Tested: Where Does The Tone Come From In A Guitar Amplifier?
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- Опубліковано 17 тра 2024
- This completely changed how I thought about guitar amps.
0:00 - Intro
1:32 - Bias Type
2:22 - Rectifier Type
3:17 - Power Tube Type
4:27 - Preamp Tube Type
6:05 - Back To Basics
6:50 - What Is A Tone Stack?
7:13 - AskZac Vintage Amp Tests
9:02 - Fender, Vox, Marshall
10:42 - EQ/Distortion Order
12:01 - Distortion Type
13:42 - The Tacklebox
15:18 - Tacklebox Tests
16:21 - What Does All Of This Mean?
17:40 - Outro Jam
paypal.me/JimLill
My website is JimLillMusic.com
I'm @jimlill on instagram.
___
I spent a year on this.
In October 2021 I did my first amp test for this video and I was shocked by the results, leading me to keep chasing the reasons an amp sounds like it does until October 2022 when I finally get to show everyone what I've been working on all this time.
More work went into this than anything else I've ever done. I'm being totally honest when I say I'm just a performer, I don't know anything about circuits. This took me way outside my comfort zone, but I uncovered some truths that I find extremely interesting.
Throughout the process I kept getting results that didn't match things I had read and heard not just from people on the internet, but from heroes of the industry. It made me realize that we're currently alive in the only time in all of human history where two things can be recorded, edited together, and played back to back, easily, at home. I'm not so sure that our heroes ever did that. I'm thankful that I have the opportunity to.
The way I look at guitar amps has been changed forever.
-Jim, 10/3/22
''I am just a performer, I know nothing about circuits but in one summer I reversed engineered the whole guitar industry and made it open source to everyone''
I'm just a small town country lawyer but I took the case to the Supreme Court and won
"I'm just a dude, playin the dude, disguised as another dude."
Fr he made a science class but for guitar nerds, and I love it
@@Obama___ I'm a science nerd,and play guitar.
I am DYING over here because I WANT MY DISTORTION FOR A BASS AMP CUS TOO POOR TO GET a NorMal AmP
Hfjsnfbsnfnnn
I used 2 LEDS and made distortion tho KdnjajfhajJ
Lol thought the same thing
As a PhD physicist, I just want to add that this dude's ability to design an informative experiment controlling for so many variables is better than most of my colleagues
I was about to say the same too. The care for such a good control is huge in his videos and shows even more how effective his research is. His video on microphones was a whole other level on that too.
Intelligence and knowledge helps, but what's much more important is to not let your ego get in the way.
Right? I'm a surgeon but my background is in the lab. This is how WORK gets done.
Although I consider myself a musician at heart, I actually have a really close relationship with science and the method. I took biomedical science courses all through high school, I took courses in physics, acoustics (which is really just the physics of waves and sound), and eventually majored in psychology. So my educational background is much more scientific than artistic. As a result, when making choices for my signal chain, recording equipment, plugins, etc, I've always used what I feel is a very scientific mindset and philosophy. So I LOVE stuff like this content from Jim.
Like, I use amp simulation exclusively for guitar, as while some might not consider it "authentic," it gets me what I feel is at least an 80% similarity to in the tonal qualities of the audio as the real tube amp and cab while being infinitely more consistent performance wise. I don't have to worry about the age of the tubes, warming the amp up, the temperature, the room, how broken in the speaker in the cab is, the mic, the mic pres, etc. I KNOW what I'm getting out of the sim every single time. I don't really worry about special diodes, or "magic 9v batteries," secret mojo enhancers, anything that can't be defined practically and precisely. Like, I don't look for "warmth," I look at the qualities of the saturation and how the EQ curve changes with saturation. Saturation is just a type of compression, which can be quantified. EQ can be measured. And if I know the EQ, headroom, and saturation qualities of different types of circuits and amps, I can make decisions based on known quantities more or less instead of just the arbitrary qualifiers ascribed by fellow musicians or sales people.
