Tube vs Solid State Guitar Amps

[jason30]

Which type of guitar amp would generally be best suited for jazz, tube amps or solid state amps?

I'm leaning more towards a tube amp because it seems to deliver a warmer tone.

let me know what you think!

[mr. beaumont]

hey jason...

i responded to your PM as well--here's my take on jazz tone.

"warm" is sort of a tough thing to define. for some, it seems to be a tone that's firmer in the bass and mids, and loses some of the "icy" highs. for others, "warm" is that touch sensitivity you get with a tube amp--where you set it so that the hardest notes you hit have just a touch of grit to them...

to me, "warm" jazz sounds can be gotten thru a tube or solid state amp (think early pat martino on the tube side, late pat on the solid state side.) solid state jazz sounds tend to be a bit drier, and maybe lack some of the inherent character of tube amps, but there are great solid state jazz tones out there.

for me, it depends on the gig. for the solo gigs i do around town, it's always solid state--they're lighter, have less to worry about failing, and the dry, dark signal really suits the solo atmosphere.

when i play with groups, i'll often consider a tube amp. i also like tube amps in other traditional settings, like working with a big band (gotta be careful though, nobody wants a distorted guitar in a big band playing the hits of the 40's!) it really depends on how i'm feeling at the moment.

i say there's nothing wrong with having both in the stable.

[hot ford coupe]

I have used both and I find both will do a very adequate job. The size and the quality of the amps have a bit to do with getting the tone you want. There's even a lot of variability in that "warm" tone from tube amp to tube amp and SS amp to SS amp. The trick is to take your axe to the store when you're going to buy one and try as many of the different types as you can. Your ears will tell you what you'll need to choose. Believe it or not, on several occasions I've even used my bass amp, an Ampeg B100 Rocket something or other solid state amp and got a beautiful sound. You add a reverb or delay to it and you've got a winner.

[jason30]

I guess theres a lot of variables to be considered when choosing between a SS or tube amp. And just as you said, having both would definitely solve that problem. The only problem is, that there are sooo many good amps out there to chose from and with money being an issue, i cant afford to make the wrong choice. Thanks again guys for the help. I'll let you know what happens in my selection.

jason30

[Jake Hanlon]

Gigs without drums I use Solid State

Gigs with drums I use Tubs.

Default, I use Tubes.

Reason being is that while SS amps are more then capable to cover any band there is a certain projection that they don't get over Tube amps, they lack presence in many instances, especially in larger rooms. I almost always gig on a tube amp and only rarely do I bring my SS to a gig and only will if I don't know what the situation is going to be but know the room is small... many stairs... no drummer to fight with and or just sitting in.

Full blown gigage isthe Tube amp all the way. I can't really get "my sound" on the SS amps, it's close but not really it. The Tube amp is like home.

[jason30]

Gigs without drums I use Solid State

Gigs with drums I use Tubs.

Default, I use Tubes.

Reason being is that while SS amps are more then capable to cover any band there is a certain projection that they don't get over Tube amps, they lack presence in many instances, especially in larger rooms. I almost always gig on a tube amp and only rarely do I bring my SS to a gig and only will if I don't know what the situation is going to be but know the room is small... many stairs... no drummer to fight with and or just sitting in.

Full blown gigage isthe Tube amp all the way. I can't really get "my sound" on the SS amps, it's close but not really it. The Tube amp is like home.

Hi Jake,

I agree with you when you say that there are instances when a SS will work perfectly and instances when they wont make the grade. I guess i got to the point to where i was questioning what i already new simply because im having a hard time making my Twin soind the way i like for it to sound

[HotClubBrampton]

Last weekend I traded my Fender Blues Deluxe USA for a Roland Cube 60.
I am happy about it.
- Beautiful, clean, warm Tone
- Lots of room before breaking up on the JC Channel
- Switch to Blackface'ish with a button
- No more back pain, carrying the tweed monster!

[derek]

I am like Jake in that I have both ss and tube amps. The 110 watt JazzKat certainly fits nicely under your budget, is very light and portable, and gets a good jazz sound.

I play tube amps pretty exclusively for rock/pop stuff. There I use a Dumble clone head, and a Fender Tweed (5E3) clone combo. There is head room in both to play jazz, but I like the sound I get from the JazzKat enough that I haven't gigged with either tube amp.

When my JK finally craps out, I will probably buy one of their tube hybrids next. They look pretty cool, and I have been more than satisfied with their product and customer service.

