A question for Greg (and anyone else who want's to chime in)

N

notCardio

I walk the line
You've been very vocal about your opinion that the only way to really get a big amp tone is to play it loud.

The gig tone is the combination of overdriven preamp tubes, overdriven power tubes, and speaker breakup.

I was just wondering if you could assign a percentage to each of those ingredients as to their effect on the total tone.

I guess what I'm looking for is something like 'an overdriven preamp alone will only get you 25% of the way there, or 50%, or whatever.'

An overdriven pre and overdriven power tubes, without overdriving a cab will get you this far.

I'm sure you think this is a pointless exercise, but I'd appreciate it if you guys would humor me and weigh in.

And no, I don't have any point to make, I'm just curious.
 
My experience...JCM900
Preamp gives me distortion or crunch and maybe 25% of my volume (depending on the channel)
Power amp just makes everything super loud. 75% of my loudness.
Speakers are so inconsistent you hope you get one good one out of 4 (lol)
 
If there's a master volume, I dime that...and then I'll turn up the pre/volume until I have the OD tone I'm looking for....and that's it.
There's really no "percentage" that I think about, and it's different from amp to amp or for how deep I want the OD tone.

Where the output loudness level of the amp ends up...is irrelevant to me. It ends up where it it ends up.
I don't need to concern myself with how loud the amp is. I wear headphones when recording, and there's no one I'm disturbing with the level.

When you need to concern yourself with loudness levels...then it starts becoming a trade-off.

That said...there are times when I might dial back the master volume and push the pre up more...but there's a point (per amp) where you quickly start getting into "mush" territory doing that.
You just have to find the 2-3 sweet spots of an amp where you get the best "pre" OD tone, and the best power OD tone, and a combination of the two. There always a few really good positions, and they will stand out to anything else, and even if you move the knobs just a click or two, you can lose it.
 
Your question is like asking "how long is a piece of string".

You get different types of distortion from the different stages of the amp. The power amp section gets you the AC/DC sort of distortion. The preamp tends to give you the fuzzier sort of distortion. The speakers tend to just smoosh the sound of the amp together.

Depending on the amp and how you set it, you mix those types.of distortion in various amounts to get your sound.
 
ido1957 said:
My experience...JCM900
Preamp gives me distortion or crunch and maybe 25% of my volume (depending on the channel)
Power amp just makes everything super loud. 75% of my loudness.
Speakers are so inconsistent you hope you get one good one out of 4 (lol)
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OK, just to be clear, I wasn't asking about volume, just about tone.
 
miroslav said:
If there's a master volume, I dime that...and then I'll turn up the pre/volume until I have the OD tone I'm looking for....and that's it.
There's really no "percentage" that I think about, and it's different from amp to amp or for how deep I want the OD tone.

Where the output loudness level of the amp ends up...is irrelevant to me. It ends up where it it ends up.
I don't need to concern myself with how loud the amp is. I wear headphones when recording, and there's no one I'm disturbing with the level.

When you need to concern yourself with loudness levels...then it starts becoming a trade-off.

That said...there are times when I might dial back the master volume and push the pre up more...but there's a point (per amp) where you quickly start getting into "mush" territory doing that.
You just have to find the 2-3 sweet spots of an amp where you get the best "pre" OD tone, and the best power OD tone, and a combination of the two. There always a few really good positions, and they will stand out to anything else, and even if you move the knobs just a click or two, you can lose it.
Click to expand...

You'll dime the master, and then turn up the pre? Wow, that's exactly the opposite of how I do it.

OK, I don't always 'dime' the pre, it depends on the tone I'm looking for, and what I'm running into it as far as a guitar and pedal(s).
 
Farview said:
Your question is like asking "how long is a piece of string".

You get different types of distortion from the different stages of the amp. The power amp section gets you the AC/DC sort of distortion. The preamp tends to give you the fuzzier sort of distortion. The speakers tend to just smoosh the sound of the amp together.

Depending on the amp and how you set it, you mix those types.of distortion in various amounts to get your sound.
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OK, what about a bluesy SRV kind of tone, or something along those lines? Aside from the strat and 808 (and yes, his fingers), is that more of a pre or power tube sound?

And the AC/DC thing - if that's more power tubes, how much of that is speaker breakup? If you ran it into an attenuator to the point where it would push the speakers hard, I know it would affect the tone, but how close would it be?
 
Ok for my amp JCM900 if I turn it wide open with my LPC it gets bassy, really bassy. That's because of the pickups. My Kramer and Strat never get bassy, just louder with same tone.
 
notCardio said:
OK, what about a bluesy SRV kind of tone, or something along those lines? Aside from the strat and 808 (and yes, his fingers), is that more of a pre or power tube sound?

And the AC/DC thing - if that's more power tubes, how much of that is speaker breakup? If you ran it into an attenuator to the point where it would push the speakers hard, I know it would affect the tone, but how close would it be?
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From what I recall of SRV tone, it would seem to be power amp more than preamp. Didn't he use fender amps? Those amps do something a little different than Marshalls because of the different tubes, transformers, etc... But it's still the same sort of thing. As you turn up the power section, you will get to a certain point when the tone starts to change, get a little more midrangy. That's the power amp distortion, the more you push it, the more sustain.

