-made amp-control switching device known simply as “the Whizzer,” which consists of 2 parts: the foot pedal and the mechanical switching device that physically turns the amp’s knobs. The Whizzer allows Young to stomp a footswitch on the floor to command the unit to twist the Deluxe’s volume and tone controls to any of a number of determined preset positions. This allows Neil to run a pure tone set up: guitar-cord-amp. No booster, overdrive, or distortion pedals are needed to achieve his classic agro-tone…just the little 50′s Fender Tweed Deluxe and the Whizzer.

Neil Young's 1959 Fender Tweed Deluxe Amp

5. VOX AC30

Song: Bad
Arist: The Edge (U2)

The Edge is one of my all time favorite guitarists. He created a signature sound early on in his career with a Fender Stratocaster, Electro Harmonix Memory Man delay pedal and a VOX AC30 on albums such as WAR and The Unforgettable Fire. This winning combination has served him well from the early days all the way through recent records and live work. The Edge creates complex echo manipulations coupled with the airy chime of the Vox AC30. The Edge has used a massive catalog of guitars and multi FX units over the years, but the AC30 has remained a staple regardless of the other changes. These gear details coupled with his brilliant parts make U2′s catalog of songs distinguishable with just one note of the Edge’s guitar. Very few guitar players in history have created such a powerful and recognizable signature sound like The Edge.

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The Edge's 1964 Vox AC30TB (Top Boost) Amp ['64 chassis in a 70's cabinet

4. Supro Thunderbolt

Song: Communication Breakdown
Artist: Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin)
There has been a lot of speculation over the years regarding the amps that Jimmy Page used in the studio during the groundbreaking debut release Led Zeppelin. Jimmy will neither confirm nor deny which amp(s) were used in the studio, and there are no known photos in the archives to corroborate my story. But…based on the tones heard on the record, it is entirely possible that the Supro Thunderbolt was used. So in keeping with the mythical ethos of Led Zeppelin, I added it in to the mix.

Supro Thunderbolt Amp (front)

Supro Thunderbolt Amp (back)

Now, just to add to the mystery, here’s the Supro amp that Jimmy page gave to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. It’s actually a Supro 1690T Coronado, but the features of the amp do not match up with details Jimmy previously provided when questioned about the Supro amp he used on Led Zeppelin. And the mystery continues…

The Supro 1690T Coronado that Jimmy Page gave to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Supro 1690T Coronado Amp (catalog ad)

3. Marshall Bass 50w #1986 (Head)

Song: Statesboro Blues
Artist: Duane Allman (Allman Brothers Band)
Anyone that loves electric guitar cannot deny the impact Duanne Allman had on the legacy of blues slide guitar. His liquid lines and fluid tone seem to jump from the neck of his Gibson Les Paul without effort. He used a simple rig of two 50 Watt Marshall heads into two 4 x 12-inch cabs. His tone on the legendary Allman Brothers recording Live at the Filmore East is a destination for anyone wanting to capture the ultimate blues tone. Nobody plays it the way Duane did. If you don’t own a copy of this record, I recommend you head to the record store and pick it up immediately because you are missing out on a legendary sound and performance.

Marshall Bass 50w Head Model #1986

Duane Allman's Last Show (Oct. 1971, Los Angeles)

2. Dumble Overdrive Special

Song: Josie
Artist: Larry Carlton (Steely Dan)
During the 1970′s and 80′s Mr. 335 laid down over 500 tracks a year as a session player and on his own records. He is definitely one of LA’s guitar royalty. Armed with his trusty ’68 Gibson ES-335 and two Dumble Overdrive Special amps, his monster jazz fusion guitar line are unmistakable and can be heard all over popular music. Steely Dan’s 6th release, Aja, employed a huge jazz influence and was their most guitar heavy record to date. This was mostly in part to the amazingly tasty tones and licks from Larry Carlton. Aja is one of Steely Dan’s best and most popular records for sure. Mr. 335 obviously helped push that record to the top.

Larry Carlton's Dumble Overdrive Special Amps (2005)

1. Marshall Super Lead #1959 (12,000 Series Metal Panel Plexi 100-Watt)

Song: Running With The Devil
Artist: Eddie Van Halen
With the release of Van Halen I in 1978, the world of rock was changed forever. Edward Van Halen hit the scene with a new guitar sound that was so fast and furious no one had ever heard anything like it before. Eddie was a do-it-yourself kind of guy, always tweaking around with modded guitar pickups, different fx pedals on the floor and different ways to drive his Marshall amplifier into saturated overdrive. In the legend of EVH, many myths about how he created his early guitar tone have run rampant for decades. Speculation about DIY mods like power resistors across the power tubes plates, AC variacs to raise or lower the input voltage of the amp, and large resistant power loads over the speaker out have spawned endless articles and arguments on forums about how the legendary early EVH sound was created. Sketchy details from the era and no solid proof of what was used from EVH or his camp during those days continue to feed the tone chasers fuel tanks. And to this day the holy grail tone from Van Halen 1 has players frothing at the mouth. But you and I know the only real truth: The tone is 95% in the hands, and Eddie’s legendary sound has more to do with the notes he played rather than the tone in which he played it with.

Eddie Van Halen's Marshall Super Lead #1959 100-watt Plexi

Eddie Van Halen's Marshall Super Lead #1959 100-watt Plexi

Eddie Van Halen's Marshall Super Lead #1959 100-watt Plexi

10 Classic Guitar Amps & The Songs That Made Them Famous from MyRareGuitars.com

Heh! I can hear the clicking of many keyboards preparing their rebuttals to that comment!

It’s never wise to make such a sweeping generalization. But there is some sense behind my comment – at least I think so! My belief that more than 50 watts is a waste has to do with where guitarists play, the type of equipment available in live venues if a guitarist gigs, and how output power affects a guitar amp’s performance.

Guitar Amp Power Requirements Have Changed Over The Years

Back when rock and roll was young guitarists required huge amounts of back line power to fill ever larger live venues. Public Address or PA systems just weren’t up to the task of being used to amplify electric guitars so everyone in the room could hear. So, walls of 100 watt amps became a common site.

Today, if a guitarist plays a venue that would require 100s of watts of amp power to fill the room the venue will have the capability to mic the guitar amp. In that case, a 4 watt Gem or a Fender Champ could work just fine!

There’s also the unfortunate fact that some bands still insist on playing with punishingly high stage volume levels regardless of whether their amps are mic’ed. I’m not going to address this topic here – musicians should protect their hearing and the hearing of their audiences!

So, why aren’t all guitar amps under 10 watts? Because of tradition – that’s a BIG reason why lots of manufacturers still make high powered amps – and because different styles of music require different tones and varying amounts of clean headroom.

