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Calling all Geezers...

#141
D.M.N. said:
No, it's a Reeves. They're an american company who makes boutique replicas of old Hiwatts, all handwired and what not. I don't believe Hiwatts were ever branded "Reeves" in the 60s, they were always labeled as Sound City, with a Hiwatt badge on the chassis.

Welcome to Reeves Amplification
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Coulda swore that I read somewhere on the Intertubes that there were Reeves-branded amps back before those labeled Hiwatts, but such info can't always be deemed reliable. I knew about the Sound City connection to Dave Reeves, being an old Hiwatt guy (finally sold off my 1970 DR103 a couple years back - it had become too valuable to haul around and use in clubs).

Those Reeves amps do look mondo cool, though. Will definitely check them out.
 
#142
I played bass in bands on Long Island throughout my high school years, 1965-69. My bass was a '65 Hagstrom - I wish I still had it. My amp was a Fender Bassman with 2-12s, although I might have started out with something different (can't remember what) and gotten the Bassman around 1967 or so.
 
#146
My name is Mudd said:
Everything old is new again.
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And that "sort of" befuddles me.....:atoz:

Don't get me wrong, I am LOVING seeing the remakes of the old stuff, but what does that say about the whole thing??

I mean, what's next?? The Baldwin Exterminator?? :D

Honestly though, I happen to believe that the "old stuff" still, to this day, looks a hell of a lot better than the new "boutique" stuff...

Sort of like comparing a 57 T-Bird to a 2011 Toyota Hybrid...:rollno:

Give me that damn T-Bird any day of the week and twice on Sunday's!!
 
#147
Codger said:
I remember an amp called a Coral. Two cabs, each with 3 twelves? I'm sure I'm wrong. The purple haze is in my mind and is fogging it somewhat.
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Coral was DanElectro's amp line. I think it only lasted from 1967-1970 or so. Coral was also an alternate DanElectro guitar brand (to differentiate from the Silvertones they were also making for Sears). At this point, Nathan Daniel had already sold the company to MCA but was still working with them. MCA closed DanElectro's US factory down in 1969.
 
#148
#149
Dano was the affordable option to Fender, Gibson, Guild, or Gretsch when I was coming up. I remember being able to afford a new Danelectro or Silvertone or a used Fender Pbass. I chose the Fender but always admired the Danos which were so much better than the Japanese stuff flooding the market in the 60's. Lots of Danos (and Ampegs) where I was (NJ). Danelectro was in Neptune, where I was born and Ampeg in Linden, just 20 miles from where I grew up. Vitually NO Rickenbackers. Funny the regional differences.

BTW the late 90s Korean Dano reissues were pretty true to the originals and are wearing well. I have both a bass and a baritone that just kill.
 
#151
Among amps available in '68, I'd probably choose Sunn 2000S, silverface Bassman, Selmer Treble 'n' Bass 100w version, or a Marshall Superbass. Among cabs, I'd likely favor a Sunn 2x15 with JBLs or a Goodman loaded Selmer cab. I've owned a 1968 Fender 2x15 cab (it was either a Showman or Bassman cab) and I did not particularly like it.

More powerful options became available in 1969 with the start of the Ampeg SVT + 8x10 flatbacks and Hiwatt DR201 + Fane loaded 4x15 and 2x15 cabs. The biggers monster, Fender 400PS and Hiwatt DR405, debuted in 1970 I believe.

edbass said:
Sound City and Hiwatt were two entirely different entities, both UK companies.
It's my understanding that Dave Reeves did in fact built some amps for Sound City, but they didn't have "Hiwatt" anywhere on them, although many of the few actually built by Reeves did have "Hylight Electronics" (the name Dave Reeves registered in 1966) stickers inside the chassis.
I think he was actually still employed by Mullard as his “day job” at the time, and was moonlighting by building the Sound City amps for Arbiter in his garage in the evenings (Ivor Arbitor owned a music store called “Sound City”, and “Sound City” amps were the house brand, kind of like Acoustic and MarkBass are with Guitar Center nowadays).
The way I understand it, Reeves only actually assembled one batch of amps for Sound City, and then concentrated of developing his own, "Hiwatt" brand of amps after Mullard fired him, using his severance for startup money. After this emergence of the “Hiwatt” brand however, for a short time Hylight did produce amps for Macari LTD., a MI distributor in the UK, under the name “Sola Sound”; more rare than Sound City amps, but probably as much or more of a “Hiwatt by another name” than the Sound City. Pure speculation on my part though, as I’ve never even seen a “Sola Sound” amplifier.
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This is basically correct, although Dave Reeves was laid off from Mullard in 1966 before he supplied amps to Ivor Arbiter's Sound City Stores. The first 'Hiwatt' labeled amp was built in 1964, but Reeves built amps much more prolifically after the Sound City contract started. Most or all of the amps supplied by Hiwatt to SC were the Sound City 'One Hundred' 100w amp, which was basically the same as the Hiwatt CP103 amp (4 channels, 5 preamp tubes, no mid knob, no presence knob). The 'Hiwatt' label was on the chassis and 'Hylight Electronics' was on the serial tag. The front of the headbox and the control panel were labeled 'Sound City'. These amps are now known as the Mark 1 series since the later SC amps were Mark 2, Mark 3, Mark 4, and Mark 5. Pete Townshend and John Entwistle of The Who bought some of those Mark 1 Sound City built by Hiwatt. Pete wanted to amps to be modified with linked inputs/channels, and the Sound City store refused so he went straight to the builder, Dave Reeves. For the next 10+ years, Pete used Hiwatt CP103 amps when performing live, although mostly used Fender in the studio as far as I can tell. Bassist John Entwistle used Hiwatt until the early 70s when he began using Sunn amps for the most part.

