Need a cabinet recommendation

[pdshane]

I have a 1966 Bassman amp, but no cab. What would be the best cabinet for (a) plain bass use and (b) guitar use? Thanks.

 

[Lostgallifreyan]

I won't suggest a maker, but I think a 2x10 or 4x10 with a high quality treble horn is the most likely form of cab that will sound good for both instruments.

Remaining details of tone (that are not based on the instrument and method of playing it) will mostly be down to the preamp and its controls, I suggest driving that cab with a clean Class D power amp for efficiency. Then add whatever effects you use normally with each instrument.

This method will be versatile, and likely easily optimised for either instrument. It won't force ugly and expensive compromises.

 

[Michedelic]

I have a 1966 Bassman amp, but no cab. What would be the best cabinet for (a) plain bass use and (b) guitar use? Thanks.

Define your goals, and what your playing context is. You’re working with 50 watts, what kind of music are you playing? What are the guitar amp(s) you’re up against? Are you going for an old school sound? I would go with individual cabs for each task.
For guitar, ironically, using a 2x12” approximating the size of the woefully inadequate(for bass)speaker cabs that came with them back in the day would work great; guitarists have long known this. Maybe even a single 12”, which brand is a matter of taste.
For bass, there’s all sorts of options. For a classic sound, one or two 15’s would do, but efficient drivers in more modern cab designs will get you farther. For a more forward sound, a 4x10 is a proper default, but if it has a tweeter it may sound lousy for guitar, plus maybe too bassy. It’s not going to be like a Super Reverb or blonde Concert.

 

[pdshane]

Lostgallifreyan and Michedelic: These responses have been very helpful. Thank you very much.

 

[Redbrangus]

While not completely mutually exclusive, your two goals -- a bass cab and a guitar cab -- are two different things. If you optimize the cab for bass, it isn't going to be a particularly good guitar cab, and the inverse is also true, maybe more so. You do need the most efficient drivers you can get, given the low power available, and it has to be a 4-ohm cab because that's what that amp needs to see. If I were trying to build something that served this compromised goal, I would start with two 12" Neodymium drivers in a modest sized bass-reflex enclosure -- maybe only slightly larger than the 212 cabs these amps originally came with. The regular Eminence 3012, not the LF version, would work well for this purpose, but I don't know what a commercially available equivalent cab would be.

 

[pdshane]

Thanks, Red. You folks are pointing out stuff of which I do not have a clue.

 

[Jazzdogg]

I have had a '65 Bassman blackface for as long as I can remember. It's my favorite low volume bass amp, but, although the 2x12 cabinet sucks for bass, guitarists seem to LOVE it.

I would recommend a cabinet with fairly high sensitivity if you want much volume.
I am VERY happy using mine with a Crazy88 cabinet, but didn't care for the sound with my VL208. It also sounds good with my Wizzy12M.

 

[pdshane]

Crazy88? Thanks. I'll check it out.

 

[57pbass]

Check out a Bag End S12-B
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[Lostgallifreyan]

Thanks, Red. You folks are pointing out stuff of which I do not have a clue.

It's a deep rabbit hole. Bring your red pills.

My reasoning for a choice of 4x10 is this, starting with a specific history, and using a specific maker's cab as example.

JJ Burnel (Stranglers) started by using a guitar amp, and a guitar cab, for bass. He cranked up the high end to cut through the other sounds. The result became a mainstay of his and many other people's sound, but was not kind to the 12" drivers in his 4x12 cab. Later he had an 8x10 which fared better, but was inconvenient.

Years later, after many changes, he settled on an Ashdown ABM 4x10. These can be 4 or 8 ohms, it depends on the drivers and internal wiring detail which you get if you buy one. They have a single treble horn, with a switch for off/half/full horn output. He chose this for reasons that I took to mean it would work for guitar as well as bass, given how his sound originated.

There are many posts on TB saying that a guitar should have some high-pass filtering to make room for bass harmonics. This same method will reduce any bass-heavy sound when using a guitar through the Ashdown bass cab. Likewise, the treble horn's switch can easily remove nasty HF that makes the guitar sound more strident than you want.

If the cab is mounted on the floor, boundary effect will let it do a very good job for extended bass frequency response, and if you like bright hard-edged bass, switch the horn on. If you want guitar through it, use high-pass filtering, and switch the horn off.

This IS compromise, for sure, but it's CHEAP compromise, using existing signal-level gear and a horn switch, and it's likely to sound very good in this example because the cab was designed to support the kind of brightness usually wanted from a guitar, as well as for bass.

I'm sure other makers can satisfy this need, certainly Trace Elliott can, so part of the way to look for alternatives is to find out who chooses them for bright-sounding as well as hefty bass. That's a long list these days. Specially for metal..

 

[pdshane]

That was brilliant. I hadn't considered the horn aspect. I noodle with jazz guitar and jazz bass with nylon strings and so prefer a pretty bassy tone and long legato phrasing. No slapping or metal or anything like that. A deep classic sound.

 

[matante]

There's a Fender Bassman 4x10 combo from the '60s which was designed for bass, obviously, and is popular with guitarists. I think it hits 6 kHz on the high end, so that should sound good for guitar or bass. The Barefaced four10 cab might be a good option. If it's too bassy when playing guitar that would be an easy fix with EQ.

 

[Lostgallifreyan]

That was brilliant. I hadn't considered the horn aspect. I noodle with jazz guitar and jazz bass with nylon strings and so prefer a pretty bassy tone and long legato phrasing.

That could definitely still work in the context I described. JJ Burnel was classically trained on guitar, and while his bass sound is hard and uses a little overdrive to get a biting edge on it, it's basically a clean sound, and when I got close to it in my own efforts, I found that the bass sound played without a pick is a very clear open sound, fairly natural. A good guitar player, visiting me once, said the sound was 'honest'. I thought that was odd because of the effort I had to put in to get the tonal balance as I wanted it, but it IS a very natural sort of sound, it would be great for folk music even played on a p-bass. I'm also a big fan of legato phrasing. A little EQ might be all you need to adjust the balance as you like it, especially if your instruments have wide-ranging tone control.

One way to find out if you can, is to take instruments and EQ to a place where you can find cabs. If they're in a big place, sat on the floor, so much the better, the result should be something you can base a decision on. That way you can use advice here to make it easier to know which to try first. A lot of people here would say 'go with what you like', so it's worth taking a day if needed to reach some big shop beyond normal easy reach. Good info might reduce that to less than half a day.

 

[bigdaddybass12]

A cabinet that comes with a new amp!! 1966?? I’d display it in the bookcase!

 

[pdshane]

1966. It was a very good year. I was 11. I originally got it when I was in high school for $50. It sounded great with a 412 slant cabinet, but I don't need that much noise power just screwing around at home.