Electrical magic. Analogue. Lunacy.

[DawgBone]

The practicality thing is huge for working guitar players doing theatre and live arena stuff. They have all switched over to modelling, because that's been the expectation now for quite a while. But it's a one time outlay to get a pro level modeller. And then you have all the sounds you need.

But that's more about the convenience than sound, true - that tech is being used to chase those classic analog/tube tones, by and large.

However, the aesthetics of rock/pop guitar sounds have now also shifted towards what digital modelling offers. The kids are into super sparkly cleans, huge reverbs and post-Mesa digitally modelled saturated but tight overdrive sounds. They grew up playing plug ins and modeller amps and they wouldn't know what to do with a Plexi. Their style is modelled around that type of sound and they aren't wedded to what came out of the limited (if good sounding) equipment options in the late 60s and 70s.

Maybe it's different in England but in ten years and many hundreds of gigs in the Austin area I've seen exactly four guys use modeling amps. One guy was a kid with a heavily processed sound, two others were amateurs who were horseshit across the board, and the last guy was an 80 year old fella who told me he loved Twins with JBL's but can't lug them anymore cause he's 80.

[Tom Karol]

Best amp I ever had was a '68 Silverface Non-master volume Twin Reverb with EV SRO speakers, but it weighed 90 pounds! I'm almost 77, and I have absolutely no interest in carrying anything much over 20 pounds now.

[John A.]

Maybe it's different in England but in ten years and many hundreds of gigs in the Austin area I've seen exactly four guys use modeling amps. One guy was a kid with a heavily processed sound, two others were amateurs who were horseshit across the board, and the last guy was an 80 year old fella who told me he loved Twins with JBL's but can't lug them anymore cause he's 80.

I've heard rumors that there is some sort of conveyance that uses some sort of magic liquid that explodes in a continuous and controlled way, causing a series of mechanisms and wheels to allow the conveyance to move without a human having to contribute any of his own physical effort to the motion. I've heard that such conveyances can be used to transport large, heavy objects containing vast amounts of wire, glass, wood, and "magnets" to and from places where musical performances occur. I have not encountered such things in my musical perambulations, and have instead resorted to transporting smaller objects via my own physical effort. But one day I would indeed like to witness such a conveyance. Though I am not in England and actually reside on a small continent bordered by the large island of North America, I would like to go to England some day. I've heard other magical combustible liquids can result in flying there!

[Stringswinger]

In the last 25 years of playing music for a living, my observation is that jazz bassists went solid state full force while guitarists stuck with tubes to a large extent. Digital? I haven't seen too much of that until recently and still, most jazz bassists and jazz guitarists who use solid state amps have not yet gone digital. SVT amps? The rock/blues bassists that I know still either use them or talk fondly about how they used to use them when they were younger.

I started using solid state amps back in 1974 when I saw Joe Pass leave the Village Gate (an upstairs club in NYC) carrying his Polytone amp in one hand and his guitar in the other. The next day, I went up to 48th street and bought the first of many Polytone amps that I owned over the years. I soon sold my Fender Twin Reverb with JBLs. But as I played both rock and Jazz over the years, I went back to tube amps quite a bit over the years (often between Fender and Mesa amps). Today, I have 4 amps. Three of them are solid state (2 Henriksens and a Quilter). The 4th amp is a hybrid (Milkman) that uses a tube in the preamp. I have not played a rock/blues/Country gig in quite a few years and if I did, I would probably use my 23 pound Quilter Mach 3. Does the Quilter sound as good to me as my old tube amps? No, but it is close enough and with the weight/reliability difference, I will stick to solid state for the remainder of my musical journey. The only digital that I have embraced is the digital reverb in all 4 of my amps. I will turn 68 in a few months, so it is unlikely that I will embrace the digital/modeling amps, but I have a Gen X bandmate who loves his Fender Tonemasters (and he still has quite the collection of vintage Fender and Gibson tube amps).

For music listening, I embraced digital a long tome ago. I like CD's. I still have quite a bit of vinyl, but mostly because the music on them has not made it's way to CD. I think CD's sound every bit as good as vinyl (except in cases where the mix has been changed in the remastering) and stay good while vinyl degrades. I was into cassettes for a time but I always found their sound inferior (and they degrade in a different way than vinyl, at some point, they stop working altogether.) I do not like the compressed sound of MP3's. I am told that FLAK files are every bit as good as what I hear on my CD's, but I like having an album cover with liner notes in my hand, so I am sticking with CD's.

I do like tube amps, but I do not want to carry them. And I do not think that the modern tubes are as good or reliable as the old ones.

I do like Vinyl, but for long term listening, I prefer CD's.

