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I was pleasently suprise how great a 5E3 clone amp would be for Jazz. I am a fan of Lil Dawg amps and they make a D-Lux (you can get it in 12 watt or 25 watt). Same Price. I have the 25 Watt that I found this for a smokin used deal a few months ago.
New you can get it for 649 as a lunchbox head or 950 as a combo (1 12"" speaker). Very high quality, made in USA
I thought I would miss reverb but this amp sounds great straight thru, no effects with an archtop. What is really cool is how the second volume control (when you are not using it) interacts with the amp. Lots of interesting way to jump channels
Great reviews on the web
5E3 Tweed Deluxe - The D-Lux
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12-01-2018 08:53 AM
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For 30 years, I was a devoted blackface Fender amp player. (Vibro-Champ for practice, Deluxe Reverb, Pro Reverb, Vibrolux Reverb, Showman, and Twin Reverb amps for gigs).
About 25 years ago, I switched to tweed amps. I have played most of them, built many, and still own, hmm, 6-8.
I love the Deluxe and Pro for gigs. Great 50s bop sounds and you can nail the "Blue Note" Record sound.
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I play a Fender 5E3 Deluxe, awesome Jazz tones. There are four different Input jacks (2 for each channel) useful for tweaking tone depending on pickups, venue and output. And there is channel interaction (blending the two channels) for more tone options.
Or, just plug and play, there's a tone knob on the amp and tone knobs on the guitar, hard to go wrong. Best amp I ever played.
I plug a small pedalboard in front, Volume pedal, Delay and Reverb. Good Luck.
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I love my Marsh 5e3. If I had to have one amp that would be it, it’s super flexible from blue note to classic rock (I also use it for P&W).
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I have played through quite a few of the tweed circuits extensively. I find the Deluxe circuits I have experience with (5c3, 5d3, and 5e3) very workable for jazz, but also find that they require a lot more fiddling to find the sweet spot. It’s there, but the interactivity of the channels means there is a lot of playing around with the volume knobs and the tone knob to get there.
I much prefer the others I’ve settled on which are the ones that I use all of the time. I have a 5F8-a set up as a head with a 2x12 cab and a 5f6-a set up as a 2x12 combo. Both of these sound glorious and since the chassis are the same size they can be cabinet swapped with each other.
Those two are probably my favorites for jazz, but I also love my 5f11. This Vibrolux is essentially a 5f10 Harvard with the vibro added. I find it much easier to dial in than a Deluxe since it’s one channel. It’s a little lower powered than a Deluxe, but has a little more headroom thanks to it’s fixed bias. This is the one I would recommend if you’re looking to build in the 10-15 watt range. Vibrolux kits aren’t hard to find and shouldn’t be a very difficult build for someone that has successfully wired an amp before.
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I use my 5e3 clone for jazz all the time.
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Like Greentone, I was a blackface Fender guy for ages. Then a few years ago a friend insisted I buy a narrow panel tweed Super. That opened the floodgates and I have been transitioning from blackface to tweed. I still have a couple blackface amps, but I now generally prefer the tweed tones for more mids and a more complex clean tone. As others have stated, part of the key is not only dialing in your desired tone, but selecting specific inputs depending on the guitar, pickups and environment. They don't call it the "need for tweed" for nothing!
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Oddly, I don't have a ton of experience playing with proper tweed amps. I'd thought about getting a Champ or Deluxe copy at some point, and then there was a while where I thought about getting an Octal Pro copy for high volume gigs.
If you're specifically after a Charlie Christian tone, then Vintage '47 makes amps that nail that octal tone for non-boutique prices (under $1000). I might not have a real EH-185 if they'd existed back when I started. That said, I swapped the speaking in my V'47 VA-185G with a Lil' Texas and it increased the volume and clean headroom substantially, which I think is crucial.
But yeah, a tweed deluxe is probably a pretty good sound.
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Like ThatRhythmMan says, the 5f11 is a very special amp. I have pretty considerable experience playing both the Fender Harvard (5f10) and the Fender Vibrolux (5f11) amps. My good friend and partner in a blues duo for 25 years owned them both. He'd bring both to the gig, and he'd play one, I the other. Both the Harvard and the Vibrolux are unbelievably great amps.
This led me to build my own 5f10, which I love. I am going to build a 5f11 soon. I like the 10" speaker in the Vibrolux cabinet better than I like the 12" speaker in the Deluxe cabinet. I think it sounds just tremendous with an archtop guitar. (Note: Bucky Pizzarelli played his 6 and 7 string archtops through a 5f11 amp for about 60 years on gigs and recordings. I think he always sounded excellent.)
We'll see, but I suspect that when I get done with building the 5f11 I will give away my 5e3 amps to my kids. More to come in the coming months.
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Julian Lage uses tweed champ with his tele. He sounds so good.
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Just in case anyone is interested in a 5E3 circuit on the cheap, it's a head not a combo, and most think it's fugly, but the Joyo Beale Street is a 5E3:
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That's hideous.
Cool!
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Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
LOL! Sometimes the 2 go together lol. I was actually considering buying one, strictly based on price, but decided no- if I'm going to do a 5E3, it's going to be the full shebang: a combo, tweed, handwired. Likely a Lil' Dawg, he's got very good prices, pick my own speaker.