If you back off the volume until the speakers no longer distort, it will sound more "sterile". The speaker distortion is what compresses the outdoors together and creates some of the upper harmonics. But what the speakers do really depends on what speakers and what cabinet you are using.

There was a point in the 80's that people were putting EVs in cabinets, which didn't break up. Zakk Wilde's tone on his first Ozzy album uses those. But he was more preamp than power amp.
 
notCardio said:
You'll dime the master, and then turn up the pre? Wow, that's exactly the opposite of how I do it.

OK, I don't always 'dime' the pre, it depends on the tone I'm looking for, and what I'm running into it as far as a guitar and pedal(s).
Click to expand...

If you want the whole amp/speaker rig working...you need to move some air...and to move some air, it needs to be loud...and to be loud...you need that master volume up.

Every amp is going to be different, and it depends where what is in the circuit.
That's why I said you'll have a few sweet spots for a given amp...at pre amp, power amp and some combination of the two.

Don't get me wrong, I don't always dime the Master when I have one...but I've found that driving the preamp volume well beyond the Master leads to more mushier crunch....which can have it's use, but I just like to have the Master up in most cases and then if I need to also push the preamp volume up high to get in the crunch zone, I'll do that, but of course, it will be LOUD!

Like I said, if you are giving ANY consideration to your loudness level...then you're trading off and adding that third consideration to how you are going to dial the amp in. You can find some lower level good tones, but I just prefer the amp wide open as much as needed, and I don't ever consider my loudness level. It falls where it falls. I put on the headphones to save my ears. :)
 
notCardio said:
You've been very vocal about your opinion that the only way to really get a big amp tone is to play it loud.
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And I aint wrong. I'm not a believer in the ridiculous trend of micro-amps for recording. Bah. But loud is relative. Little amps can be very loud. It doesn't take many watts of tube power to disturb the rest of the house. Power section meltdown is nice, but if you can't move air, you're shooting yourself in the foot. And the cab size matters too. A 1x10 doesn't sound like a 4x12. I've read the flawed argument in here that "you're only miking one speaker". That may be true, sometimes, but the rest of the cab still impacts the overall sound. Miking a single speaker in a little box doesn't sound like miking a single speaker in a huge box. None of this means little amps and cabs sound bad, but they struggle to sound BIG. Big amps pumping out big power sound big without even trying. That's just what they sound like. That's what they are. A dog doesn't have to try to look like a dog because it's a fucking dog. Know what I mean?

The gig tone is the combination of overdriven preamp tubes, overdriven power tubes, and speaker breakup.
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Yeah, generally.

I was just wondering if you could assign a percentage to each of those ingredients as to their effect on the total tone.

I guess what I'm looking for is something like 'an overdriven preamp alone will only get you 25% of the way there, or 50%, or whatever.'
Click to expand...
For me, I don't know percentages, but I'd always rather more power and less preamp gain. Low volume/high gain is poo. Mushy fizzy poo. Big volume low gain is the tone of the gods. You gotta have the right amp for it, but miro's explanation of cranking the master and dialing up just enough preamp gain is on point. The more volume you can get away with, the less gain you may want or need. I'll do some sound clips demonstrating this next week.

An overdriven pre and overdriven power tubes, without overdriving a cab will get you this far.
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I'm a HUGE believer in speakers. They matter. A lot. They're the last stop for your sound and they have a gigantic impact on what you hear. A Greenback sounds nothing like a stiff as hell EV. Same guitar, same amp, same settings, different speakers, different sounds. If you know what you're after, you can choose speakers that suit your tone goal. Some amps get along with certain speakers for certain sounds. Guitar, pickups, amp, cab, speakers. It all matters.

I'm sure you think this is a pointless exercise, but I'd appreciate it if you guys would humor me and weigh in.

And no, I don't have any point to make, I'm just curious.
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No problem! These are just my opinions. It's no secret that I'm a fan of big amps. No one has to agree with me, but I do practice what I preach.

 
I'd certainly agree with Greg in the areas I have personal experience of here. Been having a similar debate with some friends over the last month or so about using reasonable size amps and large cabinets as opposed to small cabinets and driving small amps to within an inch their lives especially the pre-amp stages. And medium size amps and how the damping factor of the amp drastically alters when switching from say a 1x12 to a 4x12. It's certainly been my experience that a couple of my amps which sound OK through a 1x12 with some effort required to constantly tweak while trying scratch a tone itch. Connect a 4x12 and disregard how much air is being moved makes things a whole lot easier to dial in. For a start a single vintage 30 cabinet sounds as thin as hell next to a 4x12 straight swap with no re dialing the amp, it's a whole difference in how the amp behaves in relation to the load on it. It's got to be at least half of the way toward the overall sound, what percentage everything before that plays in what proportions is I guess dictated by the actual tone which is sought at any given time. Personally I'd much rather play at reasonable volume through a large cabinet than a small one every day of the week, even just for my own amusement. It just sounds more like what I'm after in every way.
 
