I remember Standel amps. Sort of reminded me of Silertones of the day.
Funny you should show the Plush amps/cabs. There were two full stacks of Plush amps at the music store in Lincoln, NE when I bought my Standel. I remember thinking they were Kustom amps at first because I hadn't seen tuck and roll on any other amps/cabs at that point and then I read the brand as Plush. I tried out both stacks of Plush. I thought maybe something was wrong with the first one because it had two cabs stacked one on top of the other (don't remember if they were 212 cabs or 215) and they looked impressive but the sound was just too low. So I had him plug in the second double stack and it wasn't any better. Come to find out they had all of 100-watts rms, which was more than the Dual Showman I had come in looking for, but they just weren't loud enough to compete with the two Vox Super Beatle amps my guitarist and keys player had.
Was ready to give up for now when the salesman pointed out the smaller (single 215 cab plus head) Standel piggy-back amp. Tried that and almost shook everything off the walls. Gave me a good price and gave me $400 trade-in for my '66 blackface Fender Bassman amp (cost me $449 new in '66) and I walked out with it that afternoon and used it that night. Our keys player also bought a Fender Rhodes stage piano (Piano only without the amp you usually see attached to it), and the owner had to come to Little Bo's that night to see who the band was that dropped $2000 in his shop that afternoon. In today's money that's the same as casually coming into the shop and dropping $13,482. Salesman definitely made a nice commission off of our purchases.
That Plush gear really had a nice look though. Glad to hear you still have yours. If you're interested in trying to find a replacement or a repair, check with
@agedhorse. He has a pretty good handle on available parts/pieces and substitutions on that era of speakers. Wish I still had my Standel, but it was stolen in 1976 along with my '65 Jazz.[/QUOTE]
I remember Standel amps. Sort of reminded me of Silertones of the day.[/QUOTE]
NO...not at all. They were for the most part Boutique amps and some of the first solid state amp. The Silvertone amps in the 60's and early 70's were junk that you bought when you couldn't afford a real amp. Lots of times in the mid-60's they were an intermediate step that a guitarist could use until he gigged enough to buy a Fender, Gibson, Guild or other good quality amp. Silvertone never made a decent bass amp.
My particular Standel amp was incredibly clear and loud. One of the problems I had with my '66 Fender Bassman that I bought new in 1966 ($449 new) was that if I turned it up just a touch over 7 on the dial it would distort badly in an ugly way. For the first few months I was able to run it at 5 on the dial and everything was fine. Then the guitarist and keys player both bought Vox Super Beatle amps (120 or 125-watt rms - forgot which), and just buried me. Guitar player kept telling me to turn up and I couldn't. So I went bass amp shopping planning on getting a Dual Showman while we were in Lincoln, NE for a couple of weeks. Hospe music in Lincoln, had just sold their last one and their Omaha store was also out. So I went through pretty much every bass amp they had in their "Bass-ment".
After going through most of his stock, I told the sales guy I needed something that could hang with the Vox Super Beatle amps without distorting. When he showed me the comparatively short and deep Standel piggy-back MC2b/SAM30b. He said, you could play a low E on this one turned all the way up and it won't distort at all because of its bass reflex design, which takes all the air coming out the back of the speaker and channels it around the back out the 4 round ports mounted vertically in front next to its two 15" speakers (CTS speakers). He popped the front of the grill(e) off so I could see what he was talking about. He further said that with most speaker cabs the vibrations coming out the back will bounce of the back of the cab and come back to hit the speaker causing it to start distorting once enough bounce-back pressure built.
I played it for a bit on about #4 on the dial which sounded good and certainly got everyone else's attention in the room, and then told him I was going to put his claim to the test. He said, "Go for it". I turned it all the way up to 10 and then hit the low E string on my '65 Jazz. It freaking shook the walls of that Bass-ment. And it was absolutely clear. I was impressed. The amp was already marked down to $950 from $1,150, and he gave me another $100 off because the grill cover on the head had a noticeable snag on it. I told him I had a '66 Blackface Fender Bassman amp and asked what he'd give me as a trade-in for it. Said he'd be happy to take it as a trade-in but he'd need to see it.
So we went back over to Little Bo's (large club - capacity of over 700); pulled my amp off stage into our van and took it back. His eyes got wide and gleeful when he saw it and he said, "I can give you $400 trade-in for it, so your price would be $450 out the door for the Standel. I gave him the $450, he kept my 5-year old Bassman (not bad, cost me just $49 for 5-years use), and we loaded up my new Standel Amp. I used it that night and set it on #5. Stage volume was fine but folks against the far back wall were covering their ears. So our female vocalist walked out off the stage and into the audience and right to the back wall. She came back and said you are WAY too loud. So I turned it down to #4 and she did it again. She shook her head and motioned for me to turn it down more. Tried 3½ ---nope, and then finally #3 on the dial (equivalent to 9 o'clock). Then she gave me the OK sign.
It was a bit of a weird amp to try to judge how loud it was. Up close it didn't sound that loud although if I stood in front of the ports, it would flap my bell bottoms. But walk off the stage to about 20-feet away and it was really loud, far louder than stage volume. I basically had to run it for the rest of the time I had it at #3 or lower. However, when playing outdoors in wide open spaces, I could turn it up to 5. With a little experience I found out it was louder than either the acoustic 360/361 (also a powered speaker 200-watt amp) or the new Ampeg SVT (300-watt tube) with 810.
The amp actually used powered speakers so the amps were in the cab. Each of those CTS 15" speakers had its own 100-watt rms amp hooked up to it and the head was the preamp. The bottom back of it also had a line out to send that preamp signal to the input on another cab. You could daisy chain those guys forever and never worry about ohms load because you were actually slaving every other cab you hooked up and if you turned up the volume on the first one, they all turned up at the same time. They were also made with 4 round recesses on top so you could stack them two high if you wanted. You would need help to do that because those powered cabs weren't light.
After touring for three years, the group went their separate ways and although I had an offer to play for another group that was just getting into the Nevada circuit, my wife and I had a kid coming and taking a kid on tour is a disaster. So I had to get a "normal" job. I continued to play weekends with a group in the LA area call the L.A. Smogg and did a little recording for ATCO, which went nowhere. Then in early 1976 our house was robbed and they took my Standel amp, my two Shure mics, and my 1965 Fender Jazz that I had purchased in 1966. Just like that, one day I had all my touring gear and the next day it was all gone. All my gear now is insured and my DNA cabs also come RFID chipped.
Anyhow, here's a shot from 1972 where you can see at least part of my Standel amp next to my guitarist's Vox Super Beatle. My guitarist was Steve Bivins (RIP). My Standel is about twice as deep as his Vox Super Beatle. And that's my '65 Jazz bass I'm playing:
So, NO, that Standel is nothing at all like a piece of junk Silvertone.
