Weird Amps Nobody Remembers

[jhfishn]

My first amp was a Lafayette with 2-12's that was my brother's guitar amp.

I don't know what the power was but it had tremelo

My first bass amp was a Davoli Bass Strong vintage around 1970-ish that had 4-12's and my first bass was a Supro Taurus made in 1968 which I actually still have.

I got it for Christmas when I was 13 in 1968 and it's an awesome bass but completely unusable now. I did refinish it (what a total idiot I was ... but hey ... I was a kid!) with something akin to what you'd find on a coffee table at a beach shop. I think the resin is more water proof than most boats! And ... there is no truss road so it has a very distinctive bow.

But it's my very first bass!

 

[Kevorargh]

My first amp. Early 80s. JMF Spectra 312. Apparently made by Dean Markley. Googling it all these years later, it had cool features. Semi-parametric mid, built-in compressor, master volume so you could get some distortion. 150 watts with a 15. It sounded pretty good as far as I remember, but I didn’t have much of a frame of reference. View attachment 4637864

This was my first real amp - my volume knob was broken but it had a cool distortion feature. Not a lot of low end if I recall and it wasn't a particularly deep amp either, but it was cool to have. Traded it for an Amp Solid State Chorus head and cab.

 

[Michedelic]

Never owned this brand, but used to see a fair amount of them back in the day. An SG 215 tube bass ampView attachment 4637908

That was a brand developed by Gibson/CMI out of the remnants of the Standel company that they had aquired.

 

[rickster4003]

I have been having a lot of fun reading about the different amps and cabs people are using and it made me remember something I had long forgotten. My very first rig was a Heathkit that I spent all my summer savings on and built myself around 1969. I played it for about 6 months and then it was stolen.
Does anyone else remember those amps? I really liked it. Of course it was my very first and I did not know anything at all...

My dad was a Ham radio operator, he always had a healthkit magazine in the mail. I built the Heathkit helium neon laser!

 

[Freight Train]

Standells were good as I remember. PS I may have your bass!

Hah! Nope, still got it.

 

[ahbradot]

My first amp was a 1x12 Supro.

Dimed it on the front porch and abused it with my shiny red 4 pickup Teisco

1964 or so. Didn't take long before I had an audience of patrol cars.



I had one too, along with 2 folded horn 18" speaker behemoth cabinets.

How did you manage to make it sound OK?

Mine made some cool sounds when it melted down, but not with a bass.

For the money it absorbed, I coulda bought a SVT...

"Dimed it on the front porch and abused it with my shiny red 4 pickup Teisco"
So funny because my friends Teisco guitar was white with prism tape. Also that Supro had great distortion when cranked.

 

[ahbradot]

Except for an inoperable Standell bass combo and a Polytone Mini-Brute II, and the aforementioned home brew, all of my stuff now is Yorkville.

Polytone Mini-Brute II was my fathers other amp and I still have it. He bought it at Manny's Music in NYC.

 

[ahbradot]

Now we're talkin'! Loud? Light?

Yes it was especially loud because I played in a tiny tool shed in the backyard. My dad would say in his Norwegian accent, "watch the decibels, you're going to damage your ears". ....Now at 57 my hearing is awful.

 

[Analogeezer]

I have been having a lot of fun reading about the different amps and cabs people are using and it made me remember something I had long forgotten. My very first rig was a Heathkit that I spent all my summer savings on and built myself around 1969. I played it for about 6 months and then it was stolen.
Does anyone else remember those amps? I really liked it. Of course it was my very first and I did not know anything at all...

My first electronics experience was building a Heathkit fuzzbox around 1972. At the time I was playing guitar (not by choice, my dad kept buying guitars.....cheap ones) and had an amp that was physically large but low in wattage. I think it had a 12" driver and was solid state but was 5 watts if that much.

It was also super clean, no overdrive at all, just twangy like a Fender but sounded worse.

So I ordered the kit, intending on putting it together with supervision from my Dad who was well versed in stereo systems (he once owned 4 reel to reel tape recorders at the same time LOL) and electrical/electronics stuff.

Well as my dad tended to do he just took over the project and did the work while I watched LOL.

So we get the Heathkit fuzzbox all put together, I plug my guitar into it and then it into the amp, hit a power chord and BBBBRRRRRRAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNNNG Instant Black Sabbath!

I was like COOL! Meanwhile my dad was horrified, WHAT THE HELL HAVE I BUILT!

I mean I had tried to explain to him what a fuzzbox was and what the sound was going to be but he could not really comprehend it. He was more into Herb Alpert (who was a cool dude and still is!) and country (Johnny Cash).

He was from the generation for whom distortion sounded horrible; so to his ears so he thought the fuzzbox was broken!

I actually wound up with a 1980's Heathkit graphic EQ and analyzer box, a drummer from a band I was in gave it to me his dad (an electrical engineer) had built it. I don't really know why Ric gave it to me, other than him knowing I had a lot of audio gear.

I held on to it all these years, never used it (had no use for it frankly) because if I run across the guy again I plan on giving it back to him. His dad passed about 10 years after this and I figure at this point he might want it back.

Analogeezer

 

[Five String]

Univox 65B. Sold as a combo amp despite the amp and cab parts being separated. 50 watts (claimed), 15 inch speaker. Didn't sound all that bad if you sat right by it to practice at don't-wake-the-neighbors volume, but the low end would disappear once you cranked it a little. Forget about playing with anybody else, forget about using your 5-stringer. This was sold under a couple different brand names, and this was more or less how it came from the factory, including the paper "Univox" sticker on the front.