Guitar Amp Power Determines Clean Headroom

If you could compare two guitar amps that were identical in every way except one had more power than the other, what would you find?

Well, interestingly, Mack guitar amps make that comparison easy! For example, our Heatseeker amps – the Heatseeker HS-18 and now discontinued Heatseeker HS-36 – are identical amps except that the 18 features two EL84s producing about 18 watts and the 36 features four EL84s producing about 36 watts.

How are they different? The 36 has more clean headroom than the 18. Otherwise, in a ‘blind; testing they sound the same.

What? The 36 has to be MUCH louder than the 18 doesn’t it? After all it has twice the power! What gives??

Guitar Amp Power and How It Relates To Volume

OK, here’s the deal with power and how it relates to volume..

1. Double guitar amp output power – increase volume by 3 dB. The decibel, or dB, is the unit of measurement for audible sound volume. The more dB, the louder the sound. An increase in sound volume of 3 dB is generally considered to be the smallest change in sound volume that the average human ear can detect!! That’s why the 36 doesn’t produce much of a noticeable difference in volume compared to the 18.
2. Increase guitar amp output power 10 times – double the sound volume. It takes TEN TIMES the output power to double volume!! That means you have to play through a 100 watt amp to produce twice the volume as your 10 watt amp!!

So, jumping from a 25 watt amp to a 50 watt amp and then to a 100 watt amp will result in higher volume for sure. However, there won’t be nearly as much volume difference between the 25 watter and the 100 watter as you might expect. The 100 watter will be about 6 dB louder than the 25. You’ll hear the difference, but it won’t be huge. 25 watts is already REALLY LOUD! In fact, as you can now guess, 10 or 15 or 18 watts is LOUD AS HELL when you turn it up.

The above information is based on physics and how the human hear translates changes in air pressure – sound waves – to what our brain perceives as sound. It is also based on all things being equal other than output power – primarily that means that to perform comparisons you plugged the amps into the same speaker cabinets and played the same guitar through them with the same intensity.

How Many Guitar Amp Watts Do You REALLY Need?

This is how I help customers decide on how much power they really need. Bascially, we determine together how much clean headroom is required and select the amp on that basis.

Headroom is defined as being the volume at which the amp starts to overdrive or distort the incoming signal from your guitar. Fender Twins are known for producing LOUD clean tones – it’s extremely difficult to get that amp to overdrive. Therefore, it has LOTS of clean headroom.

A 1 watt amp designed to produce overdriven and distorted tones (basically more of a distortion pedal than an amp!) will overdrive at very low volume. This type of amp has very low clean headroom.

So, how do we figure out how much clean headroom and output power is required?

1. Determine the syle of music. There are two extremes that relate power to music style to clean headroom. AC/DC cover band? Crunch all night with extra distortion for solos. Country band? Predominantly clean all night. The cleans have to be loud enough to keep up with your band’s stage volume.
2. Determine how to get distortion for solos. Are you going to rely on your amp for distortion or are you going to set up your amp for cleans and use pedals?
3. Determine the venues where the amp will be played. Do you only play at home? Do you occasionally jam with another guitarist or two? In a garage/basement band? Gig in small venues only? Large rooms? Stadiums? The jump from playing by yourself or with another guitarist to playing in a band is step that may require more clean headroom regardless of music style and method of generating distortion. The jump from a band setting in a small venue (basement, small bar) to a larger venue (bigger bar, halls, etc.) may require another increase in clean headroom. The key is to determine when/if your amp will be mid’ed and your band’s stage volume.

The louder you need clean tones the more headroom you need and the more power you require.

Playing music that requires lots of clean tones and you have to be loud enough to keep up with the band on stage? You need more headroom.

Do you rely on pedals for overdrive and distortion and your amp to be clean all the time? You need more headroom.

Do you want your amp to produce overdrive and distortion and loud cleans are not as important? You don’t need as much headroom – you want the amp to overdrive at lower volumes. You need to drive the amp into its sweet spot at a volume level that won’t make the first 5 rows of the audience look like those guys riding rocket sleds.

Now, not all amps are designed the same. Some amps of equal power are specifically designed with more or less headroom. It’s rare to get the opportunity to play an amp in your chosen venue before buying – whether you buy online or from a local store (ever tried to determine an amp’s clean headroom when the kid next to you is practicing tapping using that 100 watt Marshall?) – so you need to rely on knowledgeable players and the manufacturer to guide you. It also helps to have an unconditional, money-back guarantee so that you can get ALL your money back if for whatever reason it turns out that the amp you bought is not suitable (see Mack’s 100% Money Back Guarantee).

How Much Guitar Amp Power Is Enough?

Getting back to where we started, why do I think that 50 watts is all that would ever be required?

Because regardless of the clean headroom required, you should never be in a position where stage volume demands more power than 50 watts. A 50 watt amp turned up enough to get it into its sweet spot is PUNISHINGLY loud.

So, before you assume you need 100 watts because that’s what ___ uses, think about the music you play, how you get your overdriven/distorted tones and where you play. Then carefully consider how much power you REALLY need!

- Don Mackrill
http://www.mackamps.com/

How Much Guitar Amp Power Do I Need? from MyRareGuitars.com

I’ve only owned two Kay tube amps, and they were both keepers. One was a pretty standard (for its era) dual 6V6 with tremolo (a really rich and deep tremolo). It had a tone pretty close to the Silvertone 1482, its Dano-made Airline counterpart, the rare 1964 Ampeg Reverberocket with 6V6’s (wow, what an amp!) Lectrolab 600B (though this is the best of the bunch, IMO) and any number of other cheapie versions/variations of a Tweed Deluxe. It’s interesting that all these Chicago and New Jersey bargain companies were churning out these amps that now get called a “poor person’s Tweed Deluxe”—these great 6V6 amps with tons of snarl and growl long after Leo Fender had left Tweed pastures for the cleaner, tighter sound of the Tolex models. By 1964, when Danos and Lectrolabs were still sounding like proto-Neil Young dirt, Fender had long left behind the loose sag and grit of the Tweed Deluxe, replacing it with the much tighter, much stiffer (though still a cool amp) Deluxe Reverb.

Don’t get me wrong. The Deluxe Reverb is a great amp. But the Fenders I love pretty much all fall in the tweed era, where there wasn’t a ton of great headroom and you got into a nice snarl pretty early in the sweep of the volume knob.

1960's Kay 507 Twin Ten Vintage Guitar Amp

You don’t see a bunch of the dual 6V6 single 12” Kays. The models you tend to see the most are the little (and somewhat anemic) single-ended practice amp, the 703. And the Kay tube amp you tend to see the least is the VERY cool duel 6L6 (sometimes) Kay 507 Twin Ten.