The Roland Cube 60, JazzKat and Henriksen are all well built, affordable ss amps that give you that warm, dark jazz tone in spades. More and more pros play ss, as they are more portable and reliable for travel compared to their tube brethren. Really, if you go with any of the suggestions on this thread, it will be tough to make a 'bad choice". Good luck

[mmukav]

I have a Fender Blues Junior and a Roland Cube 60. The Cube 60 gives me a really nice jazz tone, full, round, warm (using the JC Clean channel), I really like it with my Ibanez Artcore AK85. The Blues Junior is a nice amp, and does deliver that great warm tube sound, but at higher volumes breaks up easily. (good for blues, not jazz). I like my Cube 60 a lot.

I recently saw John Pizarelli in Cleveland at the Nightown, and was fortunate enough to have him sit down and talk to us after his show. We talked guitars and amps. He normally likes a Roland Jazz Chorus, (he also has a JazzKat) but at this gig was using the house amp, an Ampeg Jet. ($850). I was really impressed at the tone from that amp. John seemed to like it also. The thing I found interesting is that he mentioned that last year at the same venue they had a Fender Twin and he did not like the sound at all, for jazz at least.

I read David Lamkins' article and didn't find it too helpful. He didn't seem to like any of the amps he discussed all that much.

Tube/SS, ahh, the neverending quest for tone! It's a difficult decision. Each has it's own good/bad points, depending on what your looking for.

If I were you, I might be inclined to sell the Twin, then pick up a decent SS amp and perhaps a smaller tube amp. Best of both worlds.

Mike

[Jody Putt]

You better be a body-builder if you plan to haul that Twin around! I have a Vibrolux that I don't even like to pick up.

I've always been a pretty die-hard anti-solid state guy, but after reading so much positive hype about the Henriksen Jazz Amp, I finally tried one, and have to admit that it sounds wonderfully "warm", and is SO much lighter than a big Fender that I'm pretty sure I will give my herniated discs a break and buy one.

[jason30]

Hey guys,

thanks for all the replies to the thread that was postyed on tube versus solid state amps. I learned alot just from reading the different comments and experiences that you all have had. And basically what i gathered is that different ppl are going to prefer a different sounds from their amp.. some prefering solid state and others, tube amps.

so for now what idecided to do was to change the speakers in my Twin and replace them with the Eminence Delta Pro speakers.. which is a versatile speaker that can be used for guitar, bass or PA applications.. These speakers gave me the bottom end that i was looking for, and a big fa. warm jazz tone to go along with it. And now the only left for me to do in relation to my jazz tone, is to lear how to play jazz! LOL! Ok, im joking.. but i still have a long way to go musically, but finding a sound that you like makes practicing a bit more exciting!!

Thanks for everything guys. The information that you gave me helped me make ehat i thought was a good decision!

jason30

[RebShira]

I have 2 amps: a mesa boogie DC5 and a Roland JC-120 ... a tube amp and a ss.

I loved my mesa, up until the time when it needed repair, and I just wasn't gigging enough to justify fixing it with my other financial responsibilities.

Don't get me wrong: there's a reason some folks swear by tube amps. If I had more dough, I probably would too. There is no ss amp in the world that can ever fully duplicate tubes (I am 100% welcome to anyone on the forum proving me wrong)

But alas ... there's reality, and one thing to keep in mind is that when you go tubes, you're not just committing to the sale price. You also have to spend money every so often to maintain/repair it. Tubes need replacement on a fairly regular basis, and can break.

I would recommend the JC-120, in deference to cost and criticisms about ss on this thread. It is well under $800, and it can be as loud as you want it to be. While it may very well be that tubes have more of a presence in a live situation, I've NEVER had that come up as a problem with this amp. It also has an open back, so the sound doesn't get compressed. It has a reasonably responsive parametric eq, and can be quite warm, if you take the time to play with the settings.

Try it, and let me know what you think!

[TieDyedDevil]

I don't think there's any such think as objective *proof* that tube amps are better than SS, or vice versa. It's really a matter of taste and objectives.

SS amps tend to fill a different niche than tube amps. You'll have a difficult time getting a pristine clean sound from a tube amp.

OTOH, tube amps are revered for their distortion characteristics. It comes naturally with the design. A lot of discussion surrounds the *character* of distortion one gets from tube amps; this varies from design to design and even from instance to instance of the same design. Even tube amps have their sub-niches, as no one design serves all sonic goals equally.