There is a cheap 5E3, no doubt made in china, Chickenhead Amps... I've actually read rave reviews, but it's not much cheaper than a Lil' Dawg... tho it does come with a P12Q....
https://www.walmart.com/ip/Chickenhe...-Amp/890030534
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I have a Mission Amps clone that I built a few years back and it has been my primary amp. It was initially in a head cab used with my RE 12" cab but that was a nuisance to tote around, so I got a combo cab with a Cannabis Rex speaker.
Be aware that the 5E3 is very bass-heavy which can be problematic with archtops and feedback. Mine has the Mission Amps humbucker I & II mods which lets me plus into the bright channel and use the normal channel to roll off the bass response. It is also less bassy with the combo cab versus the RE 12". Loud enough to play with a drummer, trumpet/sax, drums and electric bass in a band full of people who (usually) listened.
My guitar is a carvetop 17" by Matt Cushman with a neck-mounted CC floating pickup by Pete Biltoft, I think it is a great match with the 5E3. My reference sound is Jim Hall on the "Interaction" album with Art Farmer and also "The Bridge" with Sonny Rollins: warm, round, not particularly thunky but with some acoustic vibe. He was using his ES-175 with P90 and Gibson GA-50 on those recordings. I can't match his tone, of course, but it gets me to where I like to be tone-wise.
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Cunamara is accurate. The coupling caps between the preamp and power amp, and between the phase inverter and power tubes are all 0.1 mfd. These are flat to 10 hz.
The 5e3 sends gobs of bass to the output transformer.
Moreover, there is no bass cut knob.
I like this circuit with a 10" speaker.
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I’m with Greentone. My Deluxe amp is in a 2x10 Tweed Tremolux cabinet. The two tens and the big cabinet is a great match.
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I love to play this combo
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I play humbucker guitars for most part. Amp is stock, no mods. Originally Posted by Cunamara
The 5E3 volume knob is hard to control in the low vol range, due to the fast on-set (It goes from silent to loud somewhere between 2 and 3 on the dial). So standard procedure is to roll back guitar volume; Here's where some players run into trouble, if the guitar is wired in such a way it rolls off too much treble, things will get muddy at low volume settings.
The 5E3 volume knobs work like a guitar volume pot, i.e. it rolls off treble when amp volume is turned down, some of which is restored by a treble bleed cap. The louder the amp volume, the more treble gets through, and the less it would be affected by the amp tone knob.
The 5E3 tone knob cuts treble (and hiss). It doesn't add anything that wasn't there to begin with.
Also, the 5E3 will immediately disclose if a pickup is set too high on the bass side. I control boominess by lowering the pickup (or pole piece) on the bass side. (so far I've never had to re-adjust a pickup to sound good in any of my other amps). At high amp volume settings I like to dial in some more bass by blending in the unused channel.
I also play a hollow body Century with a P-90. Amp tone as low as 2-4. I even plug into the Mic channel sometimes and get a tone in line with "the incredible Jazz Guitar of WesMo". I use a Jensen P12R.
Mechanic coupling (like having the cab standing on the stage floor) adds bass. Put the cab on a stand and bass is reduced.
In summary: Pickup, electronics, venue and output determine amp settings and input jack. I would recommend guys new to the circuit to try these things first, before making mods.
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Everytime someone posts a video of Lage, I love it. Originally Posted by cosmic gumbo
Then everytime I go to download one of his albums, I preview the whole thing, and end up NOT downloading it.
What am I missing? Somebody help me out here (being serious). And this is coming from a huge fan of Jim Campilongo, Duke Levine, Jimmy Bryant, also dig Ed Bickert...
Now, in keeping with the thread (tweed tone)... Lage's tone in that video is nice, but a little dark for my personal taste... another example of great tweed tone (altho not strictly jazz) is Duke Levine... he's played many amps over the years, but the tweed Twin seems to be a go-to for him...
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Same here. I like his playing a lot but not what he composes or even his current tone (tele + champ). He sounded way better before imho. I would like to have a record of Julian playing standards with a jazz box. Originally Posted by ruger9
it is difficult to be stellar as a player and as a composer. He’s way better as a player to me
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Here's some of the tweeds I have these days from the ones I kept (didn't sell).
5C5 Pro, 5f6a Bassman, 5e3 Deluxe, 5e3 Deluxe, 5f1 Champ, 5f1 Champ, 6G15 Reverb Unit
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The 5C5 is a very, very nice all around amplifier. I love it for jazz, blues, you name it. Plus, it might be my favorite guitar for Strats and Teles, ever. They love that 15" speaker. Then, again, they love a couple of tens--like you find in a Super Amp.
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Great amps, congrats. Soundwise probably the tweed twin I had was my fave but is was too heavy and far too loud. If I had to choose one, it would be the 5E3 (the one I still have).
i don’t like the champs at all. They look very cool but sound terrible to me
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Thanks. Yep, the tweed Twin Amp is (in both low and high wattage incarnations) a GREAT amp.
If you listen to the Julian Lage video above, you will hear why I like the Champ. From that bit of hair upward, I think the Champ is the "champion" of let 'er rip amplifiers. It has the most terrific distortion signatures of any amp I have worked with. My Champ head into a 4x10" (each speaker is 16-ohms, resulting in a 4-ohm load) cabinet is a killer for fusion/rock. [That rig not shown.]
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Speaking of the tweed Pro, the first time I head this demo, I nearly soiled myself (I'm a tele player)
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