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Ok, solo or trio without drums then 15-30 watt tube amp, trio with drums and upwards then S/S.
Basically the louder I go the lighter the amp, 30 watts + then S/S is lighter and more convenient.
I've been using a 15 watt tube amp for practice and for solo and duo stuff for the last 6 months and everyone loves the warmth of tone, but blow me down, I went back to me old Cube 60 and was immediately struck by how good it does clean, punchy and twangy.
If I had a permanent gig I would go hybrid, slap bang in the middle! Tube pre-amp and S/S power amp.
Koch Jupiter! But I cannot justify £480 for an amp for my usage.
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05-01-2014 05:12 PM
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Getting back to the OP....
Originally Posted by wesmont17
For a good clean sound in a trio/quartet format, you can get a nice tone from either a SS or tube amp. The important thing is to actually try out some amps in person and find the sound that works for you. No amount of well intentioned advice on a forum can substitute for that.
SS and tube amps aren't going to sound exactly alike, but they can both sound good and get the job done. If you can be happy with a SS amp, it'll cost less and weigh less and probably need less maintenance.
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Excellent point Little Jay! In an acoustic jazz setting, recorded or live, it's near impossible to tell the difference....what does everyone think?
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That difference is more obvious in Benson because a Polytone is voiced different from a Fender. The Standel is Fender voiced I believe... making the difference harder to hear. And maybe the biggest difference is the 1x15 on the Standel vs the 4x10 on the Super Reverb? I myself don't hear a radical difference in Wes case.
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I think amp modelers or modeling amps are getting closer to tube sounds than most other SS amps.
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I guess that I am far less particular than some players.
I really like the way my archtop sounds with my 1x10 solid state amp (Evans RE200). I get a warm, balanced musical tone with immediacy and a touch of sheen. My 1x12 tube amp (Redplate) is warmer, rounder and a bit squishier than my SS amp. It really excels at clean on the edge of overdriven and overdriven tones and responds beautifully to touch and attack. So for playing solo stuff, I actually prefer the SS but within the context of a band, I prefer a tube amp.
Forgetting tone, the lighter weight (cartage) and lower maintenance (tubes) is a compelling attribute for a traveling musician.
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long story short:
for anything- tube amp
for floaters, acoustic guitars, really low tuned guitars: ss can work ok. in fact, i think i sort of prefer ss for acoustic guitars and "acoustic" sounds, not that i've done a whole lot of research on the matter.
though i've gotten great tones with a solid state, they always feel kinda... there. even with reverb or delay and what not. they're just... there. and don't even try to run a boost or overdrive into one. a tube pedal in front as a sort of preamp helps, but still. tubes just work better for most everything i do.
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I think there are a lot of jazz guitarists who prefer/preferred SS amps... like Pat Metheny, Mike Stern, Joe Pass, Pat Martino, Jack Wilkins, Bucky and John Pizzarelli, Jimmy Bruno, Jim Hall for a clean sound.
Last edited by wesmont17; 05-01-2014 at 10:05 PM.
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I think you're being a bit hyperbolic. I've found it to be possible to get some SS amps to sound like some tube amps at some settings. The Venn diagram may have a small intersection, but it's not null. If you take a very high powered and clean tube amp (say, a late silverface 100 watt Twin Reverb) at 2 on the volume and most of the highs rolled off, there are a fair number of SS amps that can sound like that. On the distorted end of the spectrum, there's more intersection. On a recording that has a colored signal chain and compression and other effects and artifacts, it gets even harder to distinguish. I'm pretty sure I could play you recordings that you couldn't identify as tube or ss (for sure I have recordings I can't identify, and I'm very attuned to the sound of Fenders). Originally Posted by jzucker
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My main amps (when the venue or jobber doesn't provide one) are Silverface Twin Reverb, MusicMan 1X12, and Polytone Brute. As clean as the Twin sounds, and similarly the MusicMan, the polytone is noticeably cleaner. I showed up to a duo gig once with a pianist, who didn't see me set up and couldn't see my amp. After one song, he said,"New amp? I like the other one more, it's clearer." I agree with Zucker that nothing sounds like tubes. I have a dozen Solid State amps I love, they sound great, but they don't sound like tube amps, period.
I saw Joe Pass at the Lighthouse in the 70s, he was using a Polytone, Baby Brute. Sounded so good, I went out and got one. Still, my Princeton is sweeter. It's the tubes.
