I did a REMIX of the Cameron CCV Video

[billboogie]

There is a mod for quite of bit extra bottom end also. Since most guys like gut shots, here is a pick of the chassis. This is the Yellow and Black color option, anything is available however.

OH MAN! FORGET BREAKFAST!

 

[jcj]

There is a mod for quite of bit extra bottom end also. Since most guys like gut shots, here is a pick of the chassis. This is the Yellow and Black color option, anything is available however.

Truly disturbing; the extreme hail damage mod

 

[steve_k]

Resembles this..........

 

[oldmanmetal]

Man, I can't unsee that....

 

[Carol-AnnAmps]

I am very sure you are the only one who thinks those clips sound dumble-e, and I am also very sure your nickname suits you perfectly

Here are some Carol Ann Triptik prototype clips, first clips on the page, these are 1 track, all dry except clip 3/4 which have a touch of delay so don't count those ;>, Les Paul-sm57-Marshall 4-12 cel 75 or a bog 1-12 cel 80 straight into protools no processing.

http://www.carolannamps.com/sounds.htm

Dumble with a little edge. Very Dumbly, except the last clip......

Have you ever played a real HRM Dumble, or a great HRM clone? Cranked up it sounds VERY much like that, except the last clip, that had a different tone, and more unique. Played The Tucana and OD2 at length, again very Dumbly.

I have, worked on quite a number.

The circuit design is about as close to any Dumble as it is my car radio. It's is completely different, like nowhere even close. What you are hearing is good harmonic balance and unrestricted dynamic range. The HRM Dumbles share that.

To say it's a Dumble / dumble clone / dumbleesque blah blah friggin blah is like saying a 911 Turbo is a Ferrari 355. Both are sports cars, but far from the same.

 

[oldmanmetal]

I would expect no less.......

 

[rockstah]

Well, it isn't something I keep a list of. Do you keep a list of close miced clips you didn't like? I know I have heard some that sounded nice.

I never heard one I liked, but ya I do keep a bunch of favorite clips that I like. Anything by Rockstah (Mark A from Starship) for an example. His VH1 clips are fucking amazing!!! That's as raw as it gets yet he still "adds" sauce to make it "better". A little reverb, delay, normalizing, maximizing maybe some compression, all necessary to make a close mic recording sound decent, imho.



I

I'll drink a beer with you and I'll give you hug, but in manly way.

Yes manly...lol. No reach arounds allowed, Don maybe, but not you buddy...lol.

Mark

Hey Mark, i appreciate that! the only thing i do add is some verb which is always on the right so the listener can listen to raw guitar on the left if they want.
i don't do any compressors, eq, normalizing, mazimizing etc.
guitar/mic cab interface/record/verb. that's it!
Mark

 

[Carol-AnnAmps]

Still waiting for your clips Please share with us mere mortals.

Mark

Ship me all that stuff, and I'll record a clip for you. Deal?

I don't understand the animosity here. The original clip sounded mehish. It happens. It's tough to mic a cab, sometimes it sounds great, sometimes it doesn't sound great. This time it didn't. Your response was to do some post magic. I mean, even you thought it needed some help to sound better or you wouldn't have done anything to it. Why get so offended for funning around about what you yourself agree to?

Hes not offended, if you knew Mark you would know he is one of the truly good guys out there. Sometimes you try to do what the people want clip wise, spend a ton of time and effort to get it done and up and then be told that this is wrong and thats wrong its frustrating and its a fickle audience to say the least.

You don't have to like the clips and being honest we were out of time and trying to get clips done on the last day just to honor requests we were getting. If you have ever been in Tone Merchants on a Saturday its busy and we were trying to record in between clients and it was not ideal. Int he future we will only record clips in a studio environment unrushed.

