View Poll Results: Is your main jazz guitar amp a solid state or a tube amp?
- Voters
- 386. You may not vote on this poll
-
Tube
169 43.78% -
Solid State
217 56.22%
-
Is your main jazz guitar amp a solid state or a tube amp?
-
02-19-2020 02:41 PM
-
Solid state for me. Don't even really own a tube amp anymore...even my princeton is living with a friend who will eventually buy it.
My "nice" amp is a Henriksen head with a redstone speaker cab.
I might ditch a bunch of stuff in the next year though and nab one of those Fender tonemasters...
-
tubes for the win
used many a ge el84!! haha
cheers
-
I’ll go with these...
1943 RCA Black plates 6V6GT
-
Somewhat old Henriksen/Sound Island original prototype 12" open back Alfresco with the heavier Weber Black Shuck speaker.
-
c'mon....you know which one is better....
haha
cheers
-
Beware of gaseous state amps.
-
It uses a nutube in the preamp and has a 12 inch Celestion speaker, open back. A reverb, tone control and reasonable weight make sense. Can't find one. They ae out of stock. Just sold my beautiful, mint, heavy Fender Deluxe Reverb with new tubes, amp cover and amp stand. And my 2010 Mustang GT and miss them both, terribly. But I now need lighter toys and need an amp with less weight. The Vox Cambridge 50 looks good. Help respectfully most welcome. Alan
-
What about trying a Fender Tone Master Deluxe Reverb (23 pounds!!) and ~$1039.00 CDN + Tax?
Originally Posted by RationalAlan
Just a thought.
-
Now that is interesting. I found some comparison videos and I was able to quickly and consistently pick out the SS from the tube version in the blind tests, but I still thought the SS sounds really good and I highly doubt I could pick it out in a band situation. I love everything about my Alfresco except that it's a bit heavy with the heavier Weber speaker. Originally Posted by Greco
-
NO solid state amp that I am aware of has the equivalent of tube amp sag. If there is one out there that can replicate the effect of a rectifier tube, please tell me about it. That might not be the first quality sought after in a jazz amp, but it is definitely something I want, since I don't always play jazz. That tiny bit of amp squishy-ness or on the edge of distortion tone has existed since tube amps were created, and some of our favorite jazz guitar recordings have it.
Solid state amps have many benefits over tube amps, such as reliability, lighter weight, and smaller size. But sag? I say, bring it!
-
Neither. Todays solid state / digital have very few, if any, transistors of that style. Originally Posted by neatomic
c'mon....you know which one is better....
haha
cheers
-
One thing to consider is using a booster or low gain pedal in front of a solid state amp. I use either a T.C.Jauernig Luxury Drive pedal or more recently an Xotic Sweet Boost pedal.
These tend to warm up the tone in a Tube like way. I believe the Xotic has some chip that is similar to a Tube Screamer? Any way it's been working for me on All of various guitars and gigs!
-
-
Agreed, and if your need for sag is so strong, then by all means go the tube route. However, judicious use of compression, eq and very mild distortion (Hermida Lovepedal Zendrive, or the more reasonably priced Wampler Tumnus) will pretty well take you there - or at least to my ageing ears! On the other hand, say goodbye to that same tone at home levels..... Originally Posted by Gitfiddler
NO solid state amp that I am aware of has the equivalent of tube amp sag. If there is one out there that can replicate the effect of a rectifier tube, please tell me about it. That might not be the first quality sought after in a jazz amp, but it is definitely something I want, since I don't always play jazz. That tiny bit of amp squishy-ness or on the edge of distortion tone has existed since tube amps were created, and some of our favorite jazz guitar recordings have it.
Solid state amps have many benefits over tube amps, such as reliability, lighter weight, and smaller size. But sag? I say, bring it!
Life is full of choices!
-
Wintermoon,
Those 7581a tubes can be run to dissipate more than a pair of 6L6GC tubes. BAM!