1960's Kay 507 Twin Ten Vintage Guitar Amp

As the name suggests, the amp pushes two (ALNICO) 10” speakers powered by a pair of 6L6’s. What’s weird is that a LOT have 7868’s as output tubes and use a 7199 in the circuit. 7868’s have a great tone, in general. They are, from what I’ve read, essentially the same tube as a 7591, but with nine pins instead of eight. 7199’s got used a lot in Ampegs and Sanos and they are very rare and they aren’t made anymore, so they tend to cost a lot of dough. So, buyer beware (especially about the 7199) on this amp. BUT, the model I have has what are obviously original 6L6’s and no rare or obscure preamp tubes (five 12AX7’s do the preamp and phase inverter jobs) and the old stand-by 5U4 for rectification. Mine is all original—as the schematic inside matches what’s in the amp. But there seem to have been some variations on the construction of the 507—so, ask the seller about/check the tubes when buying so you know what your 507 has in it.

1960's Kay 507 Twin Ten Vintage Guitar Amp

Also, it’s one of the coolest looking amps you’ll see. It has two channels (two inputs per channel), a VERY snazzy chrome rear control panel with six knobs (tone and volume for each channel and speed and intensity for the tremolo). And it has a very 50’s-looking two tone appearance (even though it lists that they were made 1960-1963), brown rear and light brown front with a white swirl on brown cloth grill. It’s a great size—not too heavy and 24” wide by 20” tall.

1960's Kay 507 Twin Ten Vintage Guitar Amp

OK, it looks cool, but how does it sound? Pretty freaking cool. It sounds a lot like the other great Chicago amps of the same period. And this is where things get kind of interesting—who made these Kay amps? It has a tone very much like the great Valcos (which ended up branded, at various times, Supro, Airline and, in the 400 series, Harmony). And, like a Valco, it has a tone a bit like some of the great Lectrolabs, too (I’ve seen Lectrolabs branded under their own name and also with Philharmonic and the 300 series of Harmony amps). But, it’s not made by either Valco or Lectrolab (I get this info from a friend of mine who knows more about off-brand amps than anyone I know and has a collection to prove it). It also doesn’t look like a Valco or Lectrolab under the hood. It’s simply made differently (though it is point-to-point like both of those brand—no hand stuffed circuit board like on a Tweed Fender). According to my friend, it was Kay who actually made these Kay amps over these years (go figure). As I say, this friend knows a lot more than me and has written several books on the Chicago giants. Plus, it’s easy to tell from looking that it wasn’t made by Valco or Lectrolab. So, if it isn’t easy to tell who DID make it, at least we know who DIDN’T.

1960's Kay Dual 6V6 Vintage Guitar Amp

Whoever made it, though, it’s a wonderful amp. At low volume, you get a VERY rich and textured clean sound. The two ten inch speakers sound great and the cleans are very complex, much like a Tweed Fender Super from the early 50’s. This is one of the richest, thickest (without being overly dark) cleans I have ever heard in a vintage amp. And when you add the tremolo, wow! It moves from a VERY slow, pulsing tremolo, to a pretty fast one—but it never gets totally choppy and helicopter-sounding like a lot of the late 60’s tremolos. Throughout the range of the “strength” control, the tremolo stays watery and smooth. Just a killer sound.

1960's Kay Dual 6V6 Vintage Guitar Amp

Turned up, it sounds more like a 6V6 amp than most 6L6 amps I’ve ever heard. Very Neil Young and Crazy Horse. If you push the volume on the channel you’re using to 6 or higher, it starts to really snarl and have a complex great sounding distortion. The volume and tone controls are interactive, too, so you can get some very nice textures of distortion by either coupling the channels with a short cord, or just playing with the volume of the channel you’re not using. Open it up full and put the other channel around 5 or 6 and it sounds VERY much like Neil Young’s tone on RAGGED GLORY—that opening of “Country Home” sounds spot on when this amp is cranked.

1960's Kay Dual 6V6 Vintage Guitar Amp

It’s a sleeper. And there don’t seem to be too many of them out there. I haven’t heard the 7868 output tube version of this amp, but I’d sure like to. In any case, if you see one of the 507 Twin Tens with 6L6 output tubes, I’d buy it in a heartbeat. I’m doing a MAJOR purge around here—selling at least five guitars and five amps. And I kept going back and forth on the Kay 507. Then I plugged it in to write this and I decided I’d be nuts to get rid of it. There simply aren’t that many of them. And I don’t want to feel like I felt about letting go of my 4X6V6 Danelectro Challenger with a 15 inch speaker. That was another super rare amp I let go of, and I still get angry at myself. From now on, I’ve vowed to only get rid of stuff I could easily replace if I truly regretted the sale. So this one stays.

1960′s Kay 507 Twin Ten Vintage Guitar Amp from MyRareGuitars.com

Better Now or Then? – The Tone Survey Results!!
As promised, this month we’ll take a look at the results of The Tone Survey.

Last month, I published a survey that asked questions about the state of electric guitar tone as it is today vs. what I called the “golden age” of rock and roll.

If you missed it you can find the survey here.

Survey Questions & Results:

1) There’s lots of high quality gear available if you’re willing to pay for it, but how has the flood of inexpensive gear affected tone quality in general?

• 62% – I believe that, compared to the golden age of rock and roll, the average piece of gear’s tone quality has decreased.
• 38% – I believe that, compared to the golden age of rock and roll, the average piece of gear’s tone quality is at least as good.

2) Compared to the 60′s and 70′s, has the glut of inexpensive gear on the market caused a general decline in electric guitar tone as heard on recordings, in live venues and at home?

• 59% – I believe that, in general, electric guitar tone is not as good as it was in the 60′s and 70′s.
• 41% – I believe that, in general, electric guitar tone is at least as good as it was in the 60′s and 70′s.

3) With all this inexpensive gear at their fingertips, do today’s guitarists spend less time working on their craft and more on finding equipment to make them sound “good”?

• 74% – I believe that, in general, today’s guitarists spend less time perfecting their skills and more time trying to find gear that will make them sound good.
• 26% – I believe that, in general, today’s guitarists spend at least as much time perfecting their skills as they did in the 60′s and 70′s.

The results were conclusive and interesting!

In general, the majority of the over 120 survey respondents believe that the electric guitar world was a better place in the 60’s and 70’s.

60% of them believe that gear and recorded/live guitar tone sounded better back then.

However, when it came to how much effort guitarists invest in improving their skills, almost 75% of respondents said that today’s guitarists are slackers compared to the good old days.

Comments ranged from wistful nostalgia and anecdotes from back in the day to virtual shots to the head demanding that guitarists get over vintage envy and take advantage of the cornucopia of gear available to today’s guitarist.