He's human and no matter how nice he is sometimes you get to the point when you cant win trying to post up what is requested. (We want a Zoom HD clip, we want a close mic clip, we want a clip with grease, we want a bone dry clip, we want a clip with you standing on one foot, eating a sandwich and humming the battle hym of the republic. Its a frustrating endeavor. Anyway its all good and the head sounds wicked. The new owners will dig it for sure and they will start posting real world end user clips which is what we want anyway.

Its all good.

Welcome to 'clip' nightmare Brad !
All a clip does is give you a reference point of how an amp recorded with a particular recording setup (what the mic, not you heard). It tells you nothing about the amp in the room and the thing that gets overlooked a LOT is the fact that higher sound pressures affect the frequency response of our hearing DRASTICALLY. We hear much more with a mid range focus as the volume increases. The highs are naturally rolled off (it's the bodies self protection mechanism kicking in). A mic has a much flatter frequency response than we do so when you hear something back recorded at a high volume it always sounds brighter and quite different. Clips do however provide a useful resource. They can be used to see how well an amp 'mics' up, to demo the efx loop, to analyise the harmonic makeup of the signal etc etc. They will never however tell you a) how the amp feels and b) How it will sound to your ears in a room.

Too many people place way too much emphasis on clips. "this amp doesn't sound like the clips" ....No....duh !!!

Trust me, you night want to eat those words when you start hearing some 'home' clips that will no doubt end up posted on You-tube. In amongst a number of cools clips, there will be a bunch of not so cool ones either.
We just have to smile and let it be.

 

[rupe]

Still waiting for your clips Please share with us mere mortals.

Mark

Ship me all that stuff, and I'll record a clip for you. Deal?

I don't understand the animosity here. The original clip sounded mehish. It happens. It's tough to mic a cab, sometimes it sounds great, sometimes it doesn't sound great. This time it didn't. Your response was to do some post magic. I mean, even you thought it needed some help to sound better or you wouldn't have done anything to it. Why get so offended for funning around about what you yourself agree to?

Hes not offended, if you knew Mark you would know he is one of the truly good guys out there. Sometimes you try to do what the people want clip wise, spend a ton of time and effort to get it done and up and then be told that this is wrong and thats wrong its frustrating and its a fickle audience to say the least.

You don't have to like the clips and being honest we were out of time and trying to get clips done on the last day just to honor requests we were getting. If you have ever been in Tone Merchants on a Saturday its busy and we were trying to record in between clients and it was not ideal. Int he future we will only record clips in a studio environment unrushed.

He's human and no matter how nice he is sometimes you get to the point when you cant win trying to post up what is requested. (We want a Zoom HD clip, we want a close mic clip, we want a clip with grease, we want a bone dry clip, we want a clip with you standing on one foot, eating a sandwich and humming the battle hym of the republic. Its a frustrating endeavor. Anyway its all good and the head sounds wicked. The new owners will dig it for sure and they will start posting real world end user clips which is what we want anyway.

Its all good.

Welcome to 'clip' nightmare Brad !
All a clip does is give you a reference point of how an amp recorded with a particular recording setup (what the mic, not you heard). It tells you nothing about the amp in the room and the thing that gets overlooked a LOT is the fact that higher sound pressures affect the frequency response of our hearing DRASTICALLY. We hear much more with a mid range focus as the volume increases. The highs are naturally rolled off (it's the bodies self protection mechanism kicking in). A mic has a much flatter frequency response than we do so when you hear something back recorded at a high volume it always sounds brighter and quite different. Clips do however provide a useful resource. They can be used to see how well an amp 'mics' up, to demo the efx loop, to analyise the harmonic makeup of the signal etc etc. They will never however tell you a) how the amp feels and b) How it will sound to your ears in a room.

Too many people place way too much emphasis on clips. "this amp doesn't sound like the clips" ....No....duh !!!

Trust me, you night want to eat those words when you start hearing some 'home' clips that will no doubt end up posted on You-tube. In amongst a number of cools clips, there will be a bunch of not so cool ones either.
We just have to smile and let it be.