Distortion has historically been an afterthought in SS amps, resulting in a lot of half-baked, awful-sounding circuits (e.g. the distortion mode on the JC-120). Recently some designers have put significant effort into emulating tube-amp distortion characteristics using SS circuitry. Consider the Peavy Transtube Series, the Tech21 amps, the ill-fated (now being closed out by the manufacturer at 20% of the original price) First-Act amps, and the boutique offerings from Pritchard (USA) and Bluetone (UK). I've played most of these (with the exception of the Pritchard and Bluetone). They're all different (as are tube amps of different origin) but all quite useable for a wide range of clean and distorted guitar tones.

I'm glad you mentioned this. Maintenance is an ongoing obligation for owners of tube amps. The tubes themselves are the most common point of failure in a tube amp. They can degrade slowly with use. They can develop various undesirable noises. They can suddenly fail (much more common for power tubes than preamp tubes). As often as not, a failure will occur at a most inconvenient time (i.e. during a gig or session).

If you're prepared (by having stocked tested spare tubes and fuses and knowing how to find and replace the bad tube) and working with an older amp (newer amps sold in the EU conform to regulations that make tube access very inconvenient), then you can be up and running again in a matter of minutes. Otherwise you'll find yourself on a first-name basis with an amp tech.

When a SS amp fails, there's no way that you'll be able to repair it on stage. That's the bad news. The good news is that failures are extremely rare, especially if you're using a SS amp designed for professional use (as opposed to a "practice" or "beginner" amp built to a low price-point).

[mr. beaumont]

In a perfect world, where people carried my equipment, I'd play through both simultaneously.

Instead, I just use a small, light, ss head/cab for jazz.

[coolvinny]

I have both a killer closed-back SS jazz amp (Mambo) and a killer open-back tube jazz amp (Sequel Ravine). I would say that the fewer the number of players, the more I prefer the tube amp. With fewer players there is more space around what I play and more attention is focused on the notes I do play, so for this I prefer the tube amp as it gives me a slightly more pleasant sound. Sometimes if I'm not careful I get a bit of a "cardboard-y" sound out of the SS amp which is not noticeable if there is a drummer but without a drummer I notice it sometimes, depending on where I have my controls and the room, etc., and of course my technique on the given day.

I know some people have the opposite preference - they prefer tubes when playing with a drummer and SS without. I don't feel that way.

If I had to just choose one, I'd definitely go SS.

[Little Jay]

A well designed solid state amp can sound and - maybe more important - react to your playing like a tube amp...... As well as a poorly designed tube amp can sound like a cheap solid state amp.... It's the way they are built and designed that matters, not if it's tube or solid state. It's just that there are a lot of cheap solid state amps around that give solid state a bad name.

One advantage that solid state amps have is that they always have a much better dampening factor than tube amps, so they will always sound a bit more direct, because they react quicker to your playing. You can definately notice that when you play fast!

[bmw2002]

One advantage that solid state amps have is that they always have a much better dampening factor than tube amps, so they will always sound a bit more direct, because they react quicker to your playing. You can definately notice that when you play fast!

Little Jay: Is that's what meant by tube amp (specifically recitifier) "sag"?

I'm facing this dilemma now as I'm trying to downsize to one amp from three. I currently have an Allen Sweet Spot, a old Fender SF Princeton, and an Evans RE200. The Evans is definitely the cleanest, most direct sounding of the three. Still warm, just less rounded than either tube amp.

[Little Jay]

Little Jay: Is that's what meant by tube amp (specifically recitifier) "sag"?

I'm not sure of 'sag' is the correct technical term for this, but it's true that tube-amps with rectifiers feel less direct than diode-rectified tube amps. I think the dampening factor has to do with the fact that tube amps need an output transformer (you can see I'm not too knowledgeable about the details...).

[jzucker]

A well designed solid state amp can sound and - maybe more important - react to your playing like a tube amp......

Disagree totally. I have a mambo and acoustic image head, both very high end, boutique SS heads. Neither comes close to the articulation of a tube amp.

The best possible combination is a BF Fender style preamp going into either of those 2 heads. Second best is something like the Ethos clean channel going into either of those 2 heads. 3rd best option is a barber barbeq.

All 3 of those options give you much better articulation, attack and response than the SS heads on their own.

[Little Jay]

Disagree totally. I have a mambo and acoustic image head, both very high end, boutique SS heads. Neither comes close to the articulation of a tube amp.