Click here to check out all of the survey comments.

So, are you surprised by the results?

Does it confirm that the gear market and guitarists in general have strayed from the path of tonal nirvana and earnest sweat and toil or that most of us are hopelessly stuck in the past?

Should the gear industry take note and make product development decisions on what appears to be a majority view that, on average, their products just aren’t as good as they once were or should they forge ahead taking as much advantage of technological development as possible?

Email me at Don@MackAmps.com with your thoughts and if I get enough feedback I’ll discuss the deeper issues related to this topic in next month’s article.

Don Mackrill
www.MackAmps.com
Don@MackAmps.com

Better Now or Then? – The Tone Survey Results!!! from MyRareGuitars.com

Says Dave:

The guitars were American-made and made at the height of American craftsmanship, the Marshalls were made with quality parts, and you had quality players – you couldn’t record a record unless you had a high level of ability.  Plus studios had the best mics in the world, they had good consoles and tape. Now we might have more stuff available, but it’s not as high-quality.

Jay goes on to ponder the current state of electric guitar gear and whether it is actually more difficult to get what he calls “a convincing, old-school rock tone” than it was when Page, Clapton and Beck were young. So, here’s the deal!  I thought I would ask what you think about this topic…

First, read Jay’s article. Then click on the link below to take a quick four question survey and tell me what YOU think!

CLICK HERE TO TAKE THE “BETTER NOW OR THEN?” SURVEY!

As always, I’ll share the results next month!!

Cheers!

Don Mackrill – Don@MackAmps.com

PS: Check out another article on Woody Tone: “Mack of Mack Amps on EL84s and Tone Controls”. In this two part interview I explain why I like EL84s, how the Heatseeker line of amps came about and why I don’t like TMB tone stacks!!

PPS: Join the Mack Amps mailing list and take advantage of the current Member’s-Only discount on Heatseeker HS-18 and Skyraider SR-15 boutique amps!

Better Now or Then? (The Tone Survey!) from MyRareGuitars.com

This month we’ll look at a few aspects of getting a good live sound. While this article is mostly aimed at those of us with who have don’t have much or any stage experience, there may be something of interest here for almost anyone.

Last week I had the genuine pleasure of attending a League of Rock ‘dark stage’ rehearsal night at Toronto’s famous Chick’n Deli night club. This was an opportunity for the six bands in the current session to rehearse their three songs on a real stage – and in this case, somewhat unexpectedly, in front of a real audience.

League of Rock is the creation of Terry Moshenberg, a dynamic entrepreneur and experienced marketer and promoter – who also happens to be a guitar playing musician.

Each LOR session, of which there are three per year, some 26 to 30 amateur musicians – ‘regular’ folks, some of whom have never before been in a band let alone performed live – are formed into six ‘bands’ and, over a 12 week period, work up three songs. Each session culminates in a recording date in a pro studio and the final gala gig at a major Toronto live music venue.

So, how did I end up at a LOR gig? Well, Mack Amps is pleased to announce that it is now the official guitar amp sponsor of LOR, Toronto!

Along with meeting a bunch of great people and having a blast, witnessing 18 songs being performed by a diverse group of guitar players who, for the most part, used various Mack amps (2 guys brought their own amps!), was a tremendous live guitar sound learning experience.

Here are some thoughts about what I learned.

The Guitar’s Place In The Stage Mix
I think of live guitar ‘sound’ as being comprised of two concepts: how good is the tone and can it be heard by you and the audience?

Consider what is going on when a typical rock band performs live:

• Drums: A drum kit produces a tremendous amount of sound energy with fundamental frequencies that range from the bass part of the audible frequency spectrum to mid range. Harmonics of fundamental tones reach all the way into the high midrange and even high frequency portions of the spectrum. You might be surprised at how much high frequency sound energy is present in a kick drum thwack not to mention toms!
• Cymbals. Of course, cymbals produce lots of high-mid and high frequency sound energy. However, their fundamental tones are centered in the mid range.
• Bass. True to its name, the bass produces fundamental tones in the bass to mid range frequencies.
• Vocalist. The vocalist is producing mid range fundamentals with high-mid and high frequency harmonics.
• Keyboards. If your band includes keyboards, they can be pumping out sound that spans the entire frequency spectrum from sub-bass to highs.

The guitar’s fundamental tones span bass to mid range frequencies and the guitar’s harmonics add energy in the high-mid range.

If you simplify each instrument’s frequency range to be generally characterized by its fundamental tones you can get a fairly realistic picture of what’s happening on stage:

• Lots of bass and low-mid energy from drums and bass.
• Lots of high-mid and high frequency energy from cymbals, vocals and often keys.
• Lots of mid range energy from low frequency instrument harmonics and lower fundamental tones from vocals and keys.

There is a LOT of competition on stage fighting to be heard!

Obviously, guitars are a critical part of a band’s sound and are known for being heard, but how do you obtain that ideal combination of stellar tone that is easily heard by both you and your audience?

EQing guitars in a recording mix is a topic of many books and is well beyond the scope of this article. However, there are a few simple things that any guitarist can do to get good live sound.

Analyze Your Guitar Tone
Your tone may sound great when you are practicing at home or playing along with recordings. However, it may not translate well to the live stage.

A fairly common characteristic of what I heard the other night is guitar sounds that seemed muffled and lost in the low-mid wash of sound booming from the stage.

In these situations the guitar players usually increased the volume at the amp in an effort to hear themselves, further adding to the general pandemonium going on in the lower half of the audio spectrum.

What to do? Here are two very basic, but critical suggestions:

1. Turn your guitar volume to 10. Many, but not all guitars feature a ‘volume control bypass capacitor’. No, that’s not something from a Star Trek episode, it’s an electronic component wired across a guitar volume control that prevents your tone from becoming muffled (reduction in high midrange frequencies) as the volume is turned down. If your guitar does NOT have one, whenever you turn down its volume your tone will generally lose presence and recede into the mix. In this case keep your guitar’s volume at 10 to help you stand out. If your guitar does have a volume bypass cap, it’s still a good idea for you to have all of your guitar volume pots full up when you hit the stage and adjust your sound before the first song’s count-in. This will ensure that you are tweaking your sound with the most signal possible coming from your guitar and gives you the best chance of avoiding a gear adjustment that will actually fight against getting a good stage sound.
2. Turn your guitar tone to 10. Guitar tone controls have one function: they roll of high and high mid range frequencies. Since we are trying to achieve optimum ‘sound’ – the combination of great tone that is easily heard by you and your audience – and since guitar tone ‘lives’ in the upper and high mid range frequencies, it makes sense to hit the stage with tone on 10. As with guitar volume, this gives you the best opportunity to properly adjust your gear and it ensures that you do not inadvertently roll of the highs and cause your sound to recede into the mix. Having said that, there are times when a tone control adjustment is certainly warranted: for example, removing the ‘ice pick’ quality from some Teles or getting Eric Clapton ‘woman’ tone from a humbucker guitar. But, generally tone on 10 will help you cut through the mix.