Well stated

Hopefully some of the resident "amp whisperers" who claim that you can deduce an amps feel with clips will chime in

 

[rockstah]

this is like the tone is in the hands argument. its a balance. as well with clips i can not only hear an amp but hear how it feels and responds listening to someone else play it. People wouldn't search out Edwards tone etc if they couldn't tell by listening to it. to me its silly to argue "oh the amp sounds nothing like the clip" "you cant tell by clips" blah blah... to me anyway. i can tell and I assume any good guitar player can tell as well.

Mark

 

[mixohoytian]

rockstah
your clips always sound great
do you use a fancy mic or post editing magic?

 

[Carol-AnnAmps]

this is like the tone is in the hands argument. its a balance. as well with clips i can not only hear an amp but hear how it feels and responds listening to someone else play it. People wouldn't search out Edwards tone etc if they couldn't tell by listening to it. to me its silly to argue "oh the amp sounds nothing like the clip" "you cant tell by clips" blah blah... to me anyway. i can tell and I assume any good guitar player can tell as well.

Mark

I gave you science, well human biology actually. You gave me rhetorical statements.

Apart from the human biology involved regarding frequency response and sound pressure, we also have some other more physical curb balls. The frequency response of the microphone used, the placement of it next to the speaker. When was the last time you had your head 2" from the cone of a 12" speaker with an amp churning out 50+ watts ?

As for being able to tell the feel, I will give you a little room there, not much though, but I do agree experience grants you a bit of a free pass.......
However, it's quite clear that in order to 'feel' something you need to be part of a closed loop. In this case the loop is Body-Guitar-Amp-Speaker-Body. Break that loop by taking yourself out of it and it becomes a different physical experience, one of monitoring only. i.e. you are on the outside listening in. In actual fact the only sense in use then is the one of hearing . That said, an experienced player may be able to hear alterations of amplitude and small delays created by compression that their brains can use to compare from personal experience from being in the loop many times in order to have an idea of how it may feel in the loop. This is all well and good in the actual room, but on a clip you've added several more layers by putting more devices in the now open loop. These other devices such as the mic, recording device, media used, playback device, playback speakers may alter the signal in a way that fools the mind.

There's also a whole other area of the fact that in clips it's not you playing. I do know that 2 guitar players playing the exact same rig with the exact same settings recording in the same way will always sound different.

Some, may I ask, why does my company use clips then to help market.......well something is better than nothing, and there's not much else you can do. But I would be the first to say never base your buying decisions on clips alone. They are not you in a room playing the amp.

All this said, a good amp always does record well and that is a fact. But that isn't enough to say it will work for an individual player.

 

[Meathead]

this is like the tone is in the hands argument. its a balance. as well with clips i can not only hear an amp but hear how it feels and responds listening to someone else play it. People wouldn't search out Edwards tone etc if they couldn't tell by listening to it. to me its silly to argue "oh the amp sounds nothing like the clip" "you cant tell by clips" blah blah... to me anyway. i can tell and I assume any good guitar player can tell as well.

Mark

I gave you science, well human biology actually. You gave me rhetorical statements.

Apart from the human biology involved regarding frequency response and sound pressure, we also have some other more physical curb balls. The frequency response of the microphone used, the placement of it next to the speaker. When was the last time you had your head 2" from the cone of a 12" speaker with an amp churning out 50+ watts ?

As for being able to tell the feel, I will give you a little room there, not much though, but I do agree experience grants you a bit of a free pass.......
However, it's quite clear that in order to 'feel' something you need to be part of a closed loop. In this case the loop is Body-Guitar-Amp-Speaker-Body. Break that loop by taking yourself out of it and it becomes a different physical experience, one of monitoring only. i.e. you are on the outside listening in. In actual fact the only sense in use then is the one of hearing . That said, an experienced player may be able to hear alterations of amplitude and small delays created by compression that their brains can use to compare from personal experience from being in the loop many times in order to have an idea of how it may feel in the loop. This is all well and good in the actual room, but on a clip you've added several more layers by putting more devices in the now open loop. These other devices such as the mic, recording device, media used, playback device, playback speakers may alter the signal in a way that fools the mind.