The best possible combination is a BF Fender style preamp going into either of those 2 heads. Second best is something like the Ethos clean channel going into either of those 2 heads. 3rd best option is a barber barbeq.

All 3 of those options give you much better articulation, attack and response than the SS heads on their own.

A solid state amp would need to be specifically designed and engineered for that, and not too many ss-manufacturers do so. In fact, I only know of one: Award Session (maybe Quilter and Tech 21 do too, but I have never played those, I was under the impression Mambo too, but apparently not then).

I have a Session Rockette:30 amp, made in '87 or so and that can compete with my Twin Reverb when it comes to articulation and responsiveness. The owner and founder of Session, Stewart Ward, now does a 'RetroTone-mod' to these old amps, that suposedly makes them even more 'tubey'. I have yet to find out if that's true, but I soon will, as I ordered the BluesBaby 22 that uses this technology.

Here's an example of a RetroToned solid state amp:

(unfortunately not a jazz-example)

[jzucker]

Whew, you mean it's as simple as the SS amp being designed to sound just like a tube amp. You had me worried for a second. I didn't realize it was so easy and straight forward, lol. Oops, they've been working on this for 60 years and still can't come close. I've owned the quilter, a pierce, a peavey bandit, an axefx, a pritchard and they all claim to be engineered to sound like a tube amp and not a single one realistically come close. They all get varying degrees of satisfying tone but none of them cop the basic vibe of even a $200 fender showman preamp going into a class D power amp. The clip you posted doesn't come close to a real tube amp and in fact, there are zillions of devices that can do dirty tones including tech 21 pedals, ethos, zendrive and in fact the ethos actually gets a great tube like clean tone but none of them are in the same league as a real vacuum tube pedal.

A solid state amp would need to be specifically designed and engineered for that, and not too many ss-manufacturers do so. In fact, I only know of one: Award Session (maybe Quilter and Tech 21 do too, but I have never played those, I was under the impression Mambo too, but apparently not then).

I have a Session Rockette:30 amp, made in '87 or so and that can compete with my Twin Reverb when it comes to articulation and responsiveness. The owner and founder of Session, Stewart Ward, now does a 'RetroTone-mod' to these old amps, that suposedly makes them even more 'tubey'. I have yet to find out if that's true, but I soon will, as I ordered the BluesBaby 22 that uses this technology.

Here's an example of a RetroToned solid state amp:

(unfortunately not a jazz-example)

[jorgemg1984]

A lot of the times people are comparing apples with oranges. Tube amps tend to have a fender voice (tweed or blackface), large open back cabs and guitar speakers. Solid state jazz amps tend to have a flat voice (baxandall), small closed back ported cab and bass speakers. In my experience these differences are much more relevant than technology... ampeg tube amps for example sound much closer to jazz amps because they employ a baxandall eq.

I once run my jazzmaster ultralight (soild state head with a fender eq) trough a dr z open back 2x12 cab with jensen tornados and sounded as close to a Twin Reverb as I can imagine (except for the reverb). I also find cheap modelers like a Zoom G3 or a Pod HD 500 are coming very close too these days - the axe-fx even better I suppose. One thing about modelers is that they're supposed to sound not like amps but like miced amps. Big difference.

So... to me it's more: do you want a more flat voiced amp or a more fender voiced amp?

[Little Jay]

Whew, you mean it's as simple as the SS amp being designed to sound just like a tube amp. You had me worried for a second.

Well....... I actually dare saying that, yes, but maybe I am naive or ignorant... But also the ss-amps you mentioned - although very nice boutique amps - are not designed to behave like tube amps.

Do keep in mind that 95% of all ss-amps are being produced as a cheaper alternative for tube amps and focus on delivering as much volume as possible and aim for the biggest public and that happens to be the rock and heavier styles orientated crowd. A niche for jazz-amps is not interesting for them because they wouldn't sell much. (You experienced that yourself with the Quilter Aviator with the frequency-range of the tone stack not being suited for jazz guitar.)

And of course we all have different expectations from an amp (solid state or tube), and that makes this discussion even more difficult.

Well, in a way I'm proving myself wrong, because I bring out my Twin Reverb whenever I can ...... :-D

[blkjazz]

The old SS Gibson LAB Series amps came closest to a tube amp feel and sound than anything else I have played. Closer than any modeler for sure.

[Little Jay]

Oops, they've been working on this for 60 years and still can't come close.

Not true, actually early solid state amps were very good in the tube thing. Can you hear the difference between Wes playing his all solid state Standell or a Twin or Super Reverb? I can't.