This. A conversation about watts is meaningless without talking about speakers at the same time. Lots of cabs are not efficient, if you use those you need way more watts. If you use more efficient designs you don’t. That’s it.
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Re-evaluating amp watts I need at live shows
- Thread starter bass4u
- Start date
This. A conversation about watts is meaningless without talking about speakers at the same time. Lots of cabs are not efficient, if you use those you need way more watts. If you use more efficient designs you don’t. That’s it.
I use a super 212 and an 800 watt amp for bar gigs. It's lighter, smaller and better sounding than my 410 at any volume. I rarely need more than a touch of juice. I played 2 gigs last year, one in a club and one outside where the pa sucked and I had to carry the gig with my rig. Having the extra firepower saved the day. I'd rather have the power and not need it than need it and not have it. The head and cab combined weigh 45 lbs. So I wouldn't say I need it, until I do. In that case, I do indeed love the overkill.
I second that. I have an ELF and it can push an Ampeg 8x10 all day long. It sounds great.
I am thinking of the first time I heard a Smoky amp through a nice 4-12 cabinet...
ElectroSmash - Smokey Amp Analysis
How can this be possible? When I read some comments here, I get the strange impression that you HAVE TO keep the gain/volume knobs all the way up.
T$
Fair enough, there’s nothing wrong with having “in case of emergency” power. I do get a kick out of the guys whose coffeehouse rig is a WD800 and cab though, and guys who would rather keep upping their wattage for more volume instead of simply adding more cone area. That’s been super prevalent in the Walkabout megathread- people want the same sound but louder, and insist on trying a million different amps through their same old cabinet, instead of just adding more speakers.
My personal philosophy is somewhat “horses for courses,” partially because it’s nice to bring a little rig to a little gig, and partially because it allows me to justify having too many amps!
You may laugh at someone playing a Mesa 800+ into a Barefaced Super Twin at a coffee house but what if that's his only rig, and it covers everything, and it's still damn lightweight and with a small footprint?
I’d still wonder what’s up with that, but at the end of the day they’re playing the gig and I’m just listening ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Thanks. Yes, it is all in his head. Twenty years ago when I still had guitar gigs as well as bass gigs, instead of an amplifier I ran a POD 2.0, the red kidney. The emulations are digitally derived from prime examples of the actual amplifiers and speakers, and I remember one gig where my emulation sounded more like a Marshall stack than a Marshall stack, to the point of even feeling it off the back wall during a rather enthusiastic solo. For small gigs I mostly used the Blackface Deluxe setting. And generally, the effects, especially the compressor, were of the highest quality and lowest noise. The POD has a side headphone out, which I used as my monitor, and the built-in tuner is accurate. I ran the output through a volume pedal before the direct box so that I could kill the volume when tuning, checking settings, etc., or if anything went awry. One time at a theatre gig in Branson the stage tech came up to me and asked what my amp was. I pointed at my POD sitting on a black music stand. Her reply was a multiple thank you that the POD would keep my signal from bleeding over and make her job easier. I almost got the grey bass version of the POD, but then I started running direct, and never saw the need, as the sound man took care of everything wherever I was, including eq, compression, etc.
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Fair enough, there’s nothing wrong with having “in case of emergency” power. I do get a kick out of the guys whose coffeehouse rig is a WD800 and cab though, and guys who would rather keep upping their wattage for more volume instead of simply adding more cone area. That’s been super prevalent in the Walkabout megathread- people want the same sound but louder, and insist on trying a million different amps through their same old cabinet, instead of just adding more speakers.
My personal philosophy is somewhat “horses for courses,” partially because it’s nice to bring a little rig to a little gig, and partially because it allows me to justify having too many amps!
What are you trying to say, man?
I'm one who has a WD 800 running through an Aguilar GS 112. That is my coffeehouse and everything rig.
