No to the bassman
All Those Yesterdays
Posts: 2,723
Well a few of you knew I was looking into buying my buddies '59 bassman. Well I played thru it the other day and the clean just was getting it. But I played thru his 5E3 and even though the clean only goes to about 2, that was where it was at. Had to be the best clean tone I've heard in a lone time.
He's been getting into building his own amps, coming up with modified circuits etc. He thru the idea of doing a clone of taking the power amp circuit (and the 6V6's from a 5E3 and combineing them with the pre amp circuit of a Marshall 1974x). He had me intrigued with it for sure. I've asked him to lay it out and get me a price. We shall see if this is the route I end up going or not.
He's been getting into building his own amps, coming up with modified circuits etc. He thru the idea of doing a clone of taking the power amp circuit (and the 6V6's from a 5E3 and combineing them with the pre amp circuit of a Marshall 1974x). He had me intrigued with it for sure. I've asked him to lay it out and get me a price. We shall see if this is the route I end up going or not.
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The 1950's was not the Golden Age of amps, the 2000's is !!!!
I still think the '59 bassman, is one of the greatest amps ever. And it sounds like a million bucks. But you need to have the gift of playing to make that amp sound amazing. I do not have that, I'm a bass player that plays guitar on the side.
The old circuits that don't have tremolo and or reverb were pretty cluttered circuits. But that was pre circuit boards, point to point was where it was at. But look at what they were trying to stuff into those chassis. Sure they were cluttered. The consistency in the components didn't have the consistency of todays components, and sure carbon comp'd parts didn't last, they dried out. But you can't take an old circuit, replace it with today's parts and still have it sound as good. There is something to be said about what those cabon comp'd parts would do.
Mind you I prefer simple class A single ended amps, I don't need multiple channels, so coming from that point of view, there isn't any new amps out these days that make me drool, besides the tiny terror and the Valve Junior. But look at what those are. It's all old school. The Valve Junior grabbed me because of the low cost, and how simple it was to modify and turn it into what I want.
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I gues I was kinda agreeing that your bud will build you a brilliant amp and that you don't need vintage.
The Bassman re-issues are very good from what I have heard too.
It's all good one way or another. Everyone digs there own stuff for sure. The boutique craze is getting over the top for sure. Which has it's pro's and con's. They are all moreless copying old circuits for sure. I think they are going over the top when they are slapping price tags on some of them. But fender, gibson, orange are guilty of that too when they come out where there hand wired series.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with PCB board. I feel the quality control is a little on the week side. I've had to fix points on a board on a amp that's a month old, because of bad solder joints. It's much easier to problem solve a PCB board for sure. Especially if the amp has reverb. The problem with the lower line of PCB board amps, is when they solder the tube sockets directly to the board. It's a weak point for sure. The '59 bassman LTD has his the nail on the head, by not mounting the sockets to the board, they are hand wired to there points on the board. With the heat from the tubes, the vibrations etc. it acts as a flexible connection in a way.
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There is no gauruntee my BAd CAt won't give me trouble in a similar timeframe. Also the H&K only cost a hundred bucks to fix, so I was hardly gutted by that.
Overall, I think amp prices are fine. We pay a huge mark-up for stuff imported from the US through our distributor. Sure , they have to do the transformer, but they are still marking em up a lot. I'll pick up my next amp on holidays next year, and pay the tranny conversion myself.
I have no problem in general with businesses making a profit, I sure would not go to work for nothing.