5e3 With Reverb?

[BreckerFan]

I recently picked up a Victoria Club Deluxe. It is the deluxe circuit but without tremolo or the bright cap but retains the spring reverb. Also has a half power switch. All of this is housed in a tweed deluxe sized pine cabinet. It is a gorgeous sounding amp and at 22lbs is quite portable. It may work for you. One of the complaints people have about the Club Deluxe is that it is on the darker side tone wise.

I have a club deluxe along with my TDRI, and they are very different amps. The club deluxe is firmly in the deluxe reverb camp, with a stiffer response and scooped mids. I like a very dark sound and typically run mine with treble at zero and it's still noticably brighter than the Tweed Deluxe, I think there's some high mid presence that's just ingrained. The Tweed has way more middle to low mids and a softer attack. When they break up the tweed is smoother, the club deluxe more grainy, but not in a bad way.

The club deluxe is a fantastic amp, and you can get great 60s straight ahead sounds with it. But they won't exactly be tweed sounds.

[John A.]

Another one I just thought of is the Mesa Subway Blues. It has a very fat, tweed-like tone. 20 watts and a 10" speaker, so not really a tweed Deluxe clone, but really nice 2x6v6 amps that can be had relatively cheap.

[2bornot2bop]

Agreed... reverb can be overused. The "velcro the pedal in the cabinet" idea is pretty cool. I have to assume you're running the pedal on 9v battery power?

I’ve never understood the obsession for reverb. It’s like salt, just a touch you’ll be fine. Too much and you ruin the meal entirely!

[Cunamara]

Agreed. I like to barely hear the reverb. Just enough to round and fatten the notes. I like a hall reverb for this.

[Herbie]

Then You can always find a DIY amp kit that fills Your needs and make it Yourself.

This is basicly a one channel Deluxe Reverb but it has two important mods, which are important for classic jazz sound seeker: the Mid pot and the Tweed pot.

Mid pot fills the typical Fender mid-scoop and gives strength for Your one string lines.

Tweed pot does not make it Tweed Deluxe (the cover material is only for visually esthetic reasons!) but it passes the eq circuit and thus makes the sound a bit more mid heavy. And hotter.

All and all this way is cheaper than a boutique amp but pricier than MIC China amps. I paid for my amp about 1500€.

[ruger9]

Keep in mind he's looking for a tweed CIRCUIT (5E3), not a tweed covering.

The Deluxe reverb (and copies) suggestions are not much like tweed circuits. Their EQ and response is quite different. I love my 5E3s, but sold my Princeton Reverb because I'm just not a "blackface" circuit guy. Too much mid scoop and too much presence for me.

[GuyBoden]

[Herbie]

Keep in mind he's looking for a tweed CIRCUIT (5E3), not a tweed covering.

The Deluxe reverb (and copies) suggestions are not much like tweed circuits. Their EQ and response is quite different. I love my 5E3s, but sold my Princeton Reverb because I'm just not a "blackface" circuit guy. Too much mid scoop and too much presence for me.

I know, I play with my DIY Tweed amp too and have tried to solve the reverb problem for years.

The Deluxe Reverb clone that I described before can be adjust to NOT to sound like blackfront with that Tweed knob. And it has the reverb so I see it as a compromise.

There might be 5E3 kits with reverb too but I don’t remember I have seen them.

BTW I have my doubts about getting the KB sound with 5E3 amp. The fine compression and hair that we hear in his records can be result from the amp in certain setting (and certain tubes and certain speaker) but also from RvG’s tube powered recording tools. At least my own efforts in mimicing him with P90 ES-175 and Tweed Deluxe have been useless.

Oh, and of course I don’t have the KB’s fingers!

[andrew]

Keep in mind he's looking for a tweed CIRCUIT (5E3), not a tweed covering.

Yup, that's why I thought the Marsh TweedyVerb that I linked earlier would be a conversation ender. It literally IS a 5E3 deluxe clone with a spring reverb tank and an analog solid state reverb circuit wedged in there.

[bluejaybill]

(snip)

BTW I have my doubts about getting the KB sound with 5E3 amp. The fine compression and hair that we hear in his records can be result from the amp in certain setting (and certain tubes and certain speaker) but also from RvG’s tube powered recording tools. At least my own efforts in mimicing him with P90 ES-175 and Tweed Deluxe have been useless.

Oh, and of course I don’t have the KB’s fingers!

Also, tweed deluxes only sound like that at pretty much one volume level, and then they start to distort pretty quick. As said, you can hear a bit of that on some of those old Van Gelder recordings, though it does sound like amp breakup to me.

I would certainly agree that KB's tone was and always has been great, a benchmark tone. Probably more in his hands as said. And certainly he didn't use a tweed Deluxe when performing, so he was capable of getting his sound from other amps.