Arbiter merged with Dallas Music to become Dallas-Arbiter around late '67 or early 68 and the people at Dallas built the Sound City amps from that point forward. After early '68, there was no link between Hiwatt and Sound City. The Mark 2 and Mark 3 amps (1968 to 1969) were similar to Hiwatt DR103/DR201 amps, but the Mark 4 amps and beyond were completely different animals with active preamp circuit and constantly evolving layout.
 
#152
I would have to go with this.

index.php


VOX 2x18 + VOX 4 Series 4120.

2x18, 120w tube power amp with a solid state pre amp.
 
#153
I started playing paying gigs at age 16 in 1965. At that point 90% of bass amps were white tolex bassman or black face bassman amps. The rest were either the dual showman (for people with money) or the ampeg B15. There weren't many B15's around but they sounded fantastic in the smaller venues.

By 67 or 68 the Sunn's, Kustoms and Traynors, and some VOX's were starting to appear in ever greater numbers. There were lots of other makes but they weren't being used by serious players.

Standel amps have been mentioned by a few people earlier. I recall them briefly. They were rare. We all thought they were gutless junk.

For basses there were precisions and jazzes and EB-0's. Period. I don't recall ever seeing a Ric in the 60's. The Hofner violin style basses started to appear in around 66. By 67 or 68 there were lots of cheezy imported basses starting to appear but the main types listed above were still the norm for the serious gigging players.

A lot of people also did the DIY thing for bass cabs and amps back then.

The strap that came with Fenders was the Bobby Lee. A skinny brown leather thing with a thin layer of white felt sown on the back. I still have one.

No one had stands. You leaned the guitars on the amps or better yet took them back stage during breaks.

Microphones were usually Shure 545's (The ones with the hinge and the buit in on/off switch) or EV 676's. The EV's were smoother but the Shure's cut through better when the volume levels went up.

The PA we had in 68 was 5 EV 676's, a small Shure mic mixer, a Dynachord tape loop echo, a Bogen Challenger 100 watt PA amp (all this was tubes), a large Traynor columns. We had no monitoring system. No one did.

This was a great idea for a thread.
 
#156
GML said:
I started playing paying gigs at age 16 in 1965. At that point 90% of bass amps were white tolex bassman or black face bassman amps. The rest were either the dual showman (for people with money) or the ampeg B15. There weren't many B15's around but they sounded fantastic in the smaller venues.

By 67 or 68 the Sunn's, Kustoms and Traynors, and some VOX's were starting to appear in ever greater numbers. There were lots of other makes but they weren't being used by serious players.

Standel amps have been mentioned by a few people earlier. I recall them briefly. They were rare. We all thought they were gutless junk.

For basses there were precisions and jazzes and EB-0's. Period. I don't recall ever seeing a Ric in the 60's. The Hofner violin style basses started to appear in around 66. By 67 or 68 there were lots of cheezy imported basses starting to appear but the main types listed above were still the norm for the serious gigging players.

A lot of people also did the DIY thing for bass cabs and amps back then.

The strap that came with Fenders was the Bobby Lee. A skinny brown leather thing with a thin layer of white felt sown on the back. I still have one.

No one had stands. You leaned the guitars on the amps or better yet took them back stage during breaks.

Microphones were usually Shure 545's (The ones with the hinge and the buit in on/off switch) or EV 676's. The EV's were smoother but the Shure's cut through better when the volume levels went up.

The PA we had in 68 was 5 EV 676's, a small Shure mic mixer, a Dynachord tape loop echo, a Bogen Challenger 100 watt PA amp (all this was tubes), a large Traynor columns. We had no monitoring system. No one did.

This was a great idea for a thread.
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Man you've got great memory recall for someone who grew up in the 60's.:smug:
This thread has been great reading and is really giving me lots of ideas on how to equip a 1968 players environment. Thanks for the great post and attention to detail.
 
#158
BoulderBassist said:
Played all of the above! Have pictures of me playing an outdoor gig as a young player My original P through a Standel with a powered bottom and pre-amp top. Hardly gutless! Wish I could get it back.
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Hey, wait a minute BoulderBassist - I was in Boulder in the late 60's (well actually going to school in Nederland). Were you there back then? Interesting place to grow up at that time in the counter culture revolution. Kind of a Rocky Mountain version of San Francisco or Berkley.
 
#159
BoulderBassist said:
Played all of the above! Have pictures of me playing an outdoor gig as a young player My original P through a Standel with a powered bottom and pre-amp top. Hardly gutless! Wish I could get it back.
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Post the pic if you can, we'd love to see it. There's a few others on this thread as well, all great. Funny to see the big side burns, bell bottoms, puffy sleeves, head bands and granny glasses vs today's jeans and a tee shirt.
 

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