To be fair, Sleep basically only needs the PA for drums and vocals with the rigs Al and Matt use.
Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
Join free Log in
Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.
Stoner/Doom Bassists Thread, Part 90: Maxed Out
- Thread starter Korladis
- Start date
Has anybody tried out a Gallien Krueger GMT 300B (or 600B) from the 70s? I've owned one for about 4 years and it's been my favorite solid state amp across the board. Extremely loud with low end and mids for days, plus it loves pedals 
I'd love to try one. The GK 800rb (mines a 1990) I have is great, despite my earlier musings. Definitely fits your description. I think they are very similar to the 'b' series, just with more watts. Could be wrong. Layout, Eq, etc virtually the same.Has anybody tried out a Gallien Krueger GMT 300B (or 600B) from the 70s? I've owned one for about 4 years and it's been my favorite solid state amp across the board. Extremely loud with low end and mids for days, plus it loves pedals
I think the fizziness I get from mine is due to the very hifi modern neo GK 412 I use. My pork loin subdues that for me. Though I have wondered what it would sound like thru an old school style Atlas cab [or 2]... with a matching rack/sleeve for the amp....
Imagine the GK thru this badass puppy:
To be fair, Sleep basically only needs the PA for drums and vocals with the rigs Al and Matt use.
they play pretty large venues. even if they wanted to, their rigs would not ne able to fill the rooms without a PA.
Though in true more is more fashion, not only are all those amps being used [unlike say the old 80s wall of marshall cab shells] they are usually all miked up. But man, they sound glorious liveHence the
Yeah I noted that about the most recent time I saw them. ALL of Al's cabs were mic'd, whereas only (big winking face here) 5/8 of Matt's cabs were mic'd.
I've always felt like the formula is as simple as Tube amp + Muff, but I may bake my cakes with shelf mix too
Nothin' wrong with off the shelf cake mix...
I think older solid state heads respond better to being cranked with fuzz than some of the newer SS heads. My usual combo of active fretless to a TS clone to a muff is way gnarlier on my Peavy amp than my Fender Rumble head.
That said the Fender head behaves better and is nice n grindy when I just run bass -> X -> amp and I'm playing faster thrashy stuff.
I don't feel like this genre will switch to modeling mostly because I don't feel that the amp sims/modelers that I've heard really do fuzz well, for that matter they usually get super noisy at ultra-high gain stuff and that works with modern sounding bands because they are gating at least once but our genre you don't really want to use noise gates because many of them tone suck and we want that sustain.
I just thought I'd share that I just went to Chicago Doomed & Stoned II and I thought I'd share the most interesting band that I hadn't heard before that I saw at the show was Wolf Blood, linked their stuff below they have a new album. I also saw a strange trend of lots of jazz basses of all things. I didn't see a P Bass, it actually was a bit weird.
I just thought I'd share that I just went to Chicago Doomed & Stoned II and I thought I'd share the most interesting band that I hadn't heard before that I saw at the show was Wolf Blood, linked their stuff below they have a new album. I also saw a strange trend of lots of jazz basses of all things. I didn't see a P Bass, it actually was a bit weird.
Hmm, I actually kind of tried to resist the big tube head cult. I used a few solid state heads, including a GK MB500 Fusion that I liked a lot. But the guitarists complained about my tone quite a bit. I ran a 100W tube guitar head for awhile, and they complained a little less, but they hated, HATED its direct out tone, I wasn't fond of it either, and it was inadequate in power. So, I bought the Super Bassman (later model). I got a pretty good deal, and it's put an end to the complaints about my tone. Heck, on the day I got it, I plugged it into my Ampeg 4x10, and just gushed over the fact that it could nail the tones on "One of these Days" perfectly with the bass plugged straight in. I do not relish lugging it around, though. The few (very few) gigs we've had where the venue has someone to carry the gear, I've appreciated it.
The Peavey Musician mentioned earlier generally gets the same happiness with tone from my bandmates (nope, I'm not sure why). It's half the weight, but half the features (no post-preamp balanced direct out, mostly).
As mentioned before, about 1/2 the venues we play don't have the PA to match our stage volume for much of anything but drums and vocals. When we play one large enough to need the direct out of the SB, it's very nice to have - even though I have to check at the last second to make sure the sound guy hasn't switched it from being after the preamp - if you can't handle the gain of the preamp, you're going to HATE it when I step on the Big Muff or Super Fuzz or whatever I'm using tonight. I've you're just going to drop me out of the mix and I'm going to have to turn up my master to project into the room, let's get that discussion out of the way during the sound check.
