The New Tone Thread

That should be a great attenuator. I like Weber stuff and have one of their speakers in my mark V

Another attenuator that interests me is the new CabClone from Mesa ........ because I'm a Mesa kinda guy!

:D

I look forward to hearing clips of what you can do with that Weber.
 
Thanks fellers, I'm pretty happy with that acoustic tone overall. With the more dead room, I can move the mic farther away and get a little more balance without sounding like I'm playing in a bedroom (even though I am!)

Greg, I've always been curious about the Weber Mass. They get great reviews, and even though their website looks like it's hosted on GeoCities in the 1990s, they give some good info there. I've used a THD HotPlate on my Traynor amp for a long time now and it's really great for taking the edge off of an insanely powerful amp. They're right, there's no way to get a cranked amp down to whisper quiet volumes without severe compromises in the tone, but if you're just taking off 4 or even 8 dB, it's damn near undetectable except for the fact that you can still hear after you've been jamming. That said, I've been using the same tubes in that amp for several years, I haven't noticed any particular strain that an attenuator puts on the tubes. They're the pros so I can't really disagree but I've spent plenty of time attenuating down to -16dB and lower without blowing anything up in my amp's power section. Those JJ 6L6GC tubes have been survivors!
 
Lt. Bob said:
That should be a great attenuator. I like Weber stuff and have one of their speakers in my mark V

Another attenuator that interests me is the new CabClone from Mesa ........ because I'm a Mesa kinda guy!

:D

I look forward to hearing clips of what you can do with that Weber.
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Ido1957 here at HR has a Cab Clone. Ask him about it.

All of my research pointed me towards the Weber stuff. Miroslav uses them too, so I bent his ear a little about them. He gave me some guidance. They seem like the right fit for me. And the Mass200 is beefy. I like that they use dummy speaker motors instead of just a gigantic resistor. I don't want to install a PPIMV on this new 50 watter, so it's gonna have to be an attenuator. And I'm not interested in whisper quiet bedroom playing. I just want to knock off a few db for playing live. The JCM 800 is gig loud on like 4. If I can get that thing up to about 6 or 7 and then knock it back down some with the attenuator, that would be bad ass.
 
Greg_L said:
If I can get that thing up to about 6 or 7 and then knock it back down some with the attenuator, that would be bad ass.
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That's pretty much what attenuators specialize in, knocking off a few dB without being conspicuous. All the more room to dig into a tube power section, which is where the glorious tones come from!
 
Tadpui said:
Greg, I've always been curious about the Weber Mass. They get great reviews, and even though their website looks like it's hosted on GeoCities in the 1990s, they give some good info there. I've used a THD HotPlate on my Traynor amp for a long time now and it's really great for taking the edge off of an insanely powerful amp. They're right, there's no way to get a cranked amp down to whisper quiet volumes without severe compromises in the tone, but if you're just taking off 4 or even 8 dB, it's damn near undetectable except for the fact that you can still hear after you've been jamming. That said, I've been using the same tubes in that amp for several years, I haven't noticed any particular strain that an attenuator puts on the tubes. They're the pros so I can't really disagree but I've spent plenty of time attenuating down to -16dB and lower without blowing anything up in my amp's power section. Those JJ 6L6GC tubes have been survivors!
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I know a guy that uses a Hot Plate. It's pretty good to me. My only problem with them is that they're load specific. I use 4, 8, and 16 ohm cabs. I'd need three different Hot Plates. No thanks. Lol. If they made one that did everything, I would have considered it.

Tadpui said:
That's pretty much what attenuators specialize in, knocking off a few dB without being conspicuous. All the more room to dig into a tube power section, which is where the glorious tones come from!
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Right. And most of my amps are the traditional "gotta be loud as shit" variety.
 
Greg_L said:
Yes. I could have gotten by with a 100w model because I'm just trying to shave off a few db and not play at bedroom levels, but the 200w is extra insurance.
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Doesn't hurt to have the extra capability, I guess. Does having a 200W version affect its effect on a 50W head, or will the extra capability be transparent?
 
jonny deep said:
Doesn't hurt to have the extra capability, I guess. Does having a 200W version affect its effect on a 50W head, or will the extra capability be transparent?
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Well no attenuator is truly transparent. None of them. They all do something to the sound. A large part of it is simply how we hear loud things compared to quieter things, and also how a speaker reacts to big power. How good or bad one attenuator sounds compared to another is totally subjective. I'm more concerned with the health of the amp than preserving tiny little nuances of micro-tone that no one would ever notice anyway. The small amounts of attenuation that I plan on using for gigs will probably have little to no effect anyway. But we shall see.

