How much does your guitar amp contribute to your sound?

[West LA Jazz]

Excluding your hands and technique, some say that the amp is at least 51% of a guitarists sound.
I took my guitar to a store that carries the reissued Magnatone brand and played it though a Twilighter. The Vibrato is out of this world. I thought I had the wrong guitar in my hands. It's also a heavy amp. I would probably choose the Panoramic Stereo.

How much does your amp contribute to your sound. Less than 50% or more?

Magnatone | Official | Boutique Guitar Amps, Vintage Amps, Varistor Vibrato

[GNAPPI]

IMO, a great git can make a mediocre amp sound way better. That said I never met a great amp make a crap git sound better.

So, gimme a Tal Farlow plugged into a super reverb and I'm in heaven.

[lawson-stone]

I am more and more convinced that the Amp really vital to the sound. I have 3 polytopes: a 12" MiniBrute, an 8" closed-back Teeny Brute, and an 8" Open back teeny brute.

Without a doubt, the 8" open-back renders the distinctions among my several archtops most noticeably. Seriously, the difference between my ES175 and 165, between my Aria PE180 and Epiphone Elitist Broadway (2 upscale L5ces copies), are very distinct. But as I move to the 8" closed back, they sound more alike, and then with the 12" they almost sound indistinguishable. You can hear the difference between the 16" and 17" guitars, but the distinction within those sizes is lost.

I don't know why, but that 8" speaker and the open back seems to bring out the unique tone of each guitar much better.

[2bornot2bop]

Play that '180 through a Twin if you really want to hear what it can do, imho. It will sound like a different guitar. There's no replacement for the liquidity of a good tube amp.

[West LA Jazz]

IMO, a great git can make a mediocre amp sound way better.
So, gimme a Tal Farlow plugged into a super reverb and I'm in heaven.

I have to think about this. Since we tend to roll off our tone to suit individual taste, I'm thinking a fantastic amp can step up a so so guitar some. TBD. ;-)

[999369]

Sound ? All : Guitar + pick (or no pick ) + Cable + Amp

[mad dog]

The right amp (and that's a moving target) helps bring out the best in any of my guitars. It's not like there's one best amp, anymore than there is one best guitar. When you get the right match, it opens musical doors.

No way to assign percentages ... for me, amps are more critical in good sound than guitars.
MD

[999369]

One time I show a young man my Fender American Standard Stratocaster With fender Fender Hot Rod Deluxe 40W 1x12 Amp , sound nice ( ok ) same amp but when I play with PRS HB I 10 top ( $3.8K ) guitar sound terrible , then I change to Dr.Z amp then sound is much much batter, much batter then Stratocaster



Some people say the amps sound muddy or fat ~~~ May be is " his guitar ( low-end ) or hearing( setup ) " " not the amp "

[marcwhy]

Although amps may or may not "sound" different to an audience, they "feel" and sound different to me, and can make an incredible difference in how I respond to the music, so, yeah, I think they're important.

That being said (and I've written this account before): I was selling a cab several years ago, and I told the guy, "You may want to bring your amp and guitar to demo it so you know how your gear will sound through the cab." He didn't. So, I grabbed my (tube) amp and jazz guitar, and let him go at it. He was a blues-y sort of player, and was not a hollow-body sort of guy. Well, the sounds he was getting out of my gear were incredible! I kept checking -- "Is he playing my amp? Is that my guitar?!" He was not technically gifted or anything, and he was playing with his fingers, not a pick (a-ha!), and he simply had a great sound.

So, do the math: Gear + Player = Sound.

[999369]

Gear + player = music

gear + gear + gear + Match setup + hearing = sound

[vinlander]

I love the fact my Tal sounds great no matter in what I plug it: PRRI (the best), Cube 80Xl even my cheap Behringer mixer straight into my early '90s living room Technics amp...
I don't think a guitar should depend on an amp or effect to give you the tone you are after...imho of course

[oldane]

Me or the amp? Hard to say. The amp does have a certain inborn sound - but then it's me who turns the knobs on the amp. So.....?

[vernon]

At least 51%. The best amp + speaker cab brings out the most tone from each guitar. Ironically, I knew I had found the amp I wanted (Milkman) when the amp factor became invisible. That is, I didn't think about the amp at all when playing. It gave me all I needed to make music and no longer became a separate element of the sound chain that I was consciously aware of.

[christianm77]

I'm not sure how much it contributes. I thought my fender prri was colouring the sound of my archtop, and then I listened back to recordings and realise how closely the amplified sound represented my acoustic tone. So I think many jazzers are looking for something quite transparent rather than a colouration of the sound like a blues player would.