There's also a whole other area of the fact that in clips it's not you playing. I do know that 2 guitar players playing the exact same rig with the exact same settings recording in the same way will always sound different.

Some, may I ask, why does my company use clips then to help market.......well something is better than nothing, and there's not much else you can do. But I would be the first to say never base your buying decisions on clips alone. They are not you in a room playing the amp.

All this said, a good amp always does record well and that is a fact. But that isn't enough to say it will work for an individual player.

I've purchased amps solely on internet clips because companies like Peters and Carvin don't have any of their amps in stock near me to play and it has turned out really well...what I heard that I really liked in clips was true when playing the amp in front of me as well. Actually, with Peters, I simply saw a gut shot of his hand wired work and thought it looked really well made and I took a gamble on it sounding as good as it looked.
I like to think that I can tell the feel of an amp from a clip, but from listening to good Pod clips in the past, it made me realize that I can't.

 

[rupe]

this is like the tone is in the hands argument. its a balance. as well with clips i can not only hear an amp but hear how it feels and responds listening to someone else play it. People wouldn't search out Edwards tone etc if they couldn't tell by listening to it. to me its silly to argue "oh the amp sounds nothing like the clip" "you cant tell by clips" blah blah... to me anyway. i can tell and I assume any good guitar player can tell as well.

Mark

I gave you science, well human biology actually. You gave me rhetorical statements.

Apart from the human biology involved regarding frequency response and sound pressure, we also have some other more physical curb balls. The frequency response of the microphone used, the placement of it next to the speaker. When was the last time you had your head 2" from the cone of a 12" speaker with an amp churning out 50+ watts ?

As for being able to tell the feel, I will give you a little room there, not much though, but I do agree experience grants you a bit of a free pass.......
However, it's quite clear that in order to 'feel' something you need to be part of a closed loop. In this case the loop is Body-Guitar-Amp-Speaker-Body. Break that loop by taking yourself out of it and it becomes a different physical experience, one of monitoring only. i.e. you are on the outside listening in. In actual fact the only sense in use then is the one of hearing . That said, an experienced player may be able to hear alterations of amplitude and small delays created by compression that their brains can use to compare from personal experience from being in the loop many times in order to have an idea of how it may feel in the loop. This is all well and good in the actual room, but on a clip you've added several more layers by putting more devices in the now open loop. These other devices such as the mic, recording device, media used, playback device, playback speakers may alter the signal in a way that fools the mind.

There's also a whole other area of the fact that in clips it's not you playing. I do know that 2 guitar players playing the exact same rig with the exact same settings recording in the same way will always sound different.

Some, may I ask, why does my company use clips then to help market.......well something is better than nothing, and there's not much else you can do. But I would be the first to say never base your buying decisions on clips alone. They are not you in a room playing the amp.

All this said, a good amp always does record well and that is a fact. But that isn't enough to say it will work for an individual player.

Thank you!!!

 

[Carol-AnnAmps]

this is like the tone is in the hands argument. its a balance. as well with clips i can not only hear an amp but hear how it feels and responds listening to someone else play it. People wouldn't search out Edwards tone etc if they couldn't tell by listening to it. to me its silly to argue "oh the amp sounds nothing like the clip" "you cant tell by clips" blah blah... to me anyway. i can tell and I assume any good guitar player can tell as well.

Mark

I gave you science, well human biology actually. You gave me rhetorical statements.

Apart from the human biology involved regarding frequency response and sound pressure, we also have some other more physical curb balls. The frequency response of the microphone used, the placement of it next to the speaker. When was the last time you had your head 2" from the cone of a 12" speaker with an amp churning out 50+ watts ?