I don't think using such a mighty attenuator would have less effect on a 50 watt amp. There are a few youtube vids of guys using this Mass200 with 50w amps and they're smashed down low enough in volume that you can hear the guy's pick on the strings. It still sounds pretty good to me, even with the sound of pick on strings, which I usually hate to hear. And a 50 watt amp isn't significantly quieter than a 100w amp. In the case of "Plexi" type amps, they have no actual volume controls. They're full on as soon as you flip them off standby. The volume knobs are actually more like gain knobs. Turn them up and they go from the loudest clean ever to the loudest crunch ever. But it's always super loud. 50 or 100 watt are both more than capable of being way too loud for a bar/club gig. And for my 100 watters, if the tales are true and they do kick out way more than 100 watts at big super volumes, then having the extra beef of a 200w attenuator seems like a good idea to me.
 
Tadpui said:
Bob
Nice pics, and it sounds like you had a sweet run last week. Hopefully you get to rest up now, but I kinda doubt it :)

Greg
That really is a nice looking head, sparkling clean for used gear. Heck, that's clean for new gear, I bet that amp heads get dirtier than that just sitting around at Guitar Center.

e'erbody
Well, I got some new acoustic panels and I'm trying to judge how much less lively my room is now. They're folding gobos that I can place anywhere, so I basically put them near my listening position so they'd effectively block the untreated flanks of my room, creating a little cave-like dead zone under my ceiling cloud. It sounds way deader to my ears in this spot but only the brutally honest ears of a condenser mic will be the true judge. So I recorded this little snippet of a solo acoustic guitar, but I haven't been able to listen to it outside of my room yet. So I can't judge how much of the room is still in the signal since I'm listening in the same spot that it was recorded in.

This is a Martin D-41 (with super dead strings...gotta change those soon)
Mic is a Shure SM81, about 24" away, pointed at the neck joint
Preamp is one of the ones integrated into my interface
Added a high-pass EQ to take out some low end rumble
And I sent it through Waves L1 to bring up the volume

Sloppy playing but I just made up this riff recently and haven't practiced it much yet.

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I had been doing a lot more acoustic stuff the last year or two and this tone right here is a super acoustic tone. It has space, depth and clarity and the bottom end isn't woofing like so many of my acoustic tracks end up doing. Great job tadpui.
 
ShanPeyton said:
I had been doing a lot more acoustic stuff the last year or two and this tone right here is a super acoustic tone. It has space, depth and clarity and the bottom end isn't woofing like so many of my acoustic tracks end up doing. Great job tadpui.
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Hey thanks man! I'm definitely much happier with this than I have been in the past. Much like Greg always says about electric tone, just start with a great sounding setup, and put a mic in front of it. I love this guitar, it's truly my most prized possession. And with less reverb in the room, I was able to back the mic up farther and that seems to have balanced it out quite a bit (it is a big loud dreadnaught after all :)). I still had to low-pass it at about 110 Hz, and I'd probably put that higher if this were in a mix.
 
Tadpui said:
Hey thanks man! I'm definitely much happier with this than I have been in the past. Much like Greg always says about electric tone, just start with a great sounding setup, and put a mic in front of it. I love this guitar, it's truly my most prized possession. And with less reverb in the room, I was able to back the mic up farther and that seems to have balanced it out quite a bit (it is a big loud dreadnaught after all :)). I still had to low-pass it at about 110 Hz, and I'd probably put that higher if this were in a mix.
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I'm really impressed with how intimate it sounds even though the mic is 2 feet away.
 
Tadpui: Wow man, that is a really good sounding acoustic track, very impressive man...That's something (along with lots of other things) I struggle with myself...good job!!!!


Not heard anything about the Kiss tribute band the last couple days, IIRC, they're supposed to get together today/tonight, so I should hear yay/nay in a day or so....Like I said before, I'm gonna do something this summer regardless, either with that bunch, or someone else....


Greg: Cool on the attenuator dude, I've always wanted to try one out, just to see how it affects an amp's tone/feel...I'm sure anything you do with it will be cool though...
 
TripleM said:
A sample for you to critique. Here is what it is:

Les Paul Traditional bridge pup
SM57, on grill, on axis, ~4 in off the center of the cone
Marshall DSL40C

Gain - 4
Vol - 5
Treble - 5
Mid - 7
Bass - 8
Presence - 5
Resonance - 0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/yl5mjuvn8dm9dna/TestTone1.wav?dl=0
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Agreed that its a fun garage punk kind of tone to it. It's amazing how a different player with such a similar setup to mine can come up with such a radically different tone. That amp just has such a dynamic punch to it that your muted string swipes cut nicely.

Which of the amp's channels are you on?

I would try putting the mic even closer to the grille. I can hear some room reflections in there. Not much, and I think that they'd disappear in a mix. But solo I can hear it just a bit.
 
Greg_L said:
Don't underestimate the speaker. Yall's speakers are quite different.
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Very true....That was a big deal for me getting all these different speakers, as they each have their own different little character to 'em....

Clip sounds pretty good TM, is that the green crunch channel by any chance????


When's the attenuator gonna be there Greg????
 
minerman said:
When's the attenuator gonna be there Greg????
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Shit, probably not for a few weeks. They build them to order....so they say. Supposedly they don't have them sitting around on shelves. So it's still gonna be a little while unless some miracle happens.
 
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