As a baby boomer, I have lived in the pre digital age and the digital age. I like the technologies of the present and also like the technologies of the past. If others want to choose different amplification, different musical sources or even different guitars (I have not owned a headless guitar yet ), that is their choice. I won't opine on whether others can hear the difference that I cannot. Being adamant about whether Digital is better than analog or vice-versa is a hill that I have no intention of dying on.

Carry on.....

[emanresu]

South Park Shows Why Rock Music is Dying - YouTube

[Christian Miller]

Maybe it's different in England but in ten years and many hundreds of gigs in the Austin area I've seen exactly four guys use modeling amps. One guy was a kid with a heavily processed sound, two others were amateurs who were horseshit across the board, and the last guy was an 80 year old fella who told me he loved Twins with JBL's but can't lug them anymore cause he's 80.

I very much doubt it for the sorts of gigs I'm talking about. If you are on the big pop artist tours or playing in a pit whatever it will be the same. It's not about you and your 'sound' - it's about being able to switch to the Eddie Van Halen sound from the Steve Lukather one in the Michael Jackson jukebox musical or whatever. Digital makes that sort of thing vastly easier. You are also going to make the sound engineers job a lot easier.

As for the bar/club dates - people play what they like on those, and I expect everyone will want to use their OG gear whatever that happens to be. That's the same everywhere.

The reason that happens less in London specifically is that (very much like New York) you really don't want to be driving into gigs in town if you can avoid it. So we are on the club backline (whatever that is), or using portable solutions where there isn't one.

For myself my work runs the spectrum from bringing my own gear with easy parking, through to using the house Fender Twin (nice!) through to situations where I'm on foot and there's no backline provided.

[Christian Miller]

SVT amps? The rock/blues bassists that I know still either use them or talk fondly about how they used to use them when they were younger.

I don't know any of those, so that explains it. It's a different sound to the sort of thing a modern fusion bass player might use even.

Although I see here that Tim Lefebvre uses one, and he's the cool electric jazz bass guy for the past decade or so. There's a bigger demand for the double bass on this scene, although my band has gone electric...

[ruger9]

I very much doubt it for the sorts of gigs I'm talking about. If you are on the big pop artist tours or playing in a pit whatever it will be the same. It's not about you and your 'sound' - it's about being able to switch to the Eddie Van Halen sound from the Steve Lukather one in the Michael Jackson jukebox musical or whatever. Digital makes that sort of thing vastly easier. You are also going to make the sound engineers job a lot easier.
.

This is the only reason to go digital, IMO. And the audience isn't going to know the difference anyway.

[Christian Miller]

This is the only reason to go digital, IMO. And the audience isn't going to know the difference anyway.

Especially not in the mix.

TBH I don't think I can tell the difference these days. Maybe I've lost all of the top end in my hearing or something but I can tell zero difference between a Tonemaster and the real thing. The TM's sound great to me and I'm very familiar with the TM Twin. I would buy one in a heartbeat.

Some maintain there's a difference, but it's lost on me.

In general I think most jobbing professionals I know would take consistent, convenient and very good sounding gear for live work over great sounding gear that's inconsistent or harder to work with. And tubes are less convenient in every way than digital, so unless it's a situation you can afford to indulge yourself a little, the takeover in those sort of big shows with a lot of moving parts is really no surprise.

Which is not to say that I find tube amps unreliable or inconsistent - far from it - it's more...

well once on a soundcheck, I had an, ahem, sound engineer try to unplug the speaker with the amp on to take a line out. No mikes left, you see.

Just give them an XLR. It's what they understand.

[emanresu]

There's one good performer in our parts. Don't wanna go and name names because critique should be asked for...
Anyway. He had the habit of using the good old Roland Cube. The ancient one. It is actually great for what it is. Sound better than it should.
But since the level of the player is a bit higher, I always was surprised why doesn't he go and get hm... even a better Roland or something?
He once played with Deluxe Reverb and I loved it. But, the key here is he likes the old Cube. Maybe nowadays he has moved on. He liked it.
To "like" is the key. There are very few ways to convince people to like or dislike something. Liking is the most real thing we have in this cruel world.

The argument of "it's almost as good as the real thing" - when using this to buy gear... the reasoning is monetary/practical. Nothing to do with "like".
Got to respect the "I like it".

[ruger9]

Some maintain there's a difference, but it's lost on me.

.

I have a Roland Blues Cube Artist, which I believe is a mixture of solid state and digital. It's not a modeler- it's voiced to sound like a tweed Bassman, until you insert a "Tone Capsule", that revoices it. So mine has the "Ultimate Blues" Tone Capsule in it, and that gives me a Marshall Super-voiced lead channel, and a Fender Super Reverb-voiced clean channel. No idea how authentic the voicings are.