Clean Electric Guitar Tone
The term ‘clean headroom’ is often used, but having spoken to many guitarists over the years there is generally some confusion as to what it means.

The practical definition of clean headroom is the volume level at which your guitar signal starts to become distorted. The volume at which your tone just starts to breakup or overdrive is the point of maximum clean headroom. How loud you can get a clean tone depends on many variables such as how hard you pick, pickup output level, amp design and settings, etc.

There are three ways to achieve a clean tone:

1. Guitar volume 10, amp clean. Your basic sound is clean and, if you use overdrive and distortion it will come from pedals.
2. Guitar volume less than 10, amp dirty. In this case you set up your amp for a distorted tone and roll off your guitar volume to get a clean tone. Your distorted tone is only a flip of the guitar volume away. Note that this contradicts my earlier recommendation to leave your guitar volume on 10. “Switching” from clean to overdrive and distortion via your guitar volume control is a great strategy if your guitar volume pot is set up properly (see above) and your amp is sensitive enough to changes in guitar volume. Some amps do a great job of changing their tone with guitar volume changes and some don’t – check our your amp to see how it responds.
3. Guitar volume 10, amp channel switching. If your amp has multiple channels one is usually adjusted for a clean tone and one for an overdriven or distorted tone.

Any of the above methods of achieving a loud clean tone is valid. The one you choose depends on your gear, the music you play and whether switching tones within a song is a necessity.

Note that a clean tone will most likely have a better chance of cutting through the stage mix. Generally, the balance of upper and high mids will be greater than an overdriven or distorted tone and your guitar sound will be less compressed allowing your picking and playing dynamics to be heard.

Distorted Electric Guitar Tone
Whoever came up with the phrase “Less is more” must have been referring to distorted electric guitar tone!

You will likely have heard this before, but some of the heaviest electric guitar tones feature relatively little distortion.

For example, Keith Richards, ACDC, Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy Page, Pete Townshend, etc. have recorded some of the heaviest rock guitar sounds ever – and many of these iconic ‘heavy’ tones are really not all that distorted.

I realize that LOTS of great guitar tones feature LOTS of distortion, but to achieve the best stage guitar sound for classic rock and blues music styles, dialing down the distortion is almost always beneficial.

While there are many flavors of distortion – overdrive, fuzz, etc. – I generally think about it related to two needs: rhythm and lead.

If a song requires a distorted rhythm tone, often referred to as ‘crunch’, the ‘less is more’ credo is critical. Richards and the Young brothers are the masters of getting incredibly juicy, resonant and HEAVY crunch tones that are, when you listen closely, amazingly clean relative to their impact.

The distortion required for lead playing is dependent on the song and the player. However, I believe that the ‘right’ amount of distortion for solos is just enough to produce ‘flow’. What’s flow? It’s that musical moment where your tone is distorted and compressed enough and possesses enough sustain that the player can focus on their performance without having to ‘fight’ their way through a solo.

This may sound kind of esoteric, but I am sure you have wrestled with solos where your tone wasn’t quite there – either there wasn’t enough sustain or not enough distorted breakup and compression. Dialing up the distortion to get to that point of ‘flow’ alleviates the problem, but overdoing it will cause your sound to, once again, recede into the stage mix.

I also believe that the amount of distortion needed to obtain flow varies according to the song. Heavy songs with lots of crunch backing the solo requires more distortion; a much less distorted tone is often the perfect fit for obtaining flow with ‘lighter’ songs.

Having said that, I know there are lots of examples of impossibly distorted solos in otherwise clean songs and clean solos in heavy songs – in those cases the contrast is what works. However, I believe that a good rule of thumb is to use just as much distortion as it takes to get you into flow – and no more.

What happens if you use too much distortion?

Your tone won’t fit the song and will negatively impact the quality of your band’s overall sound and its performance. Part of getting a great stage sound is making sure your audience isn’t cringing even if they can hear you LOUD and clear. Since the primary objective of performing live is to provide your audience with an enjoyable experience, this problem should be avoided at all costs!

Worse yet, using too much distortion can overly compress your tone and, depending on how the distorted tone is EQ’d, there can be a dramatic perceived loss in highs and clarity and you end up not blending in with the song and not being heard properly! I suppose that if your tone is negatively affecting the overall performance, not being heard might be a good thing, but I think you get my point.

So, how do you do that on stage and still be heard? How do you easily get the right amount of distortion?

1. Crunch. My favorite method of getting good crunch is from an amp – preferably one that features power tube distortion. Richards and the Youngs rely on plugging a great guitar into a great amp and turning it up until they get the tone they want. Although there are lots of overdrive and boost pedals that can get crunch tones, for the most part you will find that amp crunch is more dynamic, resonant and pleasing to the ear. Dynamics are important because a good amp will respond to your picking attack by changing the amount of crunch. Organically altering your distorted tone by playing harder and softer during a song is FUN!
2. Lead. This is where pedals can really come into play. Stomping on a box to elevate your tone for solos is a classic method. However, you can get great amp lead tone by setting your amp for lead distortion and rolling your guitar volume down for clean/crunch and up for solos. Or, if you have a multi-channel amp it is easy to set up rhythm and lead tones.

There are many more aspects of live guitar sound that we haven’t covered. If there is enough interest in this topic I’ll continue next month.

Let me know how you get great live guitar tone by emailing me at Don@MackAmps.com.

Don Mackrill
www.MackAmps.com

Getting Great Guitar Sound On Stage from MyRareGuitars.com

Last month 233 readers filled out the Ideal Guitar amp survey! Based on your responses everyone had a lot of fun, but maybe not as much fun as I had reading all of your comments! Many thanks to all those who took the time to complete the survey.

So, what’s the ideal amp? Let’s find out!

The Ideal Guitar Amp

The following composite descriptions of the Unlimited Budget and Limited Budget Ideal amps are based on the most selected features (in some cases I used the mid-point of a range of selections if they were equal in popularity).

Unlimited Budget

• Head configuration
• 50 watts
• 6L6 power tubes
• Tube rectifier
• Treble-middle-bass tone controls
• Tonality: great cleans and ‘shred’ preamp distortion
• Two preamp channels
• $2,500

Limited Budget

• Combo configuration, 1×12
• 18 watts
• 6V6 power tubes
• Tube rectifier
• Treble-middle-bass tone controls
• Tonality: great cleans and ‘shred’ preamp distortion
• One or two preamp channels
• $750

Following are the compiled results from each question.