As for being able to tell the feel, I will give you a little room there, not much though, but I do agree experience grants you a bit of a free pass.......
However, it's quite clear that in order to 'feel' something you need to be part of a closed loop. In this case the loop is Body-Guitar-Amp-Speaker-Body. Break that loop by taking yourself out of it and it becomes a different physical experience, one of monitoring only. i.e. you are on the outside listening in. In actual fact the only sense in use then is the one of hearing . That said, an experienced player may be able to hear alterations of amplitude and small delays created by compression that their brains can use to compare from personal experience from being in the loop many times in order to have an idea of how it may feel in the loop. This is all well and good in the actual room, but on a clip you've added several more layers by putting more devices in the now open loop. These other devices such as the mic, recording device, media used, playback device, playback speakers may alter the signal in a way that fools the mind.

There's also a whole other area of the fact that in clips it's not you playing. I do know that 2 guitar players playing the exact same rig with the exact same settings recording in the same way will always sound different.

Some, may I ask, why does my company use clips then to help market.......well something is better than nothing, and there's not much else you can do. But I would be the first to say never base your buying decisions on clips alone. They are not you in a room playing the amp.

All this said, a good amp always does record well and that is a fact. But that isn't enough to say it will work for an individual player.

I've purchased amps solely on internet clips because companies like Peters and Carvin don't have any of their amps in stock near me to play and it has turned out really well...what I heard that I really liked in clips was true when playing the amp in front of me as well. Actually, with Peters, I simply saw a gut shot of his hand wired work and thought it looked really well made and I took a gamble on it sounding as good as it looked.
I like to think that I can tell the feel of an amp from a clip, but from listening to good Pod clips in the past, it made me realize that I can't.

Another thought for you, while a neat layout is good engineering practice, it doesn't automatically equal good tone. In fact a lead dress that concerns itself more with the accuracy of the right angles in the wire may actually become the cause of more noise, cross-talk, phase cancellations etc....this is very much design dependant too.
Neatness to the human eye and neatness to an AC signal path are very often extremely different. A high impedance low level signal won't thank you for being run next to much higher level low impedance out of phase version of itself even if it looks extremely tidy.
There are places for neatness and places where the wires have to go where they need to go. Lets take V2a on a Plexi Marshall as a simple example. Pull the cathode wire up and kind of looped over the tube socket away from the anode and all the noise goes away and the amp becomes much more open. Doesn't look too neat, but it sounds way better.
I have no experience of the amps you mention, so I'm certainly not saying anything towards those, just generic statements.
The closer any stage of an amp runs to instability, the more critical the wire positioning is and often the less neat you make it look. Unfortunately some of the best tones come from the point on the edge of instability. Lead dress becomes the tool for tuning them. Trainwreck designs are built on that principle and also the reason there are some pretty horrendous sounding clones out there. People try to replicate from a picture or another amp, but every one is it's own entity with it's own needs.

I apologise if I've sent the thread in a different direction....but I guess I like to stir up some different thoughts rather than the usual cliches.

 

[Rogue]

Another thought for you, while a neat layout is good engineering practice, it doesn't automatically equal good tone.

Nothing a little post can't spruce up.

 

[Meathead]

this is like the tone is in the hands argument. its a balance. as well with clips i can not only hear an amp but hear how it feels and responds listening to someone else play it. People wouldn't search out Edwards tone etc if they couldn't tell by listening to it. to me its silly to argue "oh the amp sounds nothing like the clip" "you cant tell by clips" blah blah... to me anyway. i can tell and I assume any good guitar player can tell as well.

Mark

I gave you science, well human biology actually. You gave me rhetorical statements.

Apart from the human biology involved regarding frequency response and sound pressure, we also have some other more physical curb balls. The frequency response of the microphone used, the placement of it next to the speaker. When was the last time you had your head 2" from the cone of a 12" speaker with an amp churning out 50+ watts ?

