Best hard rock heads/Pre amps?

[litlock123]

What are some of the best tube bass pre amps for hard rock?

[johnk_10]

IMO, the Ampeg SVP-CL, and possibly their SVP-Pro, but IME, i can get a Sansamp PSA-1 do it easily as well.

[silky smoove]

Originally Posted by johnk_10

IMO, the Ampeg SVP-CL, and possibly their SVP-Pro, but IME, i can get a Sansamp PSA-1 do it easily as well.

+1

The old Billy Sheehan preamp was a great pre for rock tone as well.

The Sansamp stuff, despite not having a tube, does sound more like a tube amp to me than most preamps that have a single 12AX7. The VT Bass would be, without question, my choice for playing hard rock. In fact, I'm currently using one to play bass in the studio for an 80's hair metal/butt rock band.

[cableguy]

IMO The Tech 21 Sansamp RBI gets a great rock tone. I personally like a little grit to my tone for harder rock and the RBI with my G&L L1505 is awesome.

[scottbass]

I played a Sansamp RBI for a couple of years and had figured out how to dial it in to get the most Ampeg-like tone posssible. It sounded great, but I eventually replaced it with an Ampeg SVP-Pro because I wanted the complete deal, that all-tube Ampeg sound. Guess what? I can't really tell the difference until I crank the Ampeg drive control into the high-distortion part its range. And I never use that much distortion when I'm gigging.

[Son of Bovril]

that depends on your taste in Hard rock I guess... are you looking for tube tone/overdriven tubes or a clean cutting tone?

I play heavy hard rock in my one band and IME I always find my ebs microbass II pre to have the cleanest tone for cutting through a dense guitar and loud drum mix (they use ebs a lot in the european metal bands too). on the other hand, for the new stuff I will be using either a sansamp VT to get more of an ampeg driven tone pedal or my fender tbp-1 pre (has both a thick tubey clean and a distortion channel)

I've experimented with the eden navigator but it doesn't seem to do the hard rock thing as easily as the others (ie. it just takes more time to dial in...) I've also tried the RBI which is great for overdriven tones but I would go with the RPM if you prefer a clean tone to an overdriven one as it has better mid control

SWR or Trace Elliot pre's are great too if you can get you hands on one plus any of the ampeg ones should give you a good tone

[Sten]

I replaced the SVP-Pro with the RBI and I will never look back. Amazing sound, and much, much more reliable. Will get you anything from nice mellow tubey sound through nice overdrive into saturated fuzz-like distortion. And no tubes to worry damaging about.

[litlock123]

awesome guys thanks a bunch. Im thinkin about lookin into the sansamp stuff, maybe even a boogie? idk. I may even want an all tube pre.