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Here's some interesting reading in the everlasting neverending debat of tubes vs solid state:
http://www.award-session.com/pdfs/GEAR_TALK_1.pdf
I have both tube amps and solid state amps, but I have to admit I'm always looking for the most tube-like solid state amp...
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I like both, but older valve (Tube) amps need to have good valves and be well maintained, valve amps have a very distinctive sound, which seems to have more dimensions than the one dimensional sounding SS amps. Also, valve amps are much more touch sensitivity.
I think SS has created it's own overloaded sound, by using transistors, opamps, diodes, fets and mosfets. It's just a different sound than Valve amps. The vast majority of guitar pedals are SS, which can give a nice overdriven sound.
If you're playing Jazz and you're not going to overdrive the amp, I think you'll be happy with a new, good quality, clean sounding, Class D, SS amp.Last edited by GuyBoden; 05-02-2014 at 06:43 AM. Reason: An SS for Jazz.
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It really is personal preference and the goal is to find a tone that makes you happy when you plug into it.
I had always been a tube amp person before I got into jazz because tube amps are very common in rock and whatnot. Then I attempted the solid state jazz amp route from Roland Cubes, to a Henriksen Jazzamp, and then an AI Clarus with Raezers Edge cab. When I used a Cube I always gravitated towards the Blackpanel/Blackface model. Modeling has gotten good and will likely get better, but there's nothing like the real thing.
Ultimately, I decided I like the feel and response of tube amps and primarily use Fender styled tube amps. When I plug into my PRRI or silverface Bandmaster, they make me want to keep playing. While I would someday like a handwired boutique (like an Allen for example), these two cover all my needs and tonally make me smile.
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It's not really that tubes themselves are "magic", it's the entire complex design that is needed with tubes that makes the magic. Put a tube in a bad design and you come out with a bad result.
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I don't know about the preferences of most of those, but Jim Hall is on record as stating he preferred tube amps for sound. He said that SS amps give you information whereas tube amps are musical. Originally Posted by wesmont17
I have a Fender tweed Deluxe head that I use with my Raezer's edge cab and I have a Clarus I use with the same cab. The differences are night and day, partly because the Deluxe is voiced very bassy. I use an ART TubeMP in the effects loop of the Clarus with very good results in "tubing up" the tone and making the amp feel more like a tube head.
The Clarus is the more flexible and adaptable setup for different situations and different instruments. The Deluxe has that nice old 50s Blue Note sound.
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Famous Jazz Guitarists and Their Guitar Gear
Jim Hall used a Polytone as well as a Walter Woods (which I am not really familiar with) which I think might be SS, as well as the GA50 which is a tube amp.Last edited by wesmont17; 05-02-2014 at 10:37 PM.
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Jim Hall did use Polytones after he retired the famous Gibson GA-50, you can spot one in a number of videos with him. He might have used other amps but he did not tend to talk about equipment in interviews. As he got older Hall used amps provided by the venue instead of bringing his own. Traveling with SS amps is easier, both locally and otherwise, and the GA-50 got too fragile in his opinion (he used to take out the tubes, wrap them up in his socks and put them in his suitcase). In his last years he apparently used the Walter Woods and had a tube preamp in front of it; it was in reference to that setup that he made his statement about SS versus tube amps- IIRC this was in his interview in Fretboard journal with Bill Frisell. I did not really like the sound he got with the Sadowsky and whatever the rest of his signal chain was; there was an odd high end ping instead of the round warmth he had with the ES-175. I think his best tone ever was on the Live! recordings with Don Thompson and Terry Clarke (the newly released tunes from those gigs are outstanding- masters at the height of their abilities); while the cover photo shows his D'Aquisto, the only photo from the gigs themselves that I have seen showed him playing the ES-175.
Walter Woods amps are famed and seem to be prized by those who own them. They are physically tiny with big power outputs. I think he stopped building amps in the late 90s, from what I can find on the interwebs (and that's never wrong, yes?). I've never seen or heard one in person. Lotsa knobs in the photos. The list of jazzers who used them is pretty impressive (Tal Farlow, Barney Kessel, Jim Hall, Nate Najar, Charlie Byrd, Herb Ellis... hey, wait! Except for Nate Najar, all those guys are deceased. Playing Walter Woods amps can be fatal! Hey Nate, stop playing that thing and send it to me for proper disposal before it's too late!!!)