I've had working musicians and recreationists alike sometimes look at my approach in half amazement half horror. It's a lot of work, but doing stuff like listing current draw for different pedals, comparing the differences in the knee, attack, and release curves of different compressors, the behaviors of different EQ bands on well known gear, all of it I feel demystifies and removes bias from my decisions. And to me, I feel like learning that kind of approach is what makes science so important to teach in schools. Believing the earth is flat or that phrenology is a credible discipline probably won't kill you. But learning the scientific method, learning what it means to identify and control for variables, all of that stuff is SO IMPORTANT. Because if you know how to do that, you can make informed and reliable decisions based on provable and quantifiable dimensions rather than off of essentially dumb luck. L
Sorry for such a long and random comment, I just think it's really cool to see other musicians than myself be passionate about science and not be afraid to approach their art with a clinical and scientific mindset
Schooling is not necessarily education.
I love how you're just showing the most polite middlefinger to the entire industry with all these tests
Science
"Marketing" is like, Mind Kontrol.
He's not at all. He's sharing the science of why the same input results in different outputs. He's not at all covering all the complexities of making things last under different conditions such as malformed AC waves. Nor is he covering how to ensure things are durable for a traveling band, especially weight reduction.
"I'm just a performer, I don't know anything about circuits."
***Proceeds to reverse engineer guitar amps and builds a perfect replica of many amps in one out of RC boosters***
Dude, you are a genius!!!
no, hes just a performer
@@rpshd7275hahahaha
@@rpshd7275Did I mention he doesn’t know anything about circuits?
That sounds like a 1973 tackle box, I normally go for 1975-80 era ones as they had more mid-range. The screws they started using for the hinges in August 1975 add a creamy saturation to the lush girth of the volume. Unmistakable tone.
Ah, the “cork sniffer” internet comments that all the so called experts seem to provide and you captured it perfectly.👏🤣
😂😂😂😂
Avoid post 1980 tackle boxes at all cost. That was when the company was sold to another company and those are trash.
@@victormaniaci2104 yeah, i bought it. and i replaced tackle boxes with lunch boxes, cause they were cheaper, and i said it was next gen technology, never heard before - which was true. not everyone heard the improvement, but i made a pile of money off the ones that did.
And what about pre-CBS tackle boxes.
This man is singlehandedly destroying the guitar industry just by asking some questions and doing some tests. I love it.
Genuinely, I'm surprised someone hasn't done this sooner. It's revolutionary
🤔 This video has opened a whole new can of worms for me! I found this video very informative, and it destroyed some of the ages-old notions about what 'really' influences guitar sound. But, I am baffled when it comes to the sound quality of his Telecaster. I found it to be uncharacteristically lousy, and off-putting for a higher end Fender guitar. It sounded that way pretty much regardless of what he plugged it into when making this video.
I've heard plenty of guitars of all makes that sound good through a clean signal, or with relatively minor effects, but ^this particular Tele definitely wasn't one of them. That brings up the next obvious question, why does one allegedly higher quality guitar sound significantly less appealing than others of the same alleged quality(or even lower quality). Are the components on his guitar so different than the average Fender?
@@HighlanderNorth1 Could just be mic placement. Without watching the video again, I think I recall the mic being just off-center. And for the one part, his friend was recording with a Fender, so did those clips sound any better to you?
@@HighlanderNorth1 have you watched his guitar video
Hardly destroying the industry, but he is educating people about tonal mythology that is being used to market guitars and amps. That's a good thing by me!
I'm an electrical engineer who played guitar for something like 35 years. I entered this same rabbit hole in about 2005. I even started a very small amplifier manufacturing company. My undergraduate final project was about the tone stack. This whole video gave me an amazing feeling. You seem to be replicating all the things I've been saying for 15 years and nobody want to listen.
