Brown Sound for $600

[ttowne]

Yeah, he definitely has the low end down....maybe bass on 10 would work and just lower the gain to 3 or 3.5. The first clip was a little rich but it has A LOT of the right elements IMO!

[ttowne]

Being totally honest, that tone is a trade off of sorts. On the one hand, you got that 'extra' something in the gain dept. (v1 cascade), but on the other hand, you got the side effects of the cascade, which imo are a touch of brittleness and harshness.
But to put it in perspective, I see it like this, THIS spec is contained within a single chassis, where as 'similar' tones to this need attenuation, which is extra cables and 30 to 60 extra lbs, plus set up time. REAL good tone and playing there .

TS

I hear ya and I agree about the "harsh" or maybe "brash" could be used. However, when I hear the ISO clips that's exactly what I hear "harsh" or "brash" whatever you want to call it. I believe that description is coming from the highs that are damn near in the frequency range of static (musical static that is)! They gets smoothed a bit with the reverb. So what I am saying is that I believe the "brash" is a big part of the VH tone.

All this sounds a little "harsh" "Brash" to me! Especially when the C and D bar chords are played!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3K0LAE-F ... re=related" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[ttowne]

Put headphones on for this.......Harsh as hell....you get the sense it hurts your ears even at low volumes, .....full of near static frequency highs, especially toward the end of the song. Smoothed out by the phaser and reverb. Strat78 had a clip somewhere that had this sort of harshness in it and it sounded flat out awesome! Ralle got that super hi-end static sound too. Again, Its a huge key to early VH tone IMO.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5k358go ... re=related" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[johnnybgoood]

The members in the Metroamp forum have great ears. I used an Audix om3xb mic on the last recording. That accounts for the difference from the first recording.

Shrillness and harshness is part of Ed's tone. I read on Woodytone the following.

"There was a LOT of engineering done to Ed’s tone on the first album, which Ed has freely admitted (though in different words). John Surh said essentially the same thing...'I was told by Michael Anthony personally that Ed’s tone in the studio for VH1 was not all of the glory we hear on the record. He said it was very shrill and trebly, and that is why Ted [Templeman, producer] and Don [Landee, engineer] had to pan him hard right on rhythm and hard left on leads, soak it in verb – and there is a ton of verb on there – along with some pretty damn creative EQing.'"
http://www.woodytone.com/2010/07/21/the ... lead-pt-2/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[dirtycooter]

I like it. For turned down to 1 on the ppimv its got IT.
I have said before you have to be able to listen past the fx to the core tone. Eds sound is bright as shit compared to wjat most think they hear. Verb can really mask things like this. But if you take a listen to other records like say 1984-thats some bright stuff man and its not all cream cheesey velvet with a blues rig rounded top end. His tone cuts like no tomorrow. Its a much harder harsher crunch then ones perceives but harmonically its very ... sweet how it crunches in its texture but very bright and cutting.
I think with the ppmiv jacked up and start makin those speakers freak out while backin down some gain further as it gets louder is gonna be tone wonderland. Or you can get 95% of the tone sanely at grandma friendly volumes. No matter what a ppimv is gonna lack the "speaker freak out factor" if you ain't punishin the speakers hard. So it makes no difference when you attenuate or use a mv-those speakers gotta break up too to complete the picture. Other than that this tone is simply ace

[T.J.Fuller]

Wow ... just listened to the bugera clip on another thread then found this thread - this 600.00 beast is a killer amp !

I have been gathering parts for a build this end of the year and I think I'm sold on doing this amp !

I noticed you used Ambience as a reverb plug in , it is actually one of the brighter reverbs out there
( but, it really makes the guitar signal sound like it is bouncing off those shiny plastered walls of that Putnam echo chamber used on vh1 / some of the zep albums, listen and pan Robert Plant's vocals on Ramble on - echo chamber all day ! )

you should experiment with a totally dry clip on left - and put an ambienced clip added panned right or vice versa
giving a little more weight to the dry clip and it will balance that bass that everyone is listening for without dialing it out on the amp.

dialed it out on the amp took away some ummph.

any how, taking that reverb brightness into consideration - this amp definitely has all the character I want personally in an amp.

Great clips , Great build , thanks for sharing the layout ... I hope to PM you in the near future in case I get stuck

[johnnybgoood]

Here is a free layout for a line out box to use an additional "wet" amp for time-based effects. Please note that this is not an attenuator. For Dry/Wet rigs grounding is an issue. Both amps will attempt to ground causing a ground loop. A ground-lift adapter is needed on the plug of one of the amps to eliminate this loop. The 100k pot is the key for this box. It helps dial in the correct resistance to send a usable signal to the wet amp.

[johnnybgoood]

Great clips , Great build , thanks for sharing the layout ... I hope to PM you in the near future in case I get stuck

No problem. You can PM me anytime. Problem is my reply make take a while since I am away quite often.

Cheers!

[Tone Slinger]

After having listened to all of your clips posted here on this thread again JB, I'd say that a JB (pick up that is ) would get you you even closer. Comparing your clips to Ed's iso's, sounds like a very 'slight' mid/mid bump is what you need, along with setting your bass knob somewhere around 4 to 6 (like mentioned earlier) to get it in between the sound of your first clips and the 'Jamie's Cryin'" clip.

The 'post Production' aspect of Ed's VHI tone is pretty hard to get, imo, out of a stock 1959 amp, attenuator or not, although several have pretty much done it VERY closely (Strat78, Pete Thorn, efraser). The vi cascade has that more modern 'hi fi' aspect, in the GAIN/COMPRESSION dept. that made Ed's sound on VHI sound so ADVANCED compared to his peer's back then. I still think he DIDNT have a v1 cascade on that album, but when it's all said and done, a v1 cascade sure does get close right out of the gate.