Am I Alone in the Way I Use My Amp?

[Sonic Blue 55]

I rely on Tweed Deluxes, Deluxe Reverb, and PRS H depending on the band and venue. The Tweeds sound good at 3 with a Tele. At 5 all Hell breaks loose. The DR is clean and crisp at 3. Turned up to 8, it spits fire with Tele, Strat, PRS, SG,...
The H is more versatile. I can keep the Master volumes at 12 O’clock for both channels. The Drive channel can dial in a Tweed sound with more volume and balls without getting too Crazy Horse.

 

[Sonic Blue 55]

I sat in with friends ata bar gig Friday night. I used the drive channel of the H for my lap steel. Drive channel kicked in and it was perfect. The Tele player used my 1980 Blackface Deluxe Reverb. He turned up to three and used an extension cabinet on both sides of the stage.
We were lighting the place up,

 

[Tim S]

What I meant was, if you take two versions of the same amp, the tweed version will sound louder (at any lower volume settings) and hit OD sooner simply because the mids are pushed forward, vs. the blackface version of the same amp.

A great illustration of this is a single channel amp that has both tweed & blackface voicings — a Tone King Gremlin. When you switch from BF input to Tweed input there’s an obvious volume jump. (I have a 2 channel TK to avoid that)

 

[Deleted member 5962]

A great illustration of this is a single channel amp that has both tweed & blackface voicings — a Tone King Gremlin. When you switch from BF input to Tweed input there’s an obvious volume jump. (I have a 2 channel TK to avoid that)

Yes, that’s exactly the kind of thing I was talking about. And, my ATMA has the one tone control on the clean channel which Bogner says dials from Blackface all the way down, to Tweed all the way up. Turning the knob from the Blackface side, the more you turn that knob, the louder it gets and the sooner it overdrives, because you’re going from scooped to flat to boosted mids.

The PRS amps I’ve tried all had a broad range (wide Q) midrange control. One night I was going for a scooped aggressive gain tone from my Archon and left it set with the mids at or below 9:00 for a few days. One night while warming up in standby, I turned the mids up to noon, and when I flipped the amp on it was WAY louder than the nights before and I immediately had to turn the master down almost a whole notch (like from 10:00 to 9:00).

 

[dmatthews]

I sat in with friends ata bar gig Friday night. I used the drive channel of the H for my lap steel. Drive channel kicked in and it was perfect. The Tele player used my 1980 Blackface Deluxe Reverb. He turned up to three and used an extension cabinet on both sides of the stage.
We were lighting the place up,

H is awesome. Love that and my Custom 50

 

[Boogie]

Yes, that’s exactly the kind of thing I was talking about. And, my ATMA has the one tone control on the clean channel which Bogner says dials from Blackface all the way down, to Tweed all the way up. Turning the knob from the Blackface side, the more you turn that knob, the louder it gets and the sooner it overdrives, because you’re going from scooped to flat to boosted mids.

The PRS amps I’ve tried all had a broad range (wide Q) midrange control. One night I was going for a scooped aggressive gain tone from my Archon and left it set with the mids at or below 9:00 for a few days. One night while warming up in standby, I turned the mids up to noon, and when I flipped the amp on it was WAY louder than the nights before and I immediately had to turn the master down almost a whole notch (like from 10:00 to 9:00).

The mystery that is tube amps. Is it ear fatigue? Tube fluctuation? Power variance? This is why I started putting the amp head on the floor instead of the cab and used a UPS on the amp. Trying to take 2 variables out of the equation. It worked for me, but I know ear fatigue, regardless of how damaged they are, is still a real thing.

 

[Sonic Blue 55]

NIOMA Lap Steel into the H drive channel. Jensen MOD 12” speaker. They gave me the four chords before I sat in. Simple song. I mostly played in tune without a monitor.The tone is awesome.