Boy, I sure blew it. Had me a nice little Markbass combo that did everything I needed and sounded great for its size. Bring it and a bass and a cable to a gig and you're out of there like a trumpet player at the end of the night. But that wasn't good enough for me. I had to completely overhaul my 69 SVT that had been sitting dormant for over 10 years. It took over a year but it finally looks like it's fixed for good. So I just had to take it to my gig tonight...
Bought it in 87, I think, for $650. Organist Doug Ingle of Iron Butterfly owned it and ran it ragged. All the speakers were shot in it, and I never had enough money to get it restored properly, so even though it sounded great to me, I never really heard it at its full potential. But last year I decided to have it restored. I knew it was a very early SVT, but I soon found out it was one of the very first SVT's ever made. So I spared no expense to get it up to technical speed. Had all the CTS speakers reconed. Had the head completely overhauled and a really stupid repair by an incompetent tech undone. All the tubes were replaced with NOS tubes (power tubes are 6146B's), and every single cap was replaced, solder joints were all redone, and now I imagine it works just as it did in 69. I didn't redo any tolex so it still looks like crap, but I did throw a cheap grillcloth on it and bought a few new knobs.
Sounded great at home so I took it to my gig tonight to see how it would perform after all these years. I don't get emotional over my tones, but I honest to God never heard an SVT that sounded as good as this one. It made playing an absolute joy like I haven't felt for a long time. I thought my B-15 stack was an amazing amp, but never in my life have I played an amp this good. I was a little louder than normal but nowhere near what it's capable of, and every note popped out plain as day with tons of cojones.
Took me a little while to find the sweet spot, though. I started in channel 2 because it sounded the most B-15-like, but I went to channel 1 in the middle of the second set because it had more bottom. But when you set channel 1 flat, it sounds more like a 70's B-15 with the Thiele cab, and there's not much upper mid or high end to speak of in those Thiele cabs. A little trial and error brought the treble knob to almost 1:00, and that brought back the proper amount of attack and somehow brought a tad more upper mid out of it, too. Yeah, that's the sound! And that cab...man, if you never heard a straightback 810 loaded with freshly reconed and broken-in CTS's, then you have never heard an SVT, my friend! I'm sorry, but no cab on earth compares.
So how did I mess myself over? I'll tell you how...as heavy as it is, I don't think I can ever use another amp again. Tonight was the first night I ever heard this amp playing up to its full potential, and as good as everything else I own is, nothing else even comes close on a gig. Love the B-15's but this SVT is in a class by itself. And yeah, it probably weighs close to 250 lbs. total. But you know, it really wasn't nearly as horrible a load as I thought it would be. There were a couple deadlifts I could have done without, but setup and teardown was only slightly longer with the SVT. And if you use leverage, getting the cab up and down off the stage really isn't so bad. I'm sure I'll have some load-ins I'll desperately wish I had the B-15 for in the future, but I think I'm going to have to suck it up and just do it.
I also messed myself up by not restoring it a long time ago. I started to once, but abandoned the idea because of lack of money, and by the time it broke for good, I just decided the weight was too much to handle and the cost too high for a broke musician. But had I known I owned the holy grail of SVT's, I would have never gotten tired of lifting it. The way I felt after the gig, I could have torn it down and set it up somewhere else and kept on playing a few hours more.
And you know how everyone says on here that your rig only matters to you? Don't you believe it! I got compliments on the sound from the civilians in the crowd like I never got before. Turns out many of them actually do notice the sound of the bass. Could they have been listening with their eyes? Maybe, but the end result was the same so what do I care?
So now I've gone full circle from my beginnings and I'm back on the SVT bandwagon once again. It may look like hell, and it may weigh a ton, but it's a rare SVT like few have ever experienced, so I will lose weight and get back in shape so I can keep moving it on all these one-nighters I do
I didn't get to take any pics of it on the gig tonight, but here's a pic of the head right before I started the repair work. Doesn't look much different now:
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Bought it in 87, I think, for $650. Organist Doug Ingle of Iron Butterfly owned it and ran it ragged. All the speakers were shot in it, and I never had enough money to get it restored properly, so even though it sounded great to me, I never really heard it at its full potential. But last year I decided to have it restored. I knew it was a very early SVT, but I soon found out it was one of the very first SVT's ever made. So I spared no expense to get it up to technical speed. Had all the CTS speakers reconed. Had the head completely overhauled and a really stupid repair by an incompetent tech undone. All the tubes were replaced with NOS tubes (power tubes are 6146B's), and every single cap was replaced, solder joints were all redone, and now I imagine it works just as it did in 69. I didn't redo any tolex so it still looks like crap, but I did throw a cheap grillcloth on it and bought a few new knobs.
Sounded great at home so I took it to my gig tonight to see how it would perform after all these years. I don't get emotional over my tones, but I honest to God never heard an SVT that sounded as good as this one. It made playing an absolute joy like I haven't felt for a long time. I thought my B-15 stack was an amazing amp, but never in my life have I played an amp this good. I was a little louder than normal but nowhere near what it's capable of, and every note popped out plain as day with tons of cojones.
Took me a little while to find the sweet spot, though. I started in channel 2 because it sounded the most B-15-like, but I went to channel 1 in the middle of the second set because it had more bottom. But when you set channel 1 flat, it sounds more like a 70's B-15 with the Thiele cab, and there's not much upper mid or high end to speak of in those Thiele cabs. A little trial and error brought the treble knob to almost 1:00, and that brought back the proper amount of attack and somehow brought a tad more upper mid out of it, too. Yeah, that's the sound! And that cab...man, if you never heard a straightback 810 loaded with freshly reconed and broken-in CTS's, then you have never heard an SVT, my friend! I'm sorry, but no cab on earth compares.
So how did I mess myself over? I'll tell you how...as heavy as it is, I don't think I can ever use another amp again. Tonight was the first night I ever heard this amp playing up to its full potential, and as good as everything else I own is, nothing else even comes close on a gig. Love the B-15's but this SVT is in a class by itself. And yeah, it probably weighs close to 250 lbs. total. But you know, it really wasn't nearly as horrible a load as I thought it would be. There were a couple deadlifts I could have done without, but setup and teardown was only slightly longer with the SVT. And if you use leverage, getting the cab up and down off the stage really isn't so bad. I'm sure I'll have some load-ins I'll desperately wish I had the B-15 for in the future, but I think I'm going to have to suck it up and just do it.
I also messed myself up by not restoring it a long time ago. I started to once, but abandoned the idea because of lack of money, and by the time it broke for good, I just decided the weight was too much to handle and the cost too high for a broke musician. But had I known I owned the holy grail of SVT's, I would have never gotten tired of lifting it. The way I felt after the gig, I could have torn it down and set it up somewhere else and kept on playing a few hours more.
And you know how everyone says on here that your rig only matters to you? Don't you believe it! I got compliments on the sound from the civilians in the crowd like I never got before. Turns out many of them actually do notice the sound of the bass. Could they have been listening with their eyes? Maybe, but the end result was the same so what do I care?
So now I've gone full circle from my beginnings and I'm back on the SVT bandwagon once again. It may look like hell, and it may weigh a ton, but it's a rare SVT like few have ever experienced, so I will lose weight and get back in shape so I can keep moving it on all these one-nighters I do
I didn't get to take any pics of it on the gig tonight, but here's a pic of the head right before I started the repair work. Doesn't look much different now:
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I owned a pro 4 for a year and couldn't stand it. made me completely turn my head away from ampeg. but I think you just made me want to give em another shot. classic anyway