Yes, the "types" of circuits have some influence but they are minimal. It's about the entire design but specially the tone stack and speakers/cabinets.
It was also fun to see you using LTSpice. I've done countless simulations with it and (when I did it right) got very close results to the real world stuff.
Bravo. You're a legend.
EDIT: Real world potentiometers are very unprecise. In my undergraduate thesis I had to find double potentiometers that where reasonably matched to do my comparisons. A lot of difference between amps of the same batch may come from this lack of consistency. This also could make the 3 o'clock position of a specific knob on an specific amplifier have very different value from the 3 o'clock position knob of a "clone" or simulation.
+
I've seen some similar conclusions about pickups and "tone" caps. The accuate value varies from brand to brand and model to model and if you were to get the same resistance/inductance of a pickup and the same resistance of the pot and capacitance of tone cap, a cheap setup could sound just like or as good as the holy grail set.
Same boat, consulting engineer and long time guitar player. I design and build tube amps as a side business. And I agree that the vast majority of the amp's tonal character is in the circuit topology (number of gain/dropping stages), the cathode networks, coupling caps, the tone stack, and the power amp class. The tube type, voltages, cap types, resistor materials, etc all contribute. But they are like frosting decorations on the cake. A speaker change has about the greatest sonic impact of any amp component.
@@merwinjm Yep. I've made some tests in that regards.
For capacitors, the two most important electrical parameters are the actual capacitance and the ESR (Equivalent Series Resistance). There are other things (like inductance and parallel resistance) that you must consider when doing high frequency or high power stuff, but this isn't much important when we're talking about a guitar tone cap wired in series with a potentiometer. What really matter here are that two values: ESR and actual capacitance.
Old paper oil capacitors have loose tolerances and high (comparing with a modern capacitor) ESR. Measuring the capacitance and the ESR of a vintage capacitor, I could mimic the exact behavior using two cheap ceramic capacitors in parallel (so I could get very close to the actual capacitance) and a cheap resistor in series with the capacitors.
The noticeable difference in sound between a modern ceramic or polyester and a paper oil happens when you close completely the tone potentiometer.
In the case of the modern capacitor, the total resistance in series with the capacitor (ESR + Potentiometer) go very close to zero (because the ESR is low).
In the case of the vintage capacitor, the total resistance in series with the capacitor (ESR + Potentiometer) is in the order of tens of ohms. Sometimes more than 100 ohms. This means a little less high frequencies filtering.
Want the sound/feeling of a vintage cap with a cheap modern ceramic? Just don't turn the tone knob all the way down.
Or just put a cheap 100 ohms resistor in series.
Done.
@@jamiemascola6614 Yes. I just would make an observation about the power amp class.
Well designed Class A, Class B and Class AB amps have practically identical behavior when not being overdriven. But:
1) Single ended vs push-pull have different harmonic contents across the entire range. It's subtle, but it's there.
2) The amount of negative feedback does make the circuit more linear, so it tends to cancel that harmonics added by the phase splitter and the power amp stages.
This is why the power stages of an old single end (with no negative feedback and no phase splitter), a push-pull without negative feedback (like a VOX AC-30) and a push-pull with lots of negative feedback (like a Fender Twin Reverb) sound a little different, specially when overdriven.
The power supply also could have some role here, as the voltage tends to sag when more current are pulled from it. This is why solid state rectifiers with a well designed and tough transformer sounds tighter and a tube state rectifier (that have a relatively high ESR) sounds looser with a sort of compression.
About the classes, usually the same amp when working in low volume could be in Class A, in medium volume in Class AB and when being overdriven, Class B or even Class C (when you will have crossover distortion).
To design a good amp you do have a lot of things to worry about. But in the end, to the user, two well designed power amps would sound very similar.
This tech talk could go on forever. LOL
I work as an audio engineer and producer at a prominent studio in my city. We have always operated under the motto "if it sounds good, it is good" and this was the perfect example of that!