Musical styles:

On average each respondent selected 2 music styles.

• 80% play rock music.
• 40% play blues. (DOH! I can’t believe I left this category out. Thanks to all you blues players for using the ‘Other’ category to write in your preference.)
• 25% play country.
• The rest are spread out over jazz, metal, fusion, surf, garage, noise, grunge, ska, gospel, swing, “folk noise Americana” and “post-rock biiiing biiiing sounds” (whoever plays that PLEASE send me a sound clip!).

Price

As you can see, it is quite clear that $2,500 seems to be the sweet spot of the ‘Unlimited Budget’ (UB) price point. It’s interesting that there are about as many people willing to pay no more than $1,500 as there are those willing to pay $5,000 for their dream amp!

The ‘Limited Budget’ (LB) sweet spot is wider spanning $500 to $1,000.

Use

When asked “What are you going to do with your ideal amp” the answers were evenly spread across playing at home, jamming, rehearsal, gigging and studio recording. There was slightly more interest in using the UB amp for gigs and in the studio, while the LB amp would get slightly more use at home.

Head or Combo?

The UB amp is slightly more likely to be a head (55%) than a combo (45%). The LB amp is most likely to be a combo as selected by 65% of respondents vs. a head selected by 35%.

Output Power

UB amps will have a fairly wide range of power spanning 30 to 100 watts.

LB amps will be lower powered with 15 to 20 watts being the clear preference. There’s a reason why there are so many amps available in this power range!

Almost all of the respondents who selected the ‘Other’ choice identified a desire for the ability to adjust the power of their UB or LB amps whether that be a continuous adjustment or switching power levels.

Power Tube Preference

Clearly 6V6s and 6L6s are the preferred tube for the ideal amp. As can be seen, V6s are the preferred choice for LB amps while L6s are the UB choice. This makes sense when desired output power is considered: 6L6s produce more power than 6V6s, which matches with the UB vs. LB desired power output.

Power Supply Rectifier
70% of UB amp designers selected tube rectifiers for their ideal amp compared to 50% for LB amps. Of the non-tube rectifier responses most said they didn’t care whether the rectifier was tube or solid state.

Flexibility: Range of Tones

These results surprised me, which makes me think that I didn’t do a good job of selecting the categories. However, the data shows that, regardless of budget, EVERYONE wants an amp that does great cleans and produces shred levels of preamp distortion. That’s surprising because virtually no one said they played shred-type music!!!

Preamp Channels

Predictably, LB amps were designed to be more simple with fewer channels than UB amps. However, there was a strong desire for even the LB amps to have built-in flexibility from 2 channels.

Single Channel Design

These results underscore my belief that the questions regarding tonal flexibility were not well conceived. The above chart shows that in a circumstance where an amp has only one channel, guitarists DO NOT want preamp distortion. That contradicts the Flexibility results shown above where it appears that most guitarists want shred preamp distortion in their amps!

The single channel preamp design question was much more clear than the flexibility question, which leads me to believe that its results are more reliable than the flexibility results.

Tone Controls
No surprises here. Regardless of budget, guitar players prefer treble-middle-bass (TMB) tone controls. They would be found on over 70% of UB amps and 60% of LB amps – 20% of LB amp owners would be OK with treble and bass controls. A presence control was a popular addition for those who selected ‘Other’.

Effects

There was widespread response regarding the inclusion of effects. However, no one effect received support from even one half of respondents. The most popular effect is reverb, only one in three think it should be included in their ideal amp.

Thankfully, digital multi-effects were generally ignored by the ideal amp respondents. As can be seen, reverb and tremolo/vibrato were relatively popular, but none of the options provided were wildly popular. That would indicate that guitarists questing after their ideal amp are mostly focussed on tone and not effects.

Combo Configuration
60% of UB amps would feature two speakers and 70% of respondents wanted 12″ speakers in their UB amp. LB combos were more or less evenly split between one and two speakers (49% and 46% respectively), but a strong preference was still shown for 12″ speakers with 65% of respondents selecting them.

The Last Word
When asked what else they would add to their ideal amps, LOTS of ideas were thrown out including:

• Stand by switch
• Wheels
• Various colors
• Ceramic tube sockets
• Hand wired circuit board
• Specific tube rectifier models
• Switchable negative feedback
• EF86 preamp
• Speaker impedance selector
• Dual power amp – high power for cleans, low power for distortion
• Fire-spitting jets that flame up during a solo!

Send me an email with your comments about the results of the Ideal Amp survey: Don@MackAmps.com.

The Ideal Guitar Amp: Survey Results from MyRareGuitars.com

Below you will find a link to a survey that will step you through the design questions that would have to be answered to build your DREAM AMP. But wait… what’s this???? As you will see, you are actually going to configure TWO amps!

One amp will be the ‘I won the lottery’ toy where you can spend as much as you want. The other amp is what you would build if you had a limited budget (I know, the real world sucks!). The survey is not sophisticated enough to restrict choices so that your design decisions will match the budgets you set for yourself. So, to make the results reasonably realistic you will have to restrain yourself depending on your budgets. But, that shouldn’t reduce the fun! Will the amps be the same or radically different? You get to choose!

The survey can take as little as a few minutes, or if you’re like me, each technical answer will require hours of agonizing soul searching to end up with just the right configuration! Well, not really… the survey shouldn’t take more than five minutes!

Have fun and I’ll see you next month!!!

GO TO THE SURVEY!

I’d like to know what you think is happening in the world of tube amps. Send me an email at: Don@MackAmps.com.

Build Your Dream Amp! (Guitar Amp Survey) from MyRareGuitars.com

It’s once again time to take stock of what’s happening in the world of tube guitar amps. I’ll examine some interesting happenings in 2009, make some predictions and revisit Tube Tone Crystal Ball 2009 to see if any of last year’s guesses came true!

Small Is Beautiful: Under 10 Watt Guitar Amps Grow Up
Last year I discussed what I believed to be the growing fascination with power reduction. At that time I reviewed the ways in which an amp’s power can be reduced: attenuators, variable power reduction, switchable power reduction, pentode/triode operation and single tube, low watt amps.

One year later it turns out that the industry seems to have focused on single tube amps and either variable or switchable power reduction.

In 2009 the already crowded ranks of the ‘under-10-watt’ category grew significantly. Three aspects of that growth are, I believe, interesting and give us an indication of what’s coming.

