The New Tone Thread

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JDOD said:
This was supposed to be the end of AMG Pop Shit... but I really like the last two bars so suddenly I want to carry on with it.

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By the way.. I'm 36 today. Feel free to give me an e-birthday card
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Happy Birthday Jdude!!!!!

Clip sounds ok to me, but there's a tuning issue there man....As far as the tone, I think the guitars are ok, not as good as your previous clips, but still way better than when you first started....


Tad: Thanks man, I actually ran a vst compressor through the amp, then compressed it a little more after it was recorded...Very subtle gain reduction with the comp(s), the gain reduction needle/meter just barely moved on each one...The one that really counted was the comp running through the amp, I'm actually quite surprised & happy with the strat tones on this...Thanks for the suggestion dude!!!
 
Cheers guys, these aren't any way keeper tracks so any tips for improvement would be good.

I'll listen back for the tuning, I've probably only listened to it the once, I was writing and recording as I was going, adlibbing till I found something I wanted.
 
I was getting random nose bleeds a while back. Just out of nowhere I would get one. Not just a little blood flowing either....it would be like my nose was running from a cold but it would be blood. Sometime twice a day even. At least one every other day. My wife tried to get me to go to the doctor but I kept putting it off and just as suddenly and radomly as they started...they stopped. I guess maybe I had a nose "roid" like greg.
Thankfully it's gone now.
I have a fear of going to the doctor for shit like that. People, with somewhat minor problems, sometimes go to the doctor and get diagnosed with a serious deadly condition...they go from everything being OK to deaths door in a week.
 
Yeah, checked it. Also checked it through an auto tune for more detail (I've never checked a guitar through an auto tune before). There's a couple of bends there that are half a semitone flat.
 
Appee berfdae JDOD.
Wales won a Euro Cup game just for you!
I quite liked the Blur bit. I'd rather you do Supergrass or, on the other end of things, Pulp.
I'd say try Oasis but what's the pint in try to sound like someone else sounding like someone else (Mind you I have 3 Oasis albums becasue they're ripped off infectiouness when they're on their game)?
 
I can't see Greg snorting preparation H.
Nasal haemorroids - not good for your singing tone.
 
I've been trying to edumahkate m'self re tubes amps and the workings.
I've read and seen commentary that pushing the power end of a tube amp results in flabby, loose bottom end while pushing the preamp end results in a good tone that a large chunk of the power stage can then amplify "cleanly"- ie: big amps are there to allow a decent amount of power to amplify the preamp sound rather than to be pushed to the max after the preamp is pushed.
Is this so?
If this is so how does it relate to a non master vol amp - in other words what does that mean for my Superbass 100W?
 
rayc said:
I've been trying to edumahkate m'self re tubes amps and the workings.
I've read and seen commentary that pushing the power end of a tube amp results in flabby, loose bottom end while pushing the preamp end results in a good tone that a large chunk of the power stage can then amplify "cleanly"- ie: big amps are there to allow a decent amount of power to amplify the preamp sound rather than to be pushed to the max after the preamp is pushed.
Is this so?
If this is so how does it relate to a non master vol amp - in other words what does that mean for my Superbass 100W?
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It depends on the amp, but in my experience the preamp gain tends to be more fizzy and the power section gain tends to be more fat and punchy. Although the opposite seems to hold true on my JCM800, where the preamp gain fattens it up and the master tends to overload what the speaker cabinet can handle. No wonder it took me so long to get this amp to give me what I wanted...it's ass-backwards from other amps that I've used.

I think that the "flabby loose bottom end" comes from simply pushing the power section beyond what it's reasonably capable of. The Traynor I used to have did a great garage rock thing when the clean channel master volume was cranked all the way up. Definitely a loose bottom end. But the saturation/distortion that it generated was so much fatter and more smooth than what the preamp was capable of generating.

I don't know a thing abut the Marshall Super Bass, other than it's a Marshall, and it's a bass amp :)
 
Well, before amps had pre-amps they were dimed out on volume and sounded glorious. The whole pre-amp thing was created in an attempt to emulate that tone and tube saturation in a lower volume environment. So, I don't necessarily agree with the commentary. I guess it really depends on the particular make, model, and design of the amp though.
 
jimistone said:
Well, before amps had pre-amps they were dimed out on volume and sounded glorious. The whole pre-amp thing was created in an attempt to emulate that tone and tube saturation in a lower volume environment. So, I don't necessarily agree with the commentary. I guess it really depends on the particular make, model, and design of the amp though.
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well now .... ALL amps had preamps ..... every single one of them.
So the preamp was always a part of the sound.
What changed was the master volume type cascading preamps which were designed to be able to overdrive more than earlier preamps.
 