For me, the sheer range of different venues means I simply cannot use an overall setting that involves 'tone' that is created by volume. Turning the volume up so the output section adds something or the speaker cones start to be non-linear is impossible. It's too loud, too uncontrollable and pointless. I'd like a consistent sound in my ears, maybe not the ultimate my rig could produce, but I don't use any processing on bass, so it's simply my guitar sound, and on 6 string outings, then the pedal board can be DI'd. I'm never doing a Gary Moore up against the cab for infinite sustain. The PA people like me, the other band members can hear, and in my ears is the same sound, everywhere we play. What is the point of a sound that can only be played at one volume?
 
rob aylestone said:
For me, the sheer range of different venues means I simply cannot use an overall setting that involves 'tone' that is created by volume. Turning the volume up so the output section adds something or the speaker cones start to be non-linear is impossible. It's too loud, too uncontrollable and pointless. I'd like a consistent sound in my ears, maybe not the ultimate my rig could produce, but I don't use any processing on bass, so it's simply my guitar sound, and on 6 string outings, then the pedal board can be DI'd. I'm never doing a Gary Moore up against the cab for infinite sustain. The PA people like me, the other band members can hear, and in my ears is the same sound, everywhere we play. What is the point of a sound that can only be played at one volume?
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LOL ^^^^

What's the point of any of this? To have fun. What's the point of having an amp if you're just gonna throw your hands up in defeat and DI from the pedalboard? :facepalm:

Here's another advantage of big amps - they can still sound good and full and punchy even when turned down a bit. Headroom. Do they sound their best turned down? No. But this is where preamp gain helps out. You can get some fullness back by turning up the gain and lower volumes. This is where using the right amp matched to the right cab and speakers can give you some benefits. This is where an attenuator can be a good thing. If you have to be quiet, you can at least still get the mashed power section part of the equation by using an attenuator. I know guys that turn their cabs towards the wall. There are all kinds of ways to make bigger, better sounding amps work in smaller venues.
 
When I play live with my Marshall TSL 100 through a Marshall 1960 with stock G12-75s, the majority of the time I use the crunch channel with the channel master at 5 to 12 and the channel gain at about 5 or 10 past 12. Using a very heavy SG style guitar with moderately powerful humbuckers this gives me a sweet tone and the perfect volume for a live show where very little is reinforced through the PA. I use exactly the same setup for most of my recording, but because of the neighbours I sometimes use triode mode on the amp. It records rather well, I think.
 
I've lost count of how many times, out at front of house, the guitar fader is off, and the volume of the band out front balanced against the live sound of the guitarist. Not so much with bass players, just the odd few. It always used to be the drummer, but now, it's a megawatt of distorted guitar from somebody deaf or uncaring. Sometimes they even tune the guitar too, which is a help. A speaker in a flightcase with a mic is much, much nicer.
 
Back in the old days, I used to just put the guitar cabs on the side of the stage, blowing across like side fills. It made it easier to hear the guitars no matter where you were on stage, so they didn't have to be in the monitors. It also kept the FOH guy from getting blasted in the face by the amps.
I always hated having the amps behind me, blowing into the audience. Once I moved to the other side of the stage, I couldn't hear myself. I don't like having the guitar in the monitors because it screws with my feedback/sustain effects.
, and it becomes hard to tell my guitar from the other guy's with everything coming from everywhere.
 
rob aylestone said:
I've lost count of how many times, out at front of house, the guitar fader is off, and the volume of the band out front balanced against the live sound of the guitarist. Not so much with bass players, just the odd few. It always used to be the drummer, but now, it's a megawatt of distorted guitar from somebody deaf or uncaring. Sometimes they even tune the guitar too, which is a help. A speaker in a flightcase with a mic is much, much nicer.
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That's the problem with soundmen - they pretty much all suck. They don't know how to deal with live music. They don't know how to adapt, make things work. Soundmen are the lowest forms of life on the planet. They have no musical talent or skill so the only option they have is to run sound, and they often can't do that either. They're there to drink and scam on girls. I've lost count of how many weak and anemic sounding bands I've heard because they have no stage volume because the soundman cried to "turn it down" and rely on stupid shit like going direct into a PA. Get close to the stage and it's all drums and vocals. Lol. A musician shouldn't have to alter his sound to please a soundman. It's supposed to be the other way around. But for some reason people have let soundmen take control. Fuck that and fuck them.
 
Good opinion - and I guess they'd say the same being given musically dreadful musicians to try and make sound nice. Their job seem to be to make a bunch of individuals sound 'whole'. Some are no doubt dreadful, in the same way musicians are. However - my side of the water we have many venues with very strict volume control by local authorities, and the sandman is the person who's job can often be to keep the place open! Indeed I saw a sound job advertised today that had this clause in the contract.
KEY TASKS

3.1 Show Operation

Control and be solely responsible for the Stage AV, Lighting and Sound for all Hotel entertainment. This includes all pre-show checks, especially ensuring that Sound Checks are undertaken at appropriate times before every show. Maximum total of six evenings per week. The hotel technician must comply with local noise level restrictions and obey the hotel manager's requests to turn the sound level down if requested to do so.
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