We Are The Music Makers (Musician's Thread)

A JCM900 is the only marshall i have owned/played. Sorta a different beast then the classic marshall sound.
Had my eye on a Germino Classic45 that might fill the bill.
After the JCM , i bought a Matchless Lightning 2x10. Great amp.
LOL @ me tho , i certainly don’t need a 100watt Dumble clone , but yolo.

I had a JCM 900 50W. Usable but the diode clipping in the dirty channel was awful. Traded it for a JTM 30 1x12 and some pedals. Still have it, and the normal channel on it is fantastic and it has an XLR line out which was nice. However, last time I fired it up it was cutting out. Went through the FX return and got nothing back so assume that means power tubes? Problem is if I buy a matched pair of 5881s and that doesn’t solve it, then I basically lit $100 on fire. It’s an amp with a notoriously terrible build quality so not interested in sinking money into it.

I am not much of a tech, but i found this…

think this case was dirty input jacks.

I think they are talking about the effects loop having dirty jacks. That’s a known issue, but it’s solvable by jumping the Fx with a patch cable. That didn’t work for me. The other thing is plugging straight into the Fx return should bypass the preamp entirely and still produce sound, albeit a weak one. I get no sound.

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One thing I’ve noticed with computer amps is running the BK Butler tube driver in front of the interface as a boost really adds another dimension that I can’t seem to replicate from just software. That sort of makes me wonder if I could run one of those “preamp in a pedal” boxes out front and only model the power amp and cab IR, but I think the problem with that is the computer pedals couldn’t be in front of the preamp unless I did some kind of loopback routing thing. Could be that I’m just not doing it right but I think my cab and reverb IRs are pretty good.

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@PapaSmurf

This is the best thing I’ve ever read on pickups, by Helmuth Lemme:

http://www.buildyourguitar.com/resources/lemme/

Love how he quickly debunks the myth of resistance and magnet type, which are seemingly the only things pickups makers want to tell you about, not the actual frequency response demonstrated in the bode plots. I found an interesting comparison tool here:

http://www.echoesofmars.com/pickup_data/viewer/

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My main squeeze atm is a prs 594 with 58/15lt tci pickups. Lt= low turn , tci = tuned capacitance inductance . Not sure what that means , but sounds like they are on the same page as Lemme. Prolly my fav humbucker.

Truth is with electric guitar , everything in the signal path can kill your tone.

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/PlatGtr12--mogami-platinum-guitar-12

Gotta have some new cables.

Flux capacitance

I still have a hundred feet of George L cable that I bought on closeout about 20 years ago. I need to pick up some of the solderless plugs b/c spot soldering cables is a pita.

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I thought this was funny:

Screenshot from 2022-07-17 21-17-11

For when you can’t afford cheap cables?

By the way, that Mogami Platinum (3368) is just their low-capacitance cable offering. Are you familiar with George Ls? That’s the OG low-capacitance cable that some people have been using for decades (notably pedal steel players and Eric Johnson). Hard to find ratings on this stuff but I saw this:

You could make a 12.5 ft cable out of George Ls and their solderless plugs for about $40 at Sweetwater prices.

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Lol, that is funny.

i was/am considering the george l’s (i am from texas and huge EJ fan, saw him a couple years back on experience hendrix tour)

the reason i am considering the mogami is “Neutrik Silent Plug allows hot-swapping guitars without the earsplitting pop”

Still havn’t pulled the trigger so …

Any recommendations for a huge sounding reverb pedal?

Some points:

(1) Don’t pay $112 for a 12’ guitar cable.

(2) The only ToNe VoOdOo MaGiC that’s happening in a guitar cable is the filtering effect of the capacitance. There’s no guarantee that you’d even prefer a low capacitance cable. Really depends on your entire signal chain (as you said before) and the tone you’re going for. Check out this video below and notice how they choose different cables for different guitars and sounds (clean vs. dirty):

(3) That video made me aware of Bestronics cables which are even lower capacitance than George L. If you really want a Silent Neutrik low capacitance cable, they make one for $48.98. Seriously get that over the Mogami and save yourself $64 in snake oil fees.

(4) Can you solder? Solderless kits like George Ls are convenient, especially for patch cables, but be aware that some people complain about them shorting out, then having to identify the bad connection and recrimp. If you aren’t a gigging musician I wouldn’t worry about that.

Strymon Big Sky comes to mind. I haven’t done any intense research on it, just sort of noticed in videos I was watching that I liked how it sounded. It’s pretty expensive imo. All of my reverbs at the moment are digital convolution reverbs in software.

If you can solder, your cost per cable can be quite a bit lower. Looks like you’d save about $20 per cable just buying the components in that Bestronics. Could even throw in some 1/4" paracord if you want a nice braided exterior. Lemme know if you’re interested and I’ll link all of the parts.

Thanks for the good advice. I have been out of the loop for a long time , the mogami is the first/only time i have seen the Silent Nuetrik. So i am not married to mogami, maybe grab the G15N instead. I’ll use George L’s for the pedal board and effects loop.

Yea, strymon seems to be highly rated atm. Expensive for sure. worth it maybe.
Rockin an old TREX v1 atm. Guess i’ll sweetwater a strymon an give it an audition.

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I have a drawer full of Neutriks here, but seems like every time I’ve tried to get the silents they were out of stock.

There’s probably something better out there, or at least better value given the insane price. I just remember hearing a few clips where I liked the reverb and it was Big Sky. Not sure how practical it is–sounded like something I may only use for clean sounds, and maybe just ambient cleans that can eat up a ton of space. I feel like reverb is one of the things that makes or breaks a guitar tone though. I add just enough for some depth/realism in the software (stereo convolver IR) and it’s a tight range I can get away with.

Edit: Another thing to consider. I think the Strymon stuff is digital? If so, there’s going to be some amount of latency in the AD/DA conversions. Maybe doesn’t matter for you but I’d need to know it in milliseconds before buying. Enough digital pieces in series and it starts to add up.

The cobra 183 is kinda unique in that it doesn’t have an effects loop , but it has insert point between the preamp and power amp. Normally you need to use a dumblator for an effects loop. However the owner of dumble 183, claims that running a digital reverb there w/o dumblator , works well for both reverb and fatting the high strings? somethin about the AD/DA converters themselves. idk

Gonna run a belle epoch and wah thru the front end.
This is all theory at this point, still waiting for the amp.

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How is this COBRA working out for you now that you’ve had time to get past the honeymoon phase? I noticed VHT (not Fryette) has a 50W ODS style head that sells for under $700 used :eyes:. Look at this fuckin’ thing:

I’m bigly skeptical of brands that offshore production, but this is absolutely brilliant execution offering an eyelet board PTP handwire at this price. Dream scenario for modders. I figure my amp guy could significantly uptweak it for ~$300. Apparently VHT encourages people to mod although it seems plenty good out of the box.

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I’ve noticed a lot of free pianos on facebook marketplace if you’re willing to hawl it out of someone’s second floor apartment or something redic.

My daughter and I want to learn to play the Ocarina of Time soundtrack on an instrument and I think the guitar would be a little too tough.

It sounds like a lot of fun but I totally realize that I could spend half a day realizing that this isn’t going to work and be stuck with a piano in the house. Either way, I’m going to take a stab at it.

If anyone knows anything about piano playing or what Im getting into, feel free.