But then again, I'm pretty happy with the direct sounds I get at home. I'm sure if nice-ish sound systems became the norm for the places we play at, I wouldn't be upset if I had to pick out a nice amp/cab sim to pack into a case instead of hauling around all the stuff I haul around already.
And on the third hand, I've been playing live for 30 years or so. Nice sound systems aren't becoming ubiquitous yet. So, I imagine I'll be hauling the head and cab for some time.
The Peavey Musician mentioned earlier generally gets the same happiness with tone from my bandmates (nope, I'm not sure why). It's half the weight, but half the features (no post-preamp balanced direct out, mostly).
As mentioned before, about 1/2 the venues we play don't have the PA to match our stage volume for much of anything but drums and vocals. When we play one large enough to need the direct out of the SB, it's very nice to have - even though I have to check at the last second to make sure the sound guy hasn't switched it from being after the preamp - if you can't handle the gain of the preamp, you're going to HATE it when I step on the Big Muff or Super Fuzz or whatever I'm using tonight. I've you're just going to drop me out of the mix and I'm going to have to turn up my master to project into the room, let's get that discussion out of the way during the sound check.
But then again, I'm pretty happy with the direct sounds I get at home. I'm sure if nice-ish sound systems became the norm for the places we play at, I wouldn't be upset if I had to pick out a nice amp/cab sim to pack into a case instead of hauling around all the stuff I haul around already.
And on the third hand, I've been playing live for 30 years or so. Nice sound systems aren't becoming ubiquitous yet. So, I imagine I'll be hauling the head and cab for some time.
This thread continues to provide all sorts of awesome music, woo!
That looks really cool but I'm a bit surprised by how difficult finding a clip of what it actually sounds like is. Still looking actually.
Same here, it's therapeutic to kinda run through all the little details. I've been doing the same for the bass I built and what I'm going to do next. Life's got me swamped right now and I have to focus on family in the near future. I don't even wanna start on pedals and amps, although I have been trying to figure out how to use my old Peavey combo as a preamp. Get myself a tube power amp and plug the fx send to it? Love the sound and simplicity but it's only 65w.
First off awesome, never heard of those guys thanks! I agree with the modeling likely to not happen in the near future. I do like some modeling dirt though. I have a zoom single stomp multi and the muff on it sounds great to my ears, so much so that I ditched my pickle fuzz.
For those who don't use much mod fx, or at least not much more than 1 a song, the zoom multi stomp, ms60b I think is the name, has been my go to. I set up what I want for each song that I use it, then just have to bend down and change the patch between songs. I think the modulation patches sound great and are easy to manipulate once you understand the interface, which has a quick learning curve. Highly recommended if you want to save space but want lots of diff fx. I use the tremolo, flanger, chorus, qtron, muff, and occasionally the phaser and various amp Sims.
Nice to just turn a knob to change which one and have the settings ready to go already. All of em sound good and work well for gigs. In the studio I'd be all for individual dedicated fx, but for gigs it's a breeze to use and saves so much space.
Additionally, most if not all fx have a blend. Since most patches are models of classic fx that never/rarely had blend it's a nice thing to have to still keep your base sound.
Hmmm, what old Peavey combo is it? I'm assuming theres no pre- or power amp outs on it? The effects send should send the post preamp signal, which you would then hook up to the power amp. Otherwise, it might be moddable.
Nice to hear that someone else has tried something similar to my current setup, as I use an MB 800 Fusion for both my pop rock and stoner metal band, and find that simply switching channels gets me most of the way to the sound I'm looking for in each band. Granted, the Darkglass pedal helps in spades for the stoner metal band, but I sure enjoy only having to cart around the tiny amp instead of the racked OB1 that I used to have. Great little amp!
It's not too old I guess. Early 2000's if I remember right. It has a send/return and I can use another preamp into the return, but when I try to send the preamp into my other amps return I get nothing...may have to mod it. Either way, this one has a voicing switch from "vintage" to modern/max and honestly the sounds you can get out of it are amazing. I've already separated it into a head and cab and made a speaker out for the head along with a cabinet for the head. But I'd kill to be able to use it for shows. Wish they had made a standalone head with the voicing switch. It changes the EQ center points and to my ears changes the EQ contour a little.
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
I wonder how similar the max 400/700 heads are? Similar age, control layout