Someone else mentioned something I also think, which is that a lot of the nuance we labor over in our living rooms tweaking our tone is largely lost on stage once the drums, bass, horns, etc., start playing. Even I can't hear a lot of that and I'm right there and probably paying more attention than anyone else in the room. With solo, duo and trio settings OTOH I think more of the nuances can be heard, as well as when recording and the instruments get good separation.Last edited by Cunamara; 05-02-2014 at 11:26 PM.
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A little bump of this topic, but I just wanted to add the following:
After my contribution to the topic I recieved my Award Session Bluesbaby 22, a 22 watts solid state amp designed to compete with tube amps. It uses a specially designed negative feedback circuitry that emulates the way an output tranformer of a tube amp interacts with the speaker (since ss-amps don't have OTs, this -amongst other things - causes them to react differently than tube amps.)
Well, to hit it off: I guess Jack was right, it's not as simple as to design a ss amp to behave and sound like a tube amp.... BUT: this Bluesbaby comes close, very close! It sounds (a lot!) better than a lot of lower buget tube amps I have played (I mention an Epiphone BC-30, Fender Blues Jr). But that goes specifically for overdriven tones (it performs way better on that than my Blues Deluxe too...). But it's struggling a bit when it comes to clean tones, although it's the best sounding solid state amp I own or have owned, but my Twin Reverb still gives that little extra magic that's hard to describe - an organic rounded off smoothness: bright but not sharp, with a kind of fullness of the tone.... So I guess it's just this little extra 'je ne sais quoi' that gives tubes their magic.
But I am very happy with the Bluesbaby! It will get a lot work for sure, best amp under 10kgs (20 lbs) that I own mow for small gigs! I will keep on advertising that I prefer a well designed ss amp over a poorly executed tube amp anytime! (But nothing beats the magic of a good Twin Reverb...).Last edited by Little Jay; 05-15-2014 at 05:05 PM.
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Forgive my ignorance, but I'm not sure that for a traditional jazz sound it makes much difference. Why would you need a tube amp if you want to play music without sustain, brightness, or distortion?
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Tubes are not just for overdrive. this has been explained about 100x on this forum already. Do a search. Originally Posted by zigzag
To jazz_175, check out the demeter pedalboard amp.
Demeter creates the Mighty Minnie pedal board amp
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My point is that it seems that traditional jazz guitarists seem to spend so much effort trying to maintain the fidelity of an acoustic, I'm not sure that it makes that much of a difference what kind of amp is used.
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and my point is this has been explained at least a 100x on this forum. Who says everyone here is a "traditional" jazz guitarist? Whatever that means. Benson, metheny, kreisberg, wes, farlow, hall, all cut their teeth on tube amps. Originally Posted by zigzag
Do some research before making the claim that tube amps have no fidelity and are only good for distortion or that what amp you use doesn't matter.
Don't mean to bust your !@#$ but this has been beaten to death...
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Seems an odd assessment of a "traditional jazz tone." Originally Posted by zigzag
After all, all those old records, the traditional jazz players...tube amps.
I'm ready to look into one of these preamps, I think. I love my henriksen, but one of these in front of it could mean I never have to take a tube amp out of the house anymore...or buy a bigger tube amp this summer for some gigs I have lined up where I'll need to be loud and probably un-mic'd...princeton ain't gonna cut it for that.
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Well, I am curious to try it with my Henriksen amp. Never tried a tube preamp in front of it.
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I have not followed the amp designs for the last couple of decades. I don't know what the designs are today. However, I have always thought that the rock and roll guys liked the softer limiting of tube amps when driven at high signal levels. The tube amps operated class A. I have seen tube amps that did not use a transformer when used in a four tube bridge circuit.
The semiconductor amps can be small at high power levels by using one transistor to drive one direction and another transistor to drive the other way. There is always crossover distortion which is a greater percentage at low levels. However, the distortion specifications are stated at high levels.
The soft limiting of tube amps can be duplicated with solid state but it would cost a little more.
I played bass through a Polytone. The guitarist I worked with used a Fender twin speaker with a little reverb. Loved his sound. He had a Gibson L-5 from about 1933, heavy strings set high, and played off the side of a heavy pick.
oldplayer2
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