1. VERY low power. Not only did many manufacturers introduce under-10-watt amps, a number of them provided the ability to reduce power to under 1 watt – sometimes well under 1 watt. I believe this acknowledges the fact that the vast majority of electric guitar players – if not all – spend a significant portion of their time playing at home. Therefore, it makes sense to provide amps optimized for home playing and less than a 1 watt output is necessary to obtain the best tone at bedroom volume.
2. The economy made me do it. The impact of the economy has helped fuel the industry’s interest in low power amps – 2009′s Mesa’s Mark V and the PRS amp line being notable exceptions. In the worst economy since The Great Depression it makes sense that manufacturers introduced lower priced products. Relatively few guitarists were willing and able to spend over $1,000 on a guitar amp this past year – and likely won’t for some time to come.
3. The economy made me do it, part II. Boutique builders embraced low power for the same reason the rest of the industry did: to have something to sell! Good news for tone hounds! Prior to the world’s economic bubble bursting, boutique amps were overwhelmingly focused on 15-18 watts and above – (2+ power tubes).

Where are we headed?
I believe that the low power amp trend will have legs at least as long as the ’18 watt’ trend – that is 5+ years. For the next few years expect to see more under-10-watters hit the market. This trend will be long lived for two reasons:

1. First, with the global economy expected to experience only limited growth over the next two years (and perhaps longer) and unemployment expected to decline at a very slow rate, high ticket guitar amps will not be selling like hot cakes. As I mentioned above, amp companies have to have something to sell at a price people are able to pay. Hello under-10-watters!
2. Second, I predict the electric guitar world will discover that under-10-watt amps can provide GREAT tone and surprising flexibility – they can be legitimate tone machines suitable for more than just bedroom strumming.

The positive result for all electric guitarists is that as more and more builders pursue low power amps of their own, the quality and variety of under-10-watt amps will increase – just like 15-18 watters did a few years ago, which were considered low power amps before the under-10-watt trend took hold!

Guitar Amp Industry Reacts to Change – Extension, Contraction and Caution
It’s no surprise that this year the Crystal Ball is clouded by the effects of the economy. Most industries (all?) have been forced to change tactics. Here’s how I think the guitar amp industry will cope.

Up until the fall of 2008 the overall guitar market was as overheated as the rest of economy. Vintage guitar prices were sky high, manufacturers were introducing new products at a rapid rate, a boutique builder baby boom was in full swing with new arrivals being born almost every week. Music Industry revenue statistics confirmed double digit annual growth: guitarists were buying gear like there was no tomorrow.

Sound familiar? Substitute guitars and amps with almost any product you can think of and the scenario was the same.

And then we hit the wall.

How have manufacturers reacted and how will they struggle through until sales start to grow?

Product Line Extension – Want More Pedals?
As mentioned above regarding low power amps, many guitar amp companies that previously relied on $1,000+ products to sustain business are searching for lower priced offerings that appeal to income battered guitar players.

This is confirmed by an interesting fact about how this recession differs from those of the past: the sale of ‘luxury’ products have dropped right along with everything else. In every recession since the Depression, luxury goods manufacturers (in our case think boutique builders) enjoyed relatively robust sales: those with money kept buying high-end items. Not this time.

So, I believe that in addition to under-10-watt amps many amp builders will extend their product lines by creating their own line of effects pedals. After all, compared to a guitar amplifier an effects pedal requires less labor, fewer components (usually), no power supply (or an off the shelf, cheap wall wart), a dramatically smaller and less costly cabinet and, as is the case with combo amps, they don’t require a large and expensive speaker.

To an amp company, that looks like a promising path to a relatively inexpensive product line add-on. I’m certain that I am not the only amp builder who has thought of that!

However, will extending a previously amp-only product line by adding pedals be the ‘answer’ to increased sales? Maybe.

We all know the pedal market is as crowded as the amp market if not more so. Will amp company offerings cause guitarists to buy a pedal when they otherwise wouldn’t or cause them to choose the amp company’s product vs. a pedal company’s?

Time will tell, but those amp companies that successfully launch a line of pedals will do so solely on the merit of their product (and their marketing budget!): amp builder pedals will have to be sufficiently different from the crowd to garner attention and sales.

Can that happen? Who knows for sure, but I believe you will see an increasing number of pedals offered by amp companies that are, of course, designed using their knowledge of tube amp design and tone – not from a pedal manufacturer’s ‘pedal-centric’ perspective.

So, expect to see pedals that are designed to form a ‘system’ with an amp rather than being simply an add on. How a pedal compliments, enhances and changes the amp’s tone (and vice versa) and how the pedal interacts with the amp’s first preamp stage will, I think, be areas of interest for amp-centric pedal designers.

Pedals designed to, in effect (bad pun), add another channel or multiple channels to an amp… pedals designed with a frequency response perfectly matched to an amp’s voicing… overdrive and distortion based on the detailed knowledge of how tubes produce their particular mojo and long experience ‘voicing’ amps. I think that amp builder’s will have their own take on pedal design, particularly in conjunction with their own amps.

Guitar Amp Product Line Contraction – Less Choice
I think we will see some amp companies narrowing their product lines. Following the unfortunate theme of this article, higher priced and/or lower volume models may see the end of their life cycle in the coming 12 months.

Too bad for guitarists, but inevitable at least to some extent I think.

Guitar Amp Product Line Caution – Fewer New Products
This is another prediction that isn’t a surprise. When sales are down there is less money available for research, product development and product launches. Plus, these days the risk inherent in any product launch is much greater than in the past.

So, as was evident in 2009 – aside from low power amps – I believe that the number of new amp product introductions will significantly lag that of past years.

Again, too bad for guitarists, but inevitable.

2009 Tube Tone Crystal Ball Revisited.
Last year I made three predictions. As it turns out, it looks like I called two of them correctly!

1. End of the 18 Watt Guitar Amp Trend: In my opinion 2009 proved what I believed was already happening in 2008: the fascination with dual EL84 amps has ended. Although I don’t have precise statistics, I think there were dramatically fewer amps of this type launched in 2009 – yes, launches were down overall, but other than perhaps a small hand full none were twin 84s. As I pointed out last year, this is not to say that EL84 based, 18 watters aren’t good amps! In fact, the trend was legitimate – these things can sound fantastic!!
2. Guitar Amp Power Reduction – enough said above.
3. PCB Amps On The Rise: My prediction that more ‘high-end’ amps will feature printed circuit boards (PCBs) instead of hand made, stuffed and soldered circuit board has not been realized. Nonetheless, I believe that this change will occur, but when it will start given the current industry situation, who knows.

I’d like to know what you think is happening in the world of tube amps. Send me an email at: Don@MackAmps.com.