As for being able to tell the feel, I will give you a little room there, not much though, but I do agree experience grants you a bit of a free pass.......
However, it's quite clear that in order to 'feel' something you need to be part of a closed loop. In this case the loop is Body-Guitar-Amp-Speaker-Body. Break that loop by taking yourself out of it and it becomes a different physical experience, one of monitoring only. i.e. you are on the outside listening in. In actual fact the only sense in use then is the one of hearing . That said, an experienced player may be able to hear alterations of amplitude and small delays created by compression that their brains can use to compare from personal experience from being in the loop many times in order to have an idea of how it may feel in the loop. This is all well and good in the actual room, but on a clip you've added several more layers by putting more devices in the now open loop. These other devices such as the mic, recording device, media used, playback device, playback speakers may alter the signal in a way that fools the mind.

There's also a whole other area of the fact that in clips it's not you playing. I do know that 2 guitar players playing the exact same rig with the exact same settings recording in the same way will always sound different.

Some, may I ask, why does my company use clips then to help market.......well something is better than nothing, and there's not much else you can do. But I would be the first to say never base your buying decisions on clips alone. They are not you in a room playing the amp.

All this said, a good amp always does record well and that is a fact. But that isn't enough to say it will work for an individual player.

I've purchased amps solely on internet clips because companies like Peters and Carvin don't have any of their amps in stock near me to play and it has turned out really well...what I heard that I really liked in clips was true when playing the amp in front of me as well. Actually, with Peters, I simply saw a gut shot of his hand wired work and thought it looked really well made and I took a gamble on it sounding as good as it looked.
I like to think that I can tell the feel of an amp from a clip, but from listening to good Pod clips in the past, it made me realize that I can't.

Another thought for you, while a neat layout is good engineering practice, it doesn't automatically equal good tone. In fact a lead dress that concerns itself more with the accuracy of the right angles in the wire may actually become the cause of more noise, cross-talk, phase cancellations etc....this is very much design dependant too.
Neatness to the human eye and neatness to an AC signal path are very often extremely different. A high impedance low level signal won't thank you for being run next to much higher level low impedance out of phase version of itself even if it looks extremely tidy.
There are places for neatness and places where the wires have to go where they need to go. Lets take V2a on a Plexi Marshall as a simple example. Pull the cathode wire up and kind of looped over the tube socket away from the anode and all the noise goes away and the amp becomes much more open. Doesn't look too neat, but it sounds way better.
I have no experience of the amps you mention, so I'm certainly not saying anything towards those, just generic statements.
The closer any stage of an amp runs to instability, the more critical the wire positioning is and often the less neat you make it look. Unfortunately some of the best tones come from the point on the edge of instability. Lead dress becomes the tool for tuning them. Trainwreck designs are built on that principle and also the reason there are some pretty horrendous sounding clones out there. People try to replicate from a picture or another amp, but every one is it's own entity with it's own needs.

I apologise if I've sent the thread in a different direction....but I guess I like to stir up some different thoughts rather than the usual cliches.

I don't have buzzy amps and I certainly don't make amps, but what you say makes sense. I trust those who make them to make them well. Too many clubs and venues have bad power and I don't need anymore noise than necessary from the amp itself. You seem like a knowledgeable and well spoken fellow...it's nice to see you speak your mind and share info.

 

[Nico]

this is like the tone is in the hands argument. its a balance. as well with clips i can not only hear an amp but hear how it feels and responds listening to someone else play it. People wouldn't search out Edwards tone etc if they couldn't tell by listening to it. to me its silly to argue "oh the amp sounds nothing like the clip" "you cant tell by clips" blah blah... to me anyway. i can tell and I assume any good guitar player can tell as well.

Mark

I'm not going to give an opinion on these clips since everybody is so pro-ccv or anti-ccv...
and I find few people speaking unbiased... Exactly the same as with the Axe Fx.
People who like it won't admit a bad clip and people who hate it won't admit that they liked a clip...