BUT... tonally, meaning what I can HEAR... I can hear a difference between it and a tube amp... well, MY tube amps. It's a very subtle difference, I think Roland cracked the code to making SS/digital sound like tubes. No one would be able to tell the difference blindfolded, even if the guitar was solo (not in a mix). That's how good it SOUNDS.

FEEL... this was where the new tech isn't quite up to par. Again: Roland cracked the code, the Cube is almost as dynamic/responsive as my tube amps. There is a difference, it's less subtle than the SOUND difference is, but it's still pretty subtle. I played the Roland with my band, at rehearsals and gigs, for 2 years. Then I switched and have been playing my Fender Supersonic 22 for the last year.

You know what the [practical] difference is?
1) the Fender has a better clean channel.
2) the Roland is ALOT lighter.

That's it. The Roland is fantastic, and I still bring it to gigs as a backup to the Fender. Why take the heavier Fender if the Roland is so close? When only *I* can tell the difference? ... well, that's the answer. *I* can tell the difference, mostly in feel (not sound). So even tho I prefer the Fender only slightly, I still prefer it, and if I'm going to play at all I might as well play the top of the heap. (and this logic has me re-considering bringing my HOME amp out to gigs, as it's the cream off the crop: a Bad Cat Hot Cat. If you've got "the best", might as well use it...)

[nevershouldhavesoldit]

There's one good performer in our parts. Don't wanna go and name names because critique should be asked for...Anyway. He had the habit of using the good old Roland Cube. The ancient one. It is actually great for what it is. Sound better than it should......Got to respect the "I like it".

I bought an orange Cube 60 in the early 1980s as a beater and spare. It sounded so good and was so much easier to carry around than my Boogie and Twin that it ended up on any and every gig that didn't need more power. It was my first small amp since I went from an Ampeg Jet to a Magnatone 425 (a 4x12 combo!) in 1960. When it started giving me trouble, I sold it to my tech. But it started me on the road to using smaller amps again. It only took another 35 years to bring us lovable pro quality amps we could carry.

[Christian Miller]

I have a Roland Blues Cube Artist, which I believe is a mixture of solid state and digital. It's not a modeler- it's voiced to sound like a tweed Bassman, until you insert a "Tone Capsule", that revoices it. So mine has the "Ultimate Blues" Tone Capsule in it, and that gives me a Marshall Super-voiced lead channel, and a Fender Super Reverb-voiced clean channel. No idea how authentic the voicings are.

BUT... tonally, meaning what I can HEAR... I can hear a difference between it and a tube amp... well, MY tube amps. It's a very subtle difference, I think Roland cracked the code to making SS/digital sound like tubes. No one would be able to tell the difference blindfolded, even if the guitar was solo (not in a mix). That's how good it SOUNDS.

FEEL... this was where the new tech isn't quite up to par. Again: Roland cracked the code, the Cube is almost as dynamic/responsive as my tube amps. There is a difference, it's less subtle than the SOUND difference is, but it's still pretty subtle. I played the Roland with my band, at rehearsals and gigs, for 2 years. Then I switched and have been playing my Fender Supersonic 22 for the last year.

You know what the [practical] difference is?
1) the Fender has a better clean channel.
2) the Roland is ALOT lighter.

That's it. The Roland is fantastic, and I still bring it to gigs as a backup to the Fender. Why take the heavier Fender if the Roland is so close? When only *I* can tell the difference? ... well, that's the answer. *I* can tell the difference, mostly in feel (not sound). So even tho I prefer the Fender only slightly, I still prefer it, and if I'm going to play at all I might as well play the top of the heap. (and this logic has me re-considering bringing my HOME amp out to gigs, as it's the cream off the crop: a Bad Cat Hot Cat. If you've got "the best", might as well use it...)

If I'm not mistaken that's now quite old technology as well. Maybe they'll never get it good enough to convince everyone, but with every passing year the difference is less and the trade off's with quality of life make it more and more appealing.

I expect there'll be some who'll never make the switch, and good for them, but the beauty of it is actually you don't actually have to choose. (I mean you do in the sense that you have to choose what you are taking to the gig, but you can own both.)

OTOH it's interesting that Fender haven't gone down the Peavey route of offering improved features on their legacy tube amp range. The Peavey classics have features you find on the Tonemasters - namely attenuation and a balanced speaker simulated line out.

[ruger9]

OTOH it's interesting that Fender haven't gone down the Peavey route of offering improved features on their legacy tube amp range. The Peavey classics have features you find on the Tonemasters - namely attenuation and a balanced speaker simulated line out.

It's a good idea that Fender should incorporate. Unfortunately, it will make their already-expensive tube amps even more expensive... I feel like, over the years, Fender keeps giving us the same gear, but at higher prices. I know "inflation", but there's more to it than that. The Tonemasters were the first really "new" thing they've done in a long time.

[emanresu]

Yes! With tubes, the lag will become a character that the player can toy with.