[Boston Joe]

One time I show a young man my Fender American Standard Stratocaster With fender Fender Hot Rod Deluxe 40W 1x12 Amp , sound nice ( ok ) same amp but when I play with PRS HB I 10 top ( $3.8K ) guitar sound terrible , then I change to Dr.Z amp then sound is much much batter, much batter then Stratocaster



Some people say the amps sound muddy or fat ~~~ May be is " his guitar ( low-end ) or hearing( setup ) " " not the amp "

Dr. Z amps are in no way muddy or flat. They're beautiful sounding.

[Boston Joe]

I've always considered the amp to be part of the instrument. I know that a lot of more traditional jazz guitarists tend to think of their amps solely as "enloudening" devices, but coming up as a rock and blues guy, I've always been pretty attuned to how a good amp can really push your tone to another level.

[BigDaddyLoveHandles]

It depends. With an archtop (I have an L5) I want the amp to sound like the guitar only louder. With a Tele I want some interesting colouring, some added warmth and sometimes a little hair on the sound.

[Boston Joe]

It depends. With an archtop (I have an L5) I want the amp to sound like the guitar only louder.

Does it really, though? Or does it sound like you *think* your guitar sounds? Your perception of different frequency ranges changes with the volume. In any case, that's a tonal choice you've made, and presumably you set your amp up accordingly. It's still part of the instrument, you've just chosen the particular way you want to deploy it.

(I realize this is kind of hair-splitting, but I've had so many discussions about tone with people to know that different people have wildly different perceptions of it.)

[BigDaddyLoveHandles]

Does it really, though? Or does it sound like you *think* your guitar sounds? Your perception of different frequency ranges changes with the volume. In any case, that's a tonal choice you've made, and presumably you set your amp up accordingly. It's still part of the instrument, you've just chosen the particular way you want to deploy it.

(I realize this is kind of hair-splitting, but I've had so many discussions about tone with people to know that different people have wildly different perceptions of it.)

You're right, but i guess everything could be prefaced by "according to my perceptions".

[lawson-stone]

Play that '180 through a Twin if you really want to hear what it can do, imho. It will sound like a different guitar. There's no replacement for the liquidity of a good tube amp.

Unfortunately, no Twin is in my future. I can't spend $1000 on an amp, and it's so heavy no way I could every carry it! I wouldn't mind finding a small tube amp, but don't know what would be the closest approach to the twin.

[BigDaddyLoveHandles]

SoOOoo I'm getting close to buying a Twin, I'm checking one out on Monday and hopefully I won't be out more than $CAN 600. I think I should buy the hand truck first!

[christianm77]

Yeah when I play Tele it's nice to have a bit of tube screamer in the mix. Actually, I'm wondering if I shouldn't also get some sort of preamp like the Echoplex. My amp is set up to have more headroom but for lead lines on the Tele it can sound a bit non descript - but I don't always want a driven sound. Any ideas?

[BigDaddyLoveHandles]

Yeah when I play Tele it's nice to have a bit of tube screamer in the mix. Actually, I'm wondering if I shouldn't also get some sort of preamp like the Echoplex. My amp is set up to have more headroom but for lead lines on the Tele it can sound a bit non descript - but I don't always want a driven sound. Any ideas?

I use a number of pedals, mostly dialled to subtle (you notice when you turn them off):

chorus -- I know there are haters out there, but my TC Corona has a tone knob that lets me roll off the highs on the wet sound and avoid shimmer.

tremolo -- nice and slow

booster -- I use the TC Spark set on "fat" to warm the tone a little.

delay -- again, if the wet signal is dialed down it just adds some air

reverb -- only if the room is dead, like my shaggorific basement

I know there are some "preamp" or character pedals that are supposed to make clean amps sound like tube amps, for example the Tech21 Blonde, but I haven't tried any yet.

[Bluedawg]

I think I read that Keith Richards believed it was all about matching the right guitar to the right amp ....

I think he's right .....

I suspect which one contributes more to the sound depends on the amp ....

My Roland Cube 60 heavily colors the sound ... swapping out guitars changes the sound but not as much as changing guitars on my other amps ... the Roland may be contributing 75% or more ... fortunately I like that sound, but some don't

For most other amps changing out the guitar makes a bigger difference IMHO .... so some amps are probably more transparent than others

Some combos that work in my collection:

My late 80s Fender Strat Pro sounds fantastic in my Peavey Classic 50 4X10 ... but that strat sounds like poop in my expensive boutique Carr Rambler .... my vintage reissue strat sounds best in the Carr

My Le Grand sounds thin and bright in my Carr Rambler, but seems to have a beautiful friendship with my Deluxe Reverb reissue

[mr. beaumont]

I think it's kind of all over the map. Some guitars sound good plugged into anything, others are fickle. Some amps make anything sound good. Some require lots of tweaks, some it's plug and play. Some amps really color the sound, others sound completely different with every guitar.