100%
Guitar players are a special breed
problem is knowing something has a high price tag literally makes it sound better to your ears
every musician on earth agrees with that mantra, even the ones who would sneer at any amp sold for less than $1,000
ears are fallible, measurements are important to make at least once
Why does every Crate I play sound like trash though?
@@RexLlewellyn-le5se100% agree.... I've also be the victim of hype and bullshit myself.
I felt a great disturbance in the music and recording community, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. Thanks for this!
That wraps it up so perfectly. 😂
Absolutely!!!!!....My thoughts exactly.....especially for myself.....lessons learned.
They all sound pretty similar to me, but then, I’m listening to a compressed video on my phone. 😂
@@ScotClose Same here, same here. With that as a baseline, there was not a 10% difference in the sound of any of these amps. I think the main perceived differences in tone come from what's on the ends of the signal chain more than what's in the middle. The transducers- pickups, mics and SPEAKERS.
Me too, but I'm just a performer, and know nothing about circuits.
If this guy ever goes missing, the police need to take a hard look at large music companies. These videos are amazing!
lmao!
Found in a tone suitcase in bits :-(
Gibson would be my number one suspect!
Yep
Brother, I have a PhD in electrical engineering and your experiments are better than the "grown ups" ever do! I would hire you in a heartbeat if I could. So well done. I wish I'd have practiced more and studied less. Having your engineering instinct and guitar chops puts the Q in unique. Best of luck. I love watching your vids. Cheers!
I'm not a performer but I do know about circuits. Amp tech with thousands of repairs behind me and 45 years experience. Wow and wow again. I've been saying this for years but with zero evidence to back it up. I'm totally impressed with what you have achieved here. In awe, actually. Thank you.
Nice work, Jim! Keep making great content! Gotta admit, I laughed my a$$ off at the power tube part! Brace yourself for the hate comments. Guitarists tend to take things personally when you start destroying myths. Thanks for putting in all this work!
Fancy meeting you here, Sensei
waiting for the colab
@@pedrodossantos5890 I'm expecting lots of people to start building these "heads" for studio use.
No surprise Glenn would like this video. LoL!
@@alexcrouse I'm one of them, on fact, I'm doing something similar right now
Genius. As an engineer who knows a fair bit about circuits & speakers & stuff, I'm not so surprised at what you've found - but I am amazed at how well you've demonstrated all of this. Systematically and superbly done!
Ditto!
Jim may not be an engineer, but if he was he’d be a damn good one
question for you, for tube amps I've heard where they really shine is right before tou start to get tone breakup in volume. it wasn't tested here but would that make sense for a difference in sound?
I have a feeling that after doing all this testing, this guy who says "I'm just a performer" has actually learned a bit about circuits.
Excuse me, since you know about circuits, could you explain the diagrams he made? What do the half tubes with no colored line on top signify?
I have no idea what to say after watching these. My whole view on these things has been destroyed, but in the best way. What incredible effort was put into these videos and how profoundly grateful we should all be. Just effing wow.
Jim, I am so thankful you did these. Thank you for the many *many* hours this would have taken.
I have not read all of the comments, but I have yet to see anyone ask (so I am going to). Do you have a schematic for "The Tacklebox"? I would LOVE to build one for myself! I have thoroughly enjoyed and loved your "Tested" series, and can't wait to see what other industry myths you bust with time, common sense, and easy to understand explanations. ❤ Thank you Jim for your tenacity and hard work!
need this
yeah I'm more than a little agitated that he didn't provide any details about the tackle box.
@@pathmusicwriting he did show the schematics for where the EQ and distortion happens in the signal chain for the different amps though. you could just rent or borrow some EQ and distortion pedals, put them in the order he showed, and play with the settings until you get a sound you like
Would love to see the schematics and various EQ configs used in the circuit. Imagine if we open sourced it and have the community iterate on it!