rayc said:
I've been trying to edumahkate m'self re tubes amps and the workings.
I've read and seen commentary that pushing the power end of a tube amp results in flabby, loose bottom end while pushing the preamp end results in a good tone that a large chunk of the power stage can then amplify "cleanly"- ie: big amps are there to allow a decent amount of power to amplify the preamp sound rather than to be pushed to the max after the preamp is pushed.
Is this so?
If this is so how does it relate to a non master vol amp - in other words what does that mean for my Superbass 100W?
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Your Super Bass has a pretty tight power section. So your guitar goes in, the preamp section amplifies that terribly weak guitar signal, then it moves down the line to the power amp section which kicks it out the speakers. The breakup-resistant tightness of your power section keeps that preamp signal pure and just makes it louder. Your Super Bass, my best guess, doesn't break up and distort like a Super Lead because your preamp section is configured to keep things pretty tidy and the power amp is doing it's job. Your tone stack is designed for tamer mids and there's no bright cap on a Super Bass. You could make that amp a Super Lead with just a few caps and resistors. The power amp will still be the same though. All that "power tube crunch" that everyone talks about with Plexi-type amps isn't really power tube at all. It's preamp and phase inverter meltdown. There's a lot going on besides that, but Plexi-type power sections do want to resist breakup. They're pretty tight. But when you get one to give up the goods by really pushing it hard, look out. That's when they go from awesome to holy grail kind of sound. And that's when you go deaf.

Tadpui said:
It depends on the amp, but in my experience the preamp gain tends to be more fizzy and the power section gain tends to be more fat and punchy. Although the opposite seems to hold true on my JCM800, where the preamp gain fattens it up and the master tends to overload what the speaker cabinet can handle. No wonder it took me so long to get this amp to give me what I wanted...it's ass-backwards from other amps that I've used.

I think that the "flabby loose bottom end" comes from simply pushing the power section beyond what it's reasonably capable of. The Traynor I used to have did a great garage rock thing when the clean channel master volume was cranked all the way up. Definitely a loose bottom end. But the saturation/distortion that it generated was so much fatter and more smooth than what the preamp was capable of generating.

I don't know a thing abut the Marshall Super Bass, other than it's a Marshall, and it's a bass amp :)
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Your JCM 800 should work similarly to a Super Lead. The circuitry is in the same family. The pre amp vol and master vol need to be juggled against each other. Cranking both does usually result in a mess. The preamp fatness comes in when you get beyond the bright cap's control. I find that the louder I go , the less preamp vol I want in the signal. More vol, less gain.
 
Lt. Bob said:
well now .... ALL amps had preamps ..... every single one of them.
So the preamp was always a part of the sound.
What changed was the master volume type cascading preamps which were designed to be able to overdrive more than earlier preamps.
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I didn't know that. I thought the pre-amp was incorporated later on like in the mid 1970s. To allow players to achieve that low volume distortion.
I'm not well versed on the details inside guitar ps though.
thanks for clarifying that.
 
Preamps have always existed. Just part of the various amplification stages to take the minute voltage coming from the guitar to the awesome loud sound coming out of your speakers.
The master volume, and preamp volume control was the new thing.
:D
 
jimistone said:
I didn't know that. I thought the pre-amp was incorporated later on like in the mid 1970s. To allow players to achieve that low volume distortion.
.
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That was where the master volumes came in. Those older amps could always make distortion, they just couldn't do it quietly.
 
Can you explain the bright cap thing a little bit? I've heard that term for the Marshall preamp section before, but I've never really understood where it comes into play.
 
Tadpui said:
Can you explain the bright cap thing a little bit? I've heard that term for the Marshall preamp section before, but I've never really understood where it comes into play.
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The bright cap goes across two lugs of the preamp pot. It shelves out lows, like the tone control on a guitar, but in reverse. You know that cap on the tone pot on a guitar? Same principle. As you wind the preamp vol up, the cap comes less and less into play depending on the value. Usually by around 7-ish on the preamp vol, the cap is totally out of the circuit and full signal is going through, which is why the gain on those 2203/2204s kind of fattens up the higher you go. Some people remove that cap entirely, some people juggle the values until they find a sound they like. The higher the number, the brighter the amp will be when the gain isn't dimed. It's just a little disc cap across the pot, so it's very simple to change, mod, or remove entirely. If your 800 has side-by-side inputs, your bright cap will be on the PCB somewhere, so it's a little more tricky to deal with. I think, off the top of my head, a 2204's stock value is 1000pf. Some people find that too bright at lower gain levels so a common fix for that is a 500pf. Some people like 250pf.

On Plexi type amps, that bright cap really changes the gain characteristics and slope of the volume control. The stock value changed over the years, but early 70s and up have very high values so the amps are bright and aggressive. They're also damn near max volume as soon as you turn them on. Changing that bright cap to a smaller value makes them sound fatter, break up later, and the volume increase is a little smoother and more linear.
 
That little brown disc on the first pot....bright cap. On a Marshall, that one little fucker has a big effect on what part of your guitar signal hits the gain stages.
 
Talking heads or what? I didn't mind the 3 way discussion (though the mics didn't do a good job) and the balance of enthusuastic bloke, understated bloke and I don't speak much unless asked to bloke was interesting.
As for the amp...It needed to be cranked as the understated bloke understated.
 
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