Mack Amps: Skyraider SR-15 Amp (front)

Don Mackrill
www.MackAmps.com

Tube Tone Crystal Ball 2010: Amp Trends & Future Predictions! from MyRareGuitars.com

Most guitarists instantly create an image in their minds when they think of ’boutique’ guitar amps. But, what does the term really mean? Perform a Google search on the term “What is a boutique amp” and you will find many threads from many gear related forums where members debate the meaning of the term and the criteria by which a boutique amp is defined. This month we’ll sort through the debate and see if there is an underlying theme that describes what makes an amp worthy of being called ’boutique’.

The Meaning of Boutique
Boutique is a French word whose literal translation is “shop”. It appears to have come to prominence worldwide in reference to the fashion industry: boutique fashion designers and boutique clothing stores that sold pieces made by boutique designers.

Two dictionary definitions of the word boutique reads: “a small business, department, etc., specializing in one aspect of a larger industry” and “a small, exclusive producer or business”.

These are somewhat vague explanations and if we were to get really philosophical we would examine the terms “specializing” and “exclusive” in an attempt to achieve a precise definition. You’ll be please to learn that we won’t go there in this article!

It appears that there is a common theme developing regarding the concept of business size: to be considered boutique a business must be small.

However, is there more required of an amp company to be considered boutique?

The Boutique Debate
If you spend any time at all browsing online forum threads that address this topic you will see a number of different criteria discussed relative to defining a boutique amp and/or amp company.

Following is my assessment of the most commonly mentioned characteristics. And, I’ll give you my 2¢ worth on each one!

• Size: Yes, as the tired joke goes “size does matter”, but in this case small is better (if only my wife would agree…). Virtually every participant in the online boutique debate agrees that to be considered a boutique amp company small or limited production capacity is a requirement. A common example is Mesa Boogie. Often considered the first boutique amp company, Mesa seems to have outgrown the genre. I agree that mass production is not a characteristic of a boutique builder. There are some fine amps that are mass produced – many by Mesa – but, that is not the essence of a boutique builder as will be discussed below.
• Philosophy: There’s that word again. Don’t worry! A few thoughtful forum dwellers brought up the idea that boutique amp companies have a different mission than non-boutique companies. They believe that a boutique amp builder’s primary focus is on the integrity of their product concept: “built to a standard not to a price” was how one put it.I think this is a critical characteristic of boutique amp companies. Whether a builder focuses on replicating vintage designs or developing unique creations, each one follows their own recipe to make a ‘better than mass produced’ amp.Evidence of this is seen in any boutique builder’s product line. There is almost always a direction or common theme to which their products adhere. You don’t see boutique builders going after widely divergent market segments as some ‘big’ companies do: $200 entry level amps all the way to multi-thousand dollar, hand wired reissues!
• Hand wired vs. printed circuit boards: There is much lively debate concerning the authenticity of boutique amps that use printed circuit boards (PCBs). Is this an oxymoron? Many guitarists think so. The hand wired camp believe that only an amp whose every component and wire has been hand soldered can be considered boutique. However, there are many amp companies that are generally considered to be boutique, such as Soldano, Rivera, Fuchs and THD to name a few (Mack uses a PCB in the Gem) that use PCBs. Note that while these amps use PCBs, they are hand assembled and, in at least the case of the Gem, are hand wired to the chassis mounted components.Does an amp have to be hand wired to be considered boutique? Not in my opinion. The manner in which components are attached and soldered to a circuit board simply does not affect tone. A poorly laid out eyelet board will sound just as bad as a poorly designed PCB. A well designed PCB amp will sound indistinguishable from a hand wired example.Reliability is often cited as a problem with PCB amps. While a poorly designed, mass produced amp is a recipe for problems, a well designed PCB amp will be at least as reliable as a hand wired amp. After all, PCBs are used in spacecraft and military electronics – two of the most inhospitable environments on or around the planet – and, since in both of those applications cost is insignificant compared to reliability, hand wired electronics would be the norm if PCBs were unreliable.
• Price: Many guitarists believe that boutique amps are very expensive – and many are. As we all know boutique amp prices can easily run from $2,000 up to tens of thousands for Dumbles and the like. However, there is a growing segment of boutique builders who offer amps at prices in the $1,000 range and sometimes less. While $1,000 is not inexpensive, it is much less than many guitarists believe possible for a boutique amp. Plus, there are many mass produced amps from big companies that are in this price range – and higher!Nonetheless, relative to a small builder (there’s that size thing again) price is indicative of what goes into their products. Building amps completely by hand or hand assembling them simply requires more labor than if the same product is mass produced. That means a higher price. When you add in the additional cost of high-end and sometimes custom components that some boutique builders use, the price quickly escalates. BTW, my explanation of high priced, mass produced amps is that their price reflects what the company thinks they can get for them.
• Location: Most if not all participants in the boutique debate seem to agree that to be considered a boutique amp builder, production must take place locally – not in Asia or other areas of the world where labor rates are low. To my knowledge there is no small amp building company from these areas that claims boutique status (although there is a Malaysian maker of reportedly high quality amp kits that many consider be in the boutique category).I tend to agree with the assessment that an amp builder should not be considered ’boutique’ if it has their product manufactured by a third party company in, say, China. I believe that the ability to maintain product integrity relative to component quality, build quality and functional consistency is compromised if production is not close at hand.There appears to be a growing body of evidence supporting this belief based on a North American amp company that would have previously been considered boutique, but who has, it appears, elected to manufacture at least some of their product overseas. While their amps have proven to be popular and are now sold at GC (the boutique builder kiss of death?), anecdotal reports suggest that the tone and build quality of the amps are not on par with their past, domestically produced, products.
• Tone: It’s interesting to note that in all of the online forum threads that I studied, VERY few participants mentioned tone as a defining factor of a boutique amp! A few commented that not all boutique amps sound good to them. Most did not mention relative tone quality at all!I think this reflects the reality that while many boutique amps produce exceptional tone, there are mass produced amps that sound good too – or at least ‘good enough’. This is where price enters the thought process of guitarists. Is the improvement in tone worth the extra money for a boutique amp? Or, is there even an improvement in tone at all? Since tone is such a subjective assessment there are many answers to the above questions. That said, I think there are many guitarists who don’t equate significantly better tone with a boutique amp simply because they would never consider buying one.Nonetheless, I believe that if an amp claims to be boutique, that it should produce very good tone indeed. This leads to another personal belief: once in the boutique price range every increment in price should produce a noticeable improvement in tone – otherwise the value of the higher price amp is degraded.

What Is A Boutique Amp?
I believe that a boutique amp is made by a small manufacturer who follows their own philosophy of how to build amps that are better than mass produced products.

Yes, there are lots of ways to interpret that… and that’s why there are lots of boutique amp companies!

Mack Amps Heatseeker HS-18

Send me an email and let me know what you think!

Don Mackrill
Don@MackAmps.com
MACK AMPS

What Is A Boutique Guitar Amp? from MyRareGuitars.com