I myself wasn't looking for louder as my last head was as much wattage. The WD at 8 ohms is only 400 watts
and I throttle it back to 2 ohms and it runs at 300 watts at 8 ohms. My reason for the WD was tone, not power
However, when I want to be louder, I can hook it up to more speakers and get loud, in the coffeehouse
Sometimes people buy for tone and not always power. That's why a lot of you have a bunch of amps, cause they sound different, supposedly.
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*NOW* I find out I didn't need more than 30W, ever, in my admittedly short career as a bassist.
So I've got 1500W and a couple of fEARless cabs. NOW you tell me that's way more than I'll ever need. Sheesh.
And then my ego kicks in.
So I've got 1500W and a couple of fEARless cabs. NOW you tell me that's way more than I'll ever need. Sheesh.
And then my ego kicks in.
Yep!
“Mountain's first gig was at Fillmore West in 1969,” remembers Leslie West. “I had been using Marshall amps, and that’s what I expected to find when I opened a bunch of cartons that had arrived from the airport, but instead I got a Sunn - and it wasn’t even a guitar amp. The cartons contained a Sunn Coliseum P.A. head and four 4x12 cabinets, and I thought, ‘There’s no way I can get a good tone out of this thing.’ But the head had four microphone inputs and a master volume control, and when I plugged in and turned it up I got this amazing tone, which became my sound.
"And remember, this was years before amps had master volume controls. The head had huge transformers and gigantic KT88 tubes, and the cabinets were loaded with Eminence speakers, which never hurt your ears even with the treble all the way up. That’s the amp I used on Mountain Climbing, which included ‘Mississippi Queen.’”
https://www.guitarplayer.com/players/leslie-west-decodes-his-mississippi-queen-tone
I was at that Randall's Island show-- July 1970.
It was the last day of a three-day festival, featuring a pretty astounding line-up of acts. Unfortunately, the Young Lords (kind of the Puerto Rican Black Panthers) occupied and "liberated" the festival, it was then free and chaotic, and almost every one of the acts pulled out. In addition to Mountain, I did get to see John Sebastian, Grand Funk Railroad, Steppenwolf, Ten Years After, Dr. John, Van Morrison and last minute substitute acts Cactus, Rhinocerous and the New York Rock & Roll Ensemble. (On the first night, Jethro Tull and Jimi Hendrix played but I missed them because I had to catch the last train out of there.) (Never did get to see Hendrix.)
Jim Carr
Dr. Jim
- Jan 21, 2006
- 16,223
- 7,613
- 76
- Disclosures
- fEARful Kool-Aid dispensing liberal academic card-carrying union member Musicians Local 72-147
Yeah. Instead of the 12/12/6/1, I think I'll bring this to my gig tonight. It's only 800 watts into 4 ohms.
I could bring the inverted baffle 15/6/1 + 15/1/6, but that would be too much, right?
And just look how I'm still breaking all the rules...
1) 30 watts or less into 4 ohms (check)
2) 115, 210, or better, 112 (check)
3) tubes only (check)
4) probably just need a small combo
(check and double check)Please note handtruck for my roadies.
Where are you at here, Texas or Hawaii?Yeah. Instead of the 12/12/6/1, I think I'll bring this to my gig tonight. It's only 800 watts into 4 ohms.
I could bring the inverted baffle 15/6/1 + 15/1/6, but that would be too much, right?
And just look how I'm still breaking all the rules...
1) 30 watts or less into 4 ohms (check)
2) 115, 210, or better, 112 (check)
3) tubes only (check)
4) probably just need a small combo
Please note handtruck for my roadies.
View attachment 3722379
Jim Carr
Dr. Jim
- Jan 21, 2006
- 16,223
- 7,613
- 76
- Disclosures
- fEARful Kool-Aid dispensing liberal academic card-carrying union member Musicians Local 72-147
Same here. Grandbaby wants to get back. Grandma says not until this virus thang gets cleared up.
Grandbaby's favorite pastime:
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