Vox Bass amp?

[MODELL]

I was reading a Beatles book over the Holiday at my father-in-law's and noticed pictures from 1964 of the Beatles on stage. John and George had Vox guitar amps and Paul hada Vox amp that was vertical and must have been an early bass amp. Does anyone know the specifics of his amps back then? I wonder how much this contributed to his sound? There is so much talk about his Hofner, but this amp has some vintage vibe for sure.

[Thornton Davis]

Those photos would be of his AC100 (amp head) and T100 (2x15 cab). The cabinet was mounted onto the cart/stand for portability.

TD

[BassmanPaul]

Not necessarily. Paul used the T60 for a short while. Short while 'cos they tended to self destruct! The T60 has a 12 and a 15 in a vertical cabinet.

[dbase]

The T60 was the worst bass amp I ever played. It would heat up and fart out. McCartney had work done on his amps. I never like the combination of a Hofner and Vox .. sounded to cardboardy (if there is such a word). I sold Vox amps in the 60's for the Wurlitzer Organ Co. and the whole line of amps including the Super Beatle was not all that it was cracked up to be. Fender and Ampeg was always better sounding.

[Duke21]

I love the sound of a bass through an AC30. Add an Ibanez tube screamer or some mild distortion/ overdrive stompbox in front of it and you get a very nice and aggressive sound. Quite rough vintage sound that cuts through everything like hot knife through butter. Always nice to upset the guitar player!

[BassmanPaul]

I once borrowed an AC30B to play the Silver Blades ice rink on Kensington Road in Liverpool England. The thing was doing a dance all over the stage but giving virtually no distortion that I can remember. One of the fond memories from way back then.

[BassmanPaul]

Originally Posted by dbase

The T60 was the worst bass amp I ever played. It would heat up and fart out. McCartney had work done on his amps. I never like the combination of a Hofner and Vox .. sounded to cardboardy (if there is such a word). I sold Vox amps in the 60's for the Wurlitzer Organ Co. and the whole line of amps including the Super Beatle was not all that it was cracked up to be. Fender and Ampeg was always better sounding.

You have to remember that the T60 was at the leading edge of the incoming wave of SS amps. It just used its aluminium chassis as the heat sink and IIRC used Germanium semiconductors. A lot of that first wave had less than stellar reliability. In the early '70s I played through a more modern VOX 100W SS amp head that was very reliable.

[blackba]

According to 'Beatles Gear' by Andy Babiuk (Great book BTW if you are fan). It was an AC100 in 1964. I have a '66 Vox AC50 and have always wanted to try my Jazz bass through it, but I only have 4ohm bass cabs and the AC50 only has 8ohm and 16ohm outputs. I am not gutsy enough to run the amp on an impedance missmatch, this is a Vox afterall.

[Mugwump]

I don't know how I stumbled upon this, but pretty cool. Reproductions of Vox.

http://www.voxshowroom.com/northcoas...ets/index.html

[BassmanPaul]

Originally Posted by blackba

According to 'Beatles Gear' by Andy Babiuk (Great book BTW if you are fan). It was an AC100 in 1964. I have a '66 Vox AC50 and have always wanted to try my Jazz bass through it, but I only have 4ohm bass cabs and the AC50 only has 8ohm and 16ohm outputs. I am not gutsy enough to run the amp on an impedance missmatch, this is a Vox afterall.

The AC50 was originally paired with the 18" Foundation cabinet. It was the first amp I ever bought. The cabinet didn't even have handles!!! I added a pair. Mine came with a Tannoy driver. At the time the majority of UK made drivers were 15Ω. These eventually got rounded up to 16Ω to match up with US made drivers.

UK used 3.75Ω, 7.5Ω and 15Ω impedances.