I have found that I can get closer to a lot of tones with a good EQ pedal. Especially to approximate an old deluxe I need to add mids to most amps I come across, and particularly BF amps.

[customxke]

Keep in mind he's looking for a tweed CIRCUIT (5E3), not a tweed covering.

I’m sure that somewhere, on some forum, there is a thread by a guy who recovered his amp with tweed, and is adamant that the tone really opened up.

[BreckerFan]

Also, tweed deluxes only sound like that at pretty much one volume level, and then they start to distort pretty quick. As said, you can hear a bit of that on some of those old Van Gelder recordings, though it does sound like amp breakup to me.

A Freyette power station or similar reamping load box is your friend here. You can set the amp for that sound at any volume. My dream amp would be a tweed deluxe with built in spring reverb and a built in reactive load/solid state power amp so you can get power tube breakup at any volume

[GuyBoden]

I’m sure that somewhere, on some forum, there is a thread by a guy who recovered his amp with tweed, and is adamant that the tone really opened up.

Surely, you'll also need a 'Genuine Vintage Fender Tweed' strap.

[RetroSound]

********** Update **********

I decided to go with a Victoria Amps Vicky Verb! I spent some time on the phone with Mark Baier (owner / builder) and I'm pretty confident this will not only be the amp to get me the tones I'm primarily after but a variety of others as well based on the flexibility of this amp. Thanks to everyone for the opinions, insights and suggestions!

[marcwhy]

Congrats, Retro! Please let us know when you get it!

(And that was over your budget, too!)

[bluejaybill]

A Freyette power station or similar reamping load box is your friend here. You can set the amp for that sound at any volume. My dream amp would be a tweed deluxe with built in spring reverb and a built in reactive load/solid state power amp so you can get power tube breakup at any volume

Agreed, and I have one! And it's just as useful raising as lowering the volume.

[ruger9]

Victoria makes great stuff!! Congrats!!

[Herbie]

********** Update **********

I decided to go with a Victoria Amps Vicky Verb! I spent some time on the phone with Mark Baier (owner / builder) and I'm pretty confident this will not only be the amp to get me the tones I'm primarily after but a variety of others as well based on the flexibility of this amp. Thanks to everyone for the opinions, insights and suggestions!

Great! Let us know how it sounds when You get it.

Tweed amps are very original type of amps. Somehow natural or even primitive and wild. But when You learn to live with it, You can reach countless sounds with them.

[alltunes]

********** Update **********

I decided to go with a Victoria Amps Vicky Verb! I spent some time on the phone with Mark Baier (owner / builder) and I'm pretty confident this will not only be the amp to get me the tones I'm primarily after but a variety of others as well based on the flexibility of this amp. Thanks to everyone for the opinions, insights and suggestions!

So how do you like the Vicky Verb? I always tempted to pick up 518 again it just does that Champ thing so good.

[spencer096]

Vicky verb

[spencer096]

********** Update **********

I decided to go with a Victoria Amps Vicky Verb! I spent some time on the phone with Mark Baier (owner / builder) and I'm pretty confident this will not only be the amp to get me the tones I'm primarily after but a variety of others as well based on the flexibility of this amp. Thanks to everyone for the opinions, insights and suggestions!

lol just replied w that suggestion. They’re incredible amps.

[rpjazzguitar]

A guitarist I used to play with was the best kind of gearhead.

Meaning, he had a lot of gear, would bring something different every week and he always sounded fantastic.

He had a small Victoria amp. Eventually, I asked him to let me plug into it. I didn't sound any better. That week he was playing a Strat into the Victoria. I bought my first Strat in response. I liked the sound, but it didn't match his. Did I not have the right model Strat? The right pickups? Maybe not, but I stopped there. I never did ask to take the guitar out of his hands and see if I would sound the same using all his gear. Probably should have.

Am I the only one who can't tell a 5e3 the moment I hear one?

[ruger9]

A guitarist I used to play with was the best kind of gearhead.

Meaning, he had a lot of gear, would bring something different every week and he always sounded fantastic.

He had a small Victoria amp. Eventually, I asked him to let me plug into it. I didn't sound any better. That week he was playing a Strat into the Victoria. I bought my first Strat in response. I liked the sound, but it didn't match his. Did I not have the right model Strat? The right pickups? Maybe not, but I stopped there. I never did ask to take the guitar out of his hands and see if I would sound the same using all his gear. Probably should have.

Am I the only one who can't tell a 5e3 the moment I hear one?

To be fair, not all 5E3's sound the same. And on such a simple circuit, different guitars/pickups makes a HUGE difference. A Les Paul with P90s is not going to sound like a telecaster, is not going to sound like an archtop. The simpler the amp circuit, the more apparent differences in guitars/pickups becomes.

[Woody Sound]

Attachment 119435

[Woody Sound]

Surely, you'll also need a 'Genuine Vintage Fender Tweed' strap.

Not nearly as effective as this.