I'm laughing and crying hysterically, thinking about chasing tone and the money I've spent! I love this guy, he is brilliant! Again as I stated before, we let our eyes convince our ears.
As a kid I had a few bad failed upgrades before I learned to bring all my gear with me to the music store when buying a new piece of gear. Definitely the only way to truly feel and understand the differences.
This is fantastic! I'm an electrical engineer and a guitar player. Your video just validated what I've been criticized for saying for years. Thank you.
What have you been saying?
@@NONE2NONE presumably what this video just validated
Agreed .
Sound is nothing more than a mix of frequencies at different levels (volumes). So, tone is nothing more than making some frequencies louder and some other quieter, or, in other words, equalisation. Even distortion is a form of equalisation, bottom line.
@@z1xy273 more like compression, yeah distortion can add frequencies, but it crushes them also. it mainly just adds new harmonics. A eq is a eq.
Dude, I'm an electrical engineer as well as a guitar player and you just blew my mind with your exceptionally effective approach to a complex and often emotionally charged topic. Simple, precise, accurate, brilliant. Well done.
I've just binged through all your testing videos and I think your content is actually sensational. As in: Every guitarist should see and hear this before buying a single piece of equipment again.
Agreed. He's destroying all the sales talk you read in ads
Dear Jim.
You are candidate for the Nobel prize in Guitarology.
All the best to you.
And you’re a killer musician by the way…
He‘ll win that by a huge landslide.
I love this guy's work... He destroys myths like a boss and has the evidence to back it all up. Kudos to you, Jim.
Yep, he brings the receipts!
Doesn't know much about circuits though 😆
But he's a performer and doesn't know much about circuits lol
@@heatnationwpb, could you expand on what he missed? I'm sure I'm not the only one who would be interested to hear!
@@theaxehound2152 I'm pretty sure he was just repeating the line that was said repeatedly throughout the video. He was just being "funny". ✌️
I hope Jim does a video on where tone comes from in a pickup. No one else is as thorough as Jim
Hypothesis: Most significant would be amount of windings since that influences the gain of the signal, but it happens in hundreds if not thousands of difference. I don't think the type of magnet does a lot but rather the strength of the magnet.
The tone in a pickup comes from the stereo and speaker set-up, preferably Rockford-Fosgate. Unlike the tone in a minivan which comes from the wife and kids shrieking on the way to Wal Mart drowning out the oem stereo system.
I figured out years ago that a few effects pedals and any old house PA system was much better than lugging around 200 LBS of guitar amps and speaker cabs...Brilliant video!
I absolutely love how you preface everything with 'I'm just a performer, and I don't know anything about circuits'. Something more of us performers could use.
I think that part was on a loop pedal too ;)
Honestly, I got tired by the third repetition
@@wyssmaster I think it just got funnier each time
@@nuberiffic Same here.
@@nuberiffic he reminds me of Phil Hartman as the Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer. “I’m just a caveman. I fell in some ice and later got thawed out by some of your scientists. Your world frightens and confuses me.”
It's astounding how much Jim knows about amps, given that he's just a performer and doesn't know anything about circuits 😉. Loved the black screen for the distortion type comparison-- confirmation bias is a hell of a drug.
He’s being appropriately humble
There are people out there with his exact level of knowledge regarding amps who will gladly spout off in forums/Reddit etc about their knowledge 😂
If he knows how to breadboard he knows about circuits.
@@lomoholga oh and people with like 1% of his knowledge that are acting like experts.
😅😂
@@EddyFaverey to eleven, it goes to eleven!
"I am just a hobbyist musician, I know very little about electric guitars" but this made my jaw fall down regarding the accuracy and the amount of time devoted. Awesome research, true congratulations and compliments.This really explains a lot.
This series is so great. Once you get over the almost automatic defence mechanism of having your beliefs challenged, it really opens up the possibilities of how you can design your rig and sound without having to be beholden to brands and myths.
