I weep for some musicians

MIKA-the-better-one · 2011-02-25T12:24:07+00:00

Last night I had the great oppurtunity at a show, to borrow a Vox ac30 HW (older edition) I was so excited to try this out with my gear. SO I got straight into trying ot make it sound great. Now as I know Ac30's a little bit, and I know my sound quite well, I ended up putting the top bost channel up to about 2/3 volume So it was a little crunchy clean...... Just the way I like it I played my show (we play notoriously loud) but it was infact not as loud as when i use my bassman Now When the next 2 bands got on, they proceeded to freak out that I had my amp so loud and they couldnt beleive I did that (actually they said that to both of us guitarists) They then went on to use the amps, and I noticed they set them to, about 1/5 of the volume, so what proceeded was a very thin/ crap sound. May I add they were supposed to be rock n roll bands however there was no hint of that in there setup or sound Lastr band got on, and guess what they cranked the amps, and it sounded GREAT........ But really now, there is a issue here......

Reinhard

It seems amp choice is crucial for SA venues. I have been using a fender deluxe reverb, which is perfect: small, great tone not too loud. Now here comes the problem. If the monitor doesn't work properly I can forget about hearing myself. The amp gets lost in the stage volume. The turning it up just means less headroom and more drive.
At the little known blues fest my monitor dropped me and as it was an open air gig, the DR just disappeared. Out of frustration I went for a head and 2x12 cab. The head is all valve, hand wired. Two channels, the 2nd having a gain control, high and low gain input, 15 or 30w. Thus far I have only been running it at 15w, but it seems like this setup gives me headroom, more than enough power, and a 2x12 packs some nice punch. Even at 15w it kicks the DR butt. Looking forward to running it at our next gig, but at practice it it hangs with Nick's PV classic 30. In a perfect world with great PAs the DR would have been king.

Jack-Flash-Jr

Reinhard wrote It seems amp choice is crucial for SA venues. I have been using a fender deluxe reverb, which is perfect: small, great tone not too loud. Now here comes the problem. If the monitor doesn't work properly I can forget about hearing myself. The amp gets lost in the stage volume. The turning it up just means less headroom and more drive.
At the little known blues fest my monitor dropped me and as it was an open air gig, the DR just disappeared. Out of frustration I went for a head and 2x12 cab. The head is all valve, hand wired. Two channels, the 2nd having a gain control, high and low gain input, 15 or 30w. Thus far I have only been running it at 15w, but it seems like this setup gives me headroom, more than enough power, and a 2x12 packs some nice punch. Even at 15w it kicks the DR butt. Looking forward to running it at our next gig, but at practice it it hangs with Nick's PV classic 30. In a perfect world with great PAs the DR would have been king.

We all struggled with the monitoring at that gig... Sounded like Singe's vocals could be heard on mars and nothing else. When we listened to clips from the show we actually sounded fine to the crowd. Maybe the Tings engineer just needed to up the vox...

Renesongs

Yeah I'll 2nd that the stage monitoring at the LKBF was just plainly kak. I don't think the right side monitor was working at all.

Reinhard

Renesongs wrote Yeah I'll 2nd that the stage monitoring at the LKBF was just plainly kak. I don't think the right side monitor was working at all.

Yeh man, I was on the right side and ended up using Fritz's monitor for solos.

nicovlogg

Let me steer the discussion back to the original topic - when I play live, I like to play loud. Loud enough that there's a visceral force to the sound - I want to feel the bass kicking in my back. But not so loud that the front row has hearing loss the next day still. It's easy enough to know where that point is on my amp (15watt Vox Night Train), it's very near max. When I play a bigger outdoor show, I have a 4x12, small show, 1x12. The rest is up to the sound guy. My stage volume should be low enough for me to hear what's going on with the other musos, but also loud enough to get the best from the amp, and I think what's more important, to really enjoy it. Besides for the fact that you want good tone, it's so hard to enjoy playing too softly. You can't rock and roll at 1...

MIKA-the-better-one

The gig at tings and times, was funny enough onstage a great mix for me....... But as mentioned the amps do overpower smaller PA's........ its all about makng sure the sound guy knows what PA is needed.
However it takes a good engineer to get the right sounds..... I have used a 15 watt blues jnr once, and found it did not cut it live, the PA's sound never really pushed it just right, I also find alot of engineers dont mix the sound to each band, but rather to what they think every band should sound like, and that is easier for them to do.... again engineer is key.

A fender twin and bassman, are not the easiest things to use, but my goodness they sound good, better than most amps I have found. Will I opt for something smaller in the future, yes..... a Fender vibrolux or ac30, but thats preferance rather than to accomodate.

My main argument is with the fact that certain bands need decent gear and to know how to use it for them to sound right.

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