-
I've been doing almost everything with the DV Mark Little Jazz.
That's octet, 19 piece big band, trio without drums and quartet/quintet with drums.
I've heard better sounds from tube amps, but not by a wide enough margin to lug the extra weight.
-
I asked Herb Ellis about amps once. He said that nothing sounded better to him than a Fender Twin Reverb. However, he didn't want to lug one around. In fact, when I asked, he wasn't lugging any amp around--just a custom-made preamplifier that he plugged into whatever amp was provided at the gig. I think his rider specified a Polytone or a Fender, at that point...but it might be Roland Jazz Chorus, in which case he'd sweeten it up with his preamp.
-
yeah GT, I used to use black plate RCA 6L6GC's but they break up a little early for my taste. Originally Posted by Greentone
but for the last 10 yrs or so I'm using 7581A's in blackface Twins, also like the STR387 and 415's double halo getter military spec
love 'em!
-
Durn, neither... My main amp is a MusicMan 112 RD Fifty, which is a hybrid amp (SS pre-amp and and a pair of 6L6 power tubes). It has an EVM-12L speaker and I like to pair it with an extension cab with another EVM-12L.
Last edited by BigDaddyLoveHandles; 02-20-2020 at 08:15 PM.
-
I voted "SS" as that's what I actually gig with... in a perfect world I'd be using a nice Fender Twin, but something as large as a Twin would not physically fit in a lot of the venues I play in. Mostly I'm using a Quilter Aviator Twin Ten or a DV Mark Little Jazz.
The Quilter is a great amp - is has more power and headroom than I'd ever need for even the biggest gigs. I really like the 2x10 configuration. The DV mark is perfect for small venues, surprisingly loud for its size.
-
Lucky man! I had a similar rig, though the MM had a JBL and the cab was one I built with a 15" JBL. Bit of a lug, but the sound! In a lifetime of dumb moves and egregious mistakes, letting that rig go really stands in a class by itself. What could I have been thinking? Originally Posted by BigDaddyLoveHandles
Durn, neither... My main amp is a MusicMan 112 RD Fifty, which is a hybrid amp (SS pre-amp and and a pair of 6L6 power tubes). It has an EVM-12L speaker and I like to pair it with an extension cab with another EVM-12L.
-
I don't know why but I find myself rooting for the tubes. Maybe because I now see them as underdogs.
Also not known is exactly what has gone wrong in my life that resulted in me writing such things.
-
Maybe not here but on a lot of guitar forums, like the Telecaster forum, tube snobbery rules. SS amps are the redheaded stepchildren. I don't believe that, but you see comments like, "once, in the 1970s, I played a cheap SS amp and it sucked. No point trying to change my opinion on SS amps, 40 years on... Originally Posted by Tal_175
I've come to realize that some guitar players are the most conservative people you'll meet.
-
I think, but am not entirely sure, that I might be able to identify tube vs solid state in a listening room. Maybe. Basically, I'd pick the tone I liked better and assume it's the tube amp. Might be easier for an overdriven sound, but I'm not sure about that either.
I seriously doubt that I could sit in the audience listening to a quintet or bigger band and be able to tell tubes vs solid state.
On second thought, I don't think I could really tell no matter what the situation. When I tried it at home, Little Jazz vs Vintage Reverberocket, the EQ setting made much more difference than which amp I was using.'
In fact, out of all the gear choices, I think the one I might be mostly likely to identify by sound would be single coil vs humbucker. But, clearly not always. Some players get a darker jazz sound (the one I associate with humbuckers) out of single coils. But, if the guitarist is playing with a certain kind of brightness, I might get that right. I don't think I could do it for amps. I know for a fact I can't reliably do it with archtop vs solid (175 vs. solid), but I do think I can sometimes tell the difference. So much is EQ and touch.Last edited by rpjazzguitar; 02-21-2020 at 11:23 PM.
Reply With Quote
George Barnes plays Bach/1966
Yesterday, 06:29 PM in The Players