Have to add again - our ears are incredibly good with timing. Immaculate.
Not ears themselves... the thing between them.

[Christian Miller]

Hello. I think the subtle difference that Ruger9 is describing would be what I find missing in digital vs tube. Tubes “breathe” and the player can feel it. The combination(s) of dynamic response, touch sensitivity, sag, and compression. The player can feel the natural saturation and harmonic distortion of the sounds. Digital can recreate some of the sounds we all know and love, but it can’t recreate the “feel” of the sounds we all know and love. YMMV.

I honestly don't think I know what any of those things are though I hear people talk about them. But then I play squeaky clean like a nerd (unless I'm on the pedals).

I also suspect that the things that other people like about the feel of tube amps annoy me about them. They don't seem to respond as quick to fast picking and so on as the solid states. I've learned to deal with it. But honestly I have no idea.

@ChristianMiller wrote:
“I mean I'm more into the older sounds too, but I'm a Gen X and no one cares what I think. (Although can anyone explain what people see in driven Tweed sounds? I have enough flatulence in my life as it is.)”

As one Gen X to another I will try to explain my thoughts on this. Please see above comments they apply to why some love the tweed tone the best. As a player you get to the juice quicker and not at ear splitting decibels.

Tweeds crap out on you before you reach extreme danger zones. That small space between glorious grit and flatulent splatter is the pinnacle of great sound.

I feel like I need to take a shower after that.

[emanresu]

Tube amps feel springy. When the player catches it, and plays with the springiness, it feel soo good.
The softness and warmness is... dunno why they even tie these to tubes. Tubes can be clangy and harsh and all that if needed.

[Spook410]

Is there some reason why any characteristic of any tube amp can't be modeled?

But this goes to 11...

[DawgBone]

Especially not in the mix.

TBH I don't think I can tell the difference these days. Maybe I've lost all of the top end in my hearing or something but I can tell zero difference between a Tonemaster and the real thing. The TM's sound great to me and I'm very familiar with the TM Twin. I would buy one in a heartbeat.

I have serious doubts the amp would respond the same as a real Twin at the top of it's volume range.

[Christian Miller]

I have serious doubts the amp would respond the same as a real Twin at the top of it's volume range.

Lol. I think I can say for myself this will remain largely irrelevant.

Although the TM Twin does have a handy attenuation switch that the guitar players who use the one at my local venue seem to like.


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[Christian Miller]

Tube amps feel springy. When the player catches it, and plays with the springiness, it feel soo good.

Yes that’s the thing I’m not sure if really like. I’ve got more used to it over time.

I think I’m most used to how my guitars respond acoustically, because I mostly practice unplugged for various reasons and solid state amps represent this better.


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[ruger9]

Is there some reason why any characteristic of any tube amp can't be modeled?

But this goes to 11...

Probably not, but I think "the catch" comes down to individual amps, let me explain what I mean as briefly as possible.

The Fender Tonemaster Twin: is modeled after the tube amp. But not all Twins sound the same. Not 100%. "Close enough for rock n roll" as they say, and the solid state/digital realm has achieved that. But you could play 2 old Twins and they won't sound exactly alike, many reasons for that.

I find it interesting that while some pros do use things like Kemper (modeler), there are also pros who can still tell the difference... and that's not much different than hearing/feeling the difference between 2 Twins. The Tonemaster Twin probably sounds better than SOME old tube Twins. But... we're in "subjective land" now, so...

[GuyBoden]

My ideal world:

Solid State for comping.

Tube for single notes.

[DawgBone]

Probably not, but I think "the catch" comes down to individual amps, let me explain what I mean as briefly as possible.

The Fender Tonemaster Twin: is modeled after the tube amp. But not all Twins sound the same. Not 100%. "Close enough for rock n roll" as they say, and the solid state/digital realm has achieved that. But you could play 2 old Twins and they won't sound exactly alike, many reasons for that.

I find it interesting that while some pros do use things like Kemper (modeler), there are also pros who can still tell the difference... and that's not much different than hearing/feeling the difference between 2 Twins. The Tonemaster Twin probably sounds better than SOME old tube Twins. But... we're in "subjective land" now, so...

IME any two well maintained BF Twin circuits are indistinguishable from each other save for speaker and tube differences.

[ruger9]

IME any two well maintained BF Twin circuits are indistinguishable from each other save for speaker and tube differences.

My point exactly. A brand new Twin with OEM Sovtek tubes and a new Jensen speakers is not going to sound like a 50-year-old Twin with NOS glass and well-worn Jensens, not to mention old filter caps. And depending on how much it's been pummeled, no two 50-y.o. Twins will sound exactly the same.

Maybe only some of us can hear it. I'm certainly not the only one- many pros have said exactly the same thing.