But I agree with rockstah, a LOT can be learned about clips generally speaking

 

[Carol-AnnAmps]

this is like the tone is in the hands argument. its a balance. as well with clips i can not only hear an amp but hear how it feels and responds listening to someone else play it. People wouldn't search out Edwards tone etc if they couldn't tell by listening to it. to me its silly to argue "oh the amp sounds nothing like the clip" "you cant tell by clips" blah blah... to me anyway. i can tell and I assume any good guitar player can tell as well.

Mark

I gave you science, well human biology actually. You gave me rhetorical statements.

Apart from the human biology involved regarding frequency response and sound pressure, we also have some other more physical curb balls. The frequency response of the microphone used, the placement of it next to the speaker. When was the last time you had your head 2" from the cone of a 12" speaker with an amp churning out 50+ watts ?

As for being able to tell the feel, I will give you a little room there, not much though, but I do agree experience grants you a bit of a free pass.......
However, it's quite clear that in order to 'feel' something you need to be part of a closed loop. In this case the loop is Body-Guitar-Amp-Speaker-Body. Break that loop by taking yourself out of it and it becomes a different physical experience, one of monitoring only. i.e. you are on the outside listening in. In actual fact the only sense in use then is the one of hearing . That said, an experienced player may be able to hear alterations of amplitude and small delays created by compression that their brains can use to compare from personal experience from being in the loop many times in order to have an idea of how it may feel in the loop. This is all well and good in the actual room, but on a clip you've added several more layers by putting more devices in the now open loop. These other devices such as the mic, recording device, media used, playback device, playback speakers may alter the signal in a way that fools the mind.

There's also a whole other area of the fact that in clips it's not you playing. I do know that 2 guitar players playing the exact same rig with the exact same settings recording in the same way will always sound different.

Some, may I ask, why does my company use clips then to help market.......well something is better than nothing, and there's not much else you can do. But I would be the first to say never base your buying decisions on clips alone. They are not you in a room playing the amp.

All this said, a good amp always does record well and that is a fact. But that isn't enough to say it will work for an individual player.

I've purchased amps solely on internet clips because companies like Peters and Carvin don't have any of their amps in stock near me to play and it has turned out really well...what I heard that I really liked in clips was true when playing the amp in front of me as well. Actually, with Peters, I simply saw a gut shot of his hand wired work and thought it looked really well made and I took a gamble on it sounding as good as it looked.
I like to think that I can tell the feel of an amp from a clip, but from listening to good Pod clips in the past, it made me realize that I can't.

Another thought for you, while a neat layout is good engineering practice, it doesn't automatically equal good tone. In fact a lead dress that concerns itself more with the accuracy of the right angles in the wire may actually become the cause of more noise, cross-talk, phase cancellations etc....this is very much design dependant too.
Neatness to the human eye and neatness to an AC signal path are very often extremely different. A high impedance low level signal won't thank you for being run next to much higher level low impedance out of phase version of itself even if it looks extremely tidy.
There are places for neatness and places where the wires have to go where they need to go. Lets take V2a on a Plexi Marshall as a simple example. Pull the cathode wire up and kind of looped over the tube socket away from the anode and all the noise goes away and the amp becomes much more open. Doesn't look too neat, but it sounds way better.
I have no experience of the amps you mention, so I'm certainly not saying anything towards those, just generic statements.
The closer any stage of an amp runs to instability, the more critical the wire positioning is and often the less neat you make it look. Unfortunately some of the best tones come from the point on the edge of instability. Lead dress becomes the tool for tuning them. Trainwreck designs are built on that principle and also the reason there are some pretty horrendous sounding clones out there. People try to replicate from a picture or another amp, but every one is it's own entity with it's own needs.

I apologise if I've sent the thread in a different direction....but I guess I like to stir up some different thoughts rather than the usual cliches.

I don't have buzzy amps and I certainly don't make amps, but what you say makes sense. I trust those who make them to make them well. Too many clubs and venues have bad power and I don't need anymore noise than necessary from the amp itself. You seem like a knowledgeable and well spoken fellow...it's nice to see you speak your mind and share info.

Cool.