Swr sound question

[djblackrain]

I've been playing electric bass for about 20 and recently at a gig I played through an Swr sm900 head hooked up to a 410 Goliath iii with 6 string ibanez. It was as if the heavens opened up an angels flew down and personally handed me the tone and sound I've been looking for the last 20 years. So my question is, is it the head or the cab that give Swr that signature sound?

[canadian*eh]

I would say it is the combination of the 2. I run and have both the goilath 410 and the megoliath 810...now for me i love there cabs but have not been totally sold on there heads...just not the sound i like...i go for the GK heads for what i do..so yes i have a lil bit of the swr sound but also a lil bit of the GK sound...and together they give me the sound that "I" Like for me it is 1 Swr Cab + 1Gk head= "My Sound"!

[bellis1]

Its definitely the combo. I had an SM900, with a Megoliath, and also a Goliath 3. My tone was about how you're describing yours. A few weeks later, for ***** and giggles, I paired it up with an Ampeg 4x10. Terrible idea.

[djblackrain]

You think the tone changes between all the sm series? Or is it just power output that changes?

[Kenner]

I own a SM-900 and go through an Ampeg 810 and love it.....I also use a GK 700RB/112 and love it.....but, I use a VT into a SABBDI to the both amps. The Sansamp made everything sing..I was very close to selling the SWR and getting a Thunderfunk 750. A better cab would've prolly been a better thing to change than the amp...I'd love to give the Goliath's a test drive

[fractal0243]

Originally Posted by canadian*eh

I would say it is the combination of the 2. I run and have both the goilath 410 and the megoliath 810...now for me i love there cabs but have not been totally sold on there heads...just not the sound i like...i go for the GK heads for what i do..so yes i have a lil bit of the swr sound but also a lil bit of the GK sound...and together they give me the sound that "I" Like for me it is 1 Swr Cab + 1Gk head= "My Sound"!

Same here. GK 1001rb + SWR Goliath III. It's my favorite tone.

[Ronny49]

I use the SWR SM 400 (which is 500 watts RMS) through a GoLight 410 cab and a Goliath 210 and love my sound. I am running stereo as I had been daisy chaining for some time and when I changed over to stereo... WOW... it really opened up, more so and I feel I get MORE sound than I did when I was daisy chaining.

But I had tried the SWR head through other cabs and never sounded as good as when plugged into the SWR cab and vise versa. SWR should be complete SWR. Besides, I am one of those that like matching gear! I will be purchasing a matching GoLight 15" cab and selling the Goliath 210.

Welcome to the SWR world!

[mtripper]

I think it's both as well but more influenced by the head then the cab. I haven't played a cab with the same amount of high end capability of the swr, although I also haven't played as much as a lot of you guys. I have a carvin brx cab that with the tweeter all the way up is close to the swr at about half. The brx is close to the swr but a little darker and not quite as punchy. I believe all the sm products have the same tone stack.

I had a chance to try out the marcus miller sealed golite cab the other day next to the normal ported golite cab and they were both great sounding. The mm was slightly more punchy but gave up a little low end to the normal ported one.

[djblackrain]

Thank you all for your replies, so bottom line get an sm series head so the DI out to the FOH retains the tone and a Goliath cab.

[mtripper]

Or a headlite which has the sm voicing if you want something physically smaller. I would look at the ported golite cabs as well because they sound like the goliath cabs but are much lighter. I can't get the goliaths loaded myself anymore

[Son of Bovril]

they totally need to come out with a Golite 810