Bad Brain
Well-known member
Which amps is he talking about btw? What’s a modern tight amp?
NowYou'rePlayingWithPower
Well-known member
I would think a lot of Revv, Engl, etc.. My Thrasher is really tight and mud free with my ERGs through all of my cabs. Supposedly it's just a Randall branded Fortin NATAS iirc.
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Racerxrated
Well-known member
Cost has nothing to do with needing/not needing a boost. The amp's circuit determines that. The Cheapo EVH stuff needs no boost. Yet a 3K brand new Recto does.
Just circuits.
Many like me, boost because the feel changes for the better, and puts more upper mids in..but the amp is tight with/without the boost. Lots of reasons to boost that have nothing to do with the amount of gain.
Bad Brain
Well-known member
You mean iconic or the whole line? ?
RevDrucifer
Well-known member
Blame Eddie.
Watch the ToneTalk episode where James Brown is talking about Ed wanting the 5150 to stop dead when he stopped playing a note. None of that “..nnnff” hanging after, an immediate cut.
And yeah, it’s definitely a large product of modern metal and the sounds bands have been going for for about a decade now. Once there’s a $5000 Meshuggah head on the market, why not?
Watch the ToneTalk episode where James Brown is talking about Ed wanting the 5150 to stop dead when he stopped playing a note. None of that “..nnnff” hanging after, an immediate cut.
And yeah, it’s definitely a large product of modern metal and the sounds bands have been going for for about a decade now. Once there’s a $5000 Meshuggah head on the market, why not?
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braintheory
Well-known member
My IIC+ and Blueface VH4 are some of the best high gain amps I've played, but for some styles of metal I would definitely still need a boost to get the needed level of tightness and attack, while amps like Hermansson's or Dino have it there on their own. In fact, even on my Hermansson Recto if I turn the tightness knob all the way down, set it to tube rectification and spongy mode it's still probably tighter than anything else I've tried that's not a Hermansson or Dino, so this is one thing I actually would agree with Fluff lol
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ZEN Amps
Well-known member
Not sure, haven't watched the video but Revv, KSR, Driftwood come to mind when I hear this term.
Spaceboy
Well-known member
I haven’t owned an amp that’s “too tight” yet, and I didn’t grow up on plugins. Fluff dials everything in to sound like mud anyway, so what would he know about anything being tight? This doesn’t seem like a real issue, a talking head is running out of ideas to make videos about.
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Apex1Rg7X
Well-known member
This. It seems that too many people often look too far into it when the topic of boosting a already high gain, $3K+ amp comes up. I boost my amps for the very same reason Racer stated, it's a feel thing and for the life of me I can't explain why, haha. But if you're firmly in the "You shouldn't have to boost a $3K+ amp camp" then good for you, to each their own.
John4021
Well-known member
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harddriver
Well-known member
I look at boosts and EQ as tools to arrive at the desired final sound/tone now and have gotten away from thinking the amp should always do all the work in every case.
Like Angus Young's Marshall tone was good straight into the amp but stellar with the Schaffer Vega wireless preamp in the signal chain......and do we even need to discuss the EVH's sound in 1975/76 versus his 1977/78 tone using the MXR 6 band EQ, two echoplex preamps, MXR flanger, MXR phase 90 all which affect the final desired tone.
Randy Rhoads using the MXR Distortion+ and MXR 10 band EQ........Jake E Lee signal chain using the Boss OD-1 as so forth and on and on.....................
I think you guys get the point.
TheGreatGreen
Well-known member
I get the sentiments of the video. A loose amp can be tweaked and adjusted to whatever tightness you want, and in that way can be thought of as more of a "platform" upon which to build and sculpt your tone, but an amp that’s locked in from the factory to be ultra tight is basically only that and can't be tweaked any further in that regard. Also, a bit of looseness and mush can be really interesting and make for more complex shades of distortion. I agree with his points.
Personally, it's strange to me that every high gain amp on the market doesn't have a dedicated bass cut knob that cuts low end from the input. I think literally every amp with preamp distortion you can buy should have this control. Even amps built from the factory to be super tight rarely get their input bass cut curves exactly right, because an amp is just one of many components in a rig, and everybody's rig is different.
I understand that there is a widely believed trope that every guitar player in the world is a knuckle dragging retard who would immediately fill their diaper in a panic if they saw anything other than "gain, tonestack, presence, and master" knobs and that they are terrified of dialing any of those knobs outside 11:00-1:00, and I think that's nonsense. The Mesa Mark series has had an input Bass control for the last 50 years, and the latest example I can think of, the Bogner Uber Ultra, has implemented this control via its Metamorph knob and it works wonderfully.
But if I had to choose between the two extreme options presented by Fluff in his video, I'd choose a loose amp I can get surgical with, using my own tools, over an amp that's just built to be super tight from the factory and that I can't adjust from there.
Personally, it's strange to me that every high gain amp on the market doesn't have a dedicated bass cut knob that cuts low end from the input. I think literally every amp with preamp distortion you can buy should have this control. Even amps built from the factory to be super tight rarely get their input bass cut curves exactly right, because an amp is just one of many components in a rig, and everybody's rig is different.
I understand that there is a widely believed trope that every guitar player in the world is a knuckle dragging retard who would immediately fill their diaper in a panic if they saw anything other than "gain, tonestack, presence, and master" knobs and that they are terrified of dialing any of those knobs outside 11:00-1:00, and I think that's nonsense. The Mesa Mark series has had an input Bass control for the last 50 years, and the latest example I can think of, the Bogner Uber Ultra, has implemented this control via its Metamorph knob and it works wonderfully.
But if I had to choose between the two extreme options presented by Fluff in his video, I'd choose a loose amp I can get surgical with, using my own tools, over an amp that's just built to be super tight from the factory and that I can't adjust from there.
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Racerxrated
Well-known member
The Iconic slays the rest of that line, IMO. I've had all the others except the regular 100w. I heard the Iconic at a little amp fest a few months back. I much preferred that to any of the others. Killer amp.
Brandonrz
Well-known member
Yep total sleeper against the other 5150s.
LP Freak
Well-known member
So I made you a believer? ??
John4021
Well-known member
...I wanted to buy the Lil baby Jake E Lee amp.
Maybe I sound save myself about 8 hundred bucks
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Racerxrated
Well-known member
Oh yes, that amp is a good amp no matter the price. And, after having most of the other 5153 versions I can safely say the Iconic sounds the best of all of them. For what I like anyway. At volume, the Iconic didn't have anywhere near as much 'fake, plastic' thing as the other 5153s.
John4021
Well-known member
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Racerxrated
Well-known member
I don't want to say that you'll feel like I do; we all have our tastes. Plenty of players love the EVH Stealth. I had both 6L6/34 versions; just not my thing. The Iconic seemed a good bit more open sounding/less compressed when turned up, vs the others...and I just bought the Stealth 6L6 100 watter new a month ago
Dang nab it.
tallcoolone
Well-known member
People like different things, nothing is ‘better’