I’m a forensic engineer who has been tinkering with guitars and amps for about 60 years. All I can say is BRAVO! Your testing confirmed my gut feeling that most people don’t know much about where tone comes from. It’s surely not from a brand name! For a short time (before hurricane Katrina ruined it) I played through a clean Bogen PA amp, the kind a store uses for “attention Kmart shoppers!” I had an old school Line 6 Pod and a 12 inch speaker all connected and mounted in a storage trunk turned on its side, fitted with wheels. I could roll up, open the door, pull out the Pod on a tray, plug in, and I was ready to play. I could get any tone I wanted with all the volume I needed. It weighed about 30 pounds. But it all got washed away, and I got old. Fun times.
I love these kinds of "so stupid they work" DIY builds
Just play the damn thing and never go old and never ever get washed away by anything. You´ll be just fine having fun until the day you die. Just remember "That´ll be the day..."
my personal build would be a nice clean power amp fed with a multi effect pedal (depending on what I want or what's new it would change) fed into a 2x2 harley benton cab, or possibly a nice set of speakers with a cab sim going, but I never get quite passed the 'you suck to much for even this jenkey setup' skill level.
Influenced by Leslie West?
As a kid in the 70s and a son of an audiophile, My dad helped me with a 60s Bogen (tube) PA amp mated with a 50s era 12" Jensen Hi Fi speaker.. faceplate on the front of a 3/4 inch plywood box with the speaker below.
Blew away my buddies Princeton. Weighed a ton.
Hey, amp tech here. You're absolutely on the right track.
Most of what we hear is frequency response, so it stands to reason that cathode bypass cap values, coupling cap values, and interstage and tonestack filter choices - all of which affect frequency response - will dictate a huge amount of what an amp sounds like.
Tubes are quite a bit more subtle and arguably make little difference within a type. However you can tell EL84s break up a lot earlier than 6V6s, despite being the same nominal power output (a pair will do roughly 12-15 watts at about 5% THD). That's because EL84s are _insanely_ high transconductance (a measure of how much current from cathode to plate changes when the input voltage on the grid changes by a set amount, appropriately measured using the mho, which is just ohm backwards) compared to 6V6s. For a given input voltage, the EL84s are going to be a lot closer to their linear power limit than 6V6s. And of course, very few amp designers compensate for this in their amps, so EL84s sound squishy because they're probably quite a bit more distorted than a 6V6 in the same amp. The same holds true for their larger cousins, the EL34 and 6L6.
But it's more complicated than that. Amps with lots of negative feedback (think of it as distortion reduction through clever use of phase cancellation) will have less distortion, but the _onset_ of that distortion will be much more sudden. Think solid state, where it's clean clean clean CRACKLE - that's the result of lots of negative feedback. Black panel and silverface Fenders are the same way, the design philosophy was lots and lots of clean output power. Little or no negative feedback means a sooner, but more gradual onset of distortion - think about how a 5E3 Deluxe seems to change so much depending on how you pick, even though you haven't even touched the volume control.
As for rectifiers... Overrated difference. However, the same amp using solid state or tube will operate at pretty different voltages. Tube rectifiers have a pretty high internal resistance and drop a lot of voltage across them - anywhere from about 15 volts for a GZ34 to up to around 60 volts for a 5Y3 - where a silicon diode has barely any internal resistance and will drop about 0.7V across it. So, the same amp with the same power transformer and the same high voltage secondary will be substantially different operating voltages. I measured this on a Mesa Rectifier once - Silicon diodes were about 470V, tubes were about 415. With the same bias voltage, that's a pretty damn different idle current flow in the power tubes, so you'll get substantially less power output from the tube rectifier mode.
Your comment, though probably incredibly informative, is Chinese to me... I justa plucka da strings.
Agreed. Speakers/box are huge, cathode bypass is huge. Sag as it's referred is more of a feel than