Eventually I replaced it with a Fender 40 watt combo. Half the size, 10" speaker, goes louder and lower. Next time somebody tells you that they want a bigger amplifier because they want to be heard, refer them to this.
View attachment 4637634

I had a slightly earlier or later version of one of those, with the cab. I thought it sounded pretty good.

 

[Pimpernel Smith]

My first bass amp (not my pic). Baldwin B1 Professional. Very modern, almost mid-century styling. Late 60's, early 70's. Two channel, around 35-40 watts, both a 15 and 12 inch speakers.

The Bogen shown earlier. I had one, but actually used it for vocal PA - 2 high-z mics and homemade speaker cabs loaded with Radio Shack 12's and 8's.

View attachment 4637669

My first Bass amp was a Baldwin B1 Professional, as well. At 75 pounds, what were we thinking? I used to lift it into the trunk of my 1965 Chevrolet. Thank God for Class D amp heads and neodymium cabinets.

 

[GretschWretch]

So I ordered the kit, intending on putting it together with supervision from my Dad who was well versed in stereo systems (he once owned 4 reel to reel tape recorders at the same time LOL) and electrical/electronics stuff.
Analogeezer

My dad had maybe up to four-reel-to-reels: at least two Magnecorders and, I think, at least one Wollensack. He also had three wire recorders. I don't know what happened to the reel-to-reels. The wires are in my attic.

 

[mb94952]

YES!! Wow that brings it all back.. I'm not sure if it is exactly the same model, but sure looks like it. The "Solid State" logo in italics is so funny now. That was a big deal back in the day...
Thanks so much for posting this photo!

I can feel your huge smile through the screen ! That amp screams Scooby-Doo for some reason, to me.

 

[MichelD]

Garnet produced many "Stencil" amps as they are called, with numerous different brand names, sold though different mail order stores and independent shops. I have a Garnet-made "Raven" branded 15 watt guitar amp that honks.

My video seems lost but here is an example, this one with the "Mann" label:

As an additional comment: Some Garnets still have a following in Canada. they are not cheap on the used market at all.

 

[MrLenny1]

Rheem it looked like a washing machine IMO.

 

[Analogeezer]

Univox 65B. Sold as a combo amp despite the amp and cab parts being separated. 50 watts (claimed), 15 inch speaker. Didn't sound all that bad if you sat right by it to practice at don't-wake-the-neighbors volume, but the low end would disappear once you cranked it a little. Forget about playing with anybody else, forget about using your 5-stringer. This was sold under a couple different brand names, and this was more or less how it came from the factory, including the paper "Univox" sticker on the front.

Eventually I replaced it with a Fender 40 watt combo. Half the size, 10" speaker, goes louder and lower. Next time somebody tells you that they want a bigger amplifier because they want to be heard, refer them to this.
View attachment 4637634

Good Gawd that brings back the memories....

When I was first starting out playing bass our local music store ("in a mall", the mall was just a wide hallway between two rows of stores, the mall part was not technically inside, just covered.) in our town of about 20,000 people (about 30 miles from Tampa) had one of these Univox rigs.

I used to go drool over it all the time because it was local and we would go up to that store to look at gear. They NEVER had any actual name brand stuff, like Fender, Sunn, Ampeg, Acoustic. Just off brand crap like that Univox.

It was actually a brilliant bit of marketing because back then young guys like me who didn't know anything assumed any bass amp that was a combo was "a toy" and real bass players used "Piggyback" rigs because anybody knew a Piggyback rig was more professional and louder.

So Univox made this thing look not like the combo spec amp it actually was LOL and I bought it (the concept, not the amp).

The good old days, right next door to the music store was the local head shop LOL.

It wasn't until someone took me to Paragon Music in Tampa where I saw actual cool gear, they had Sunn Coliseums, Acoustic 370 rigs but strangely no Ampegs.

The one thing that always struck me about Paragon was the "smell", the place just reeked of new tolex and glue because they had a lot of new amps, like TONS of new amps.

Kind of like the new car smell but it was the new amp smell LOL

I remember standing in front of a Sunn Coliseum 880 stack (two folded horn cabs) and going DAMN I WANT THIS!

Analogeezer

 

[rodak]

Those were desiged/manufactered by Bud Ross, of Kustom/Kasino fame. His take on providing gear that would withstand the rigors of touring, the speaker cabs looked like roadcases themselves, an idea not lost on Mesa Boogie. Ironically, I would see more country bands than rock use them, so they were known.

Later, during the 90s, Bud and his son, Andy, started a new venture, resurrecting the old Kustom "tuck-&-roll" cabinet style with new solid state amps. Initially set to be branded "Klassic", they apparently caught heat from Fender about their "Classic" line of amps, so changed the name to Krossroad - K + Ross + Road - get it?
Much better name than "Klassic" anyway.

 

[Kickass]

I had a Selmer L+B (Lead and Bass) amp head, blue front with sliders which were levers attached to sideways mounted pots.
Selmer Lead and Bass Amplifier
and relatively recently came across a Jennings B100.
article

 

[Michedelic]

Later, during the 90s, Bud and his son, Andy, started a new venture, resurrecting the old Kustom "tuck-&-roll" cabinet style with new solid state amps. Initially set to be branded "Klassic", they apparently caught heat from Fender about their "Classic" line of amps, so changed the name to Krossroad - K + Ross + Road - get it?
Much better name than "Klassic" anyway.

I remember those, the irony being that they were competing with the company that actually owned the Kustom brand name at the time, who also brought back the tuck’n’roll look(retro optics were all the rage then), but used a tube amp platform(not unlike Plush/Earth). Or was it the other way around, with the Krossroads being tube? I can’t remember. Neither lasted long.

 

[higain617]

My uncle built a Heathkit integrated tube amp back in the 50's. I have an Ampeg V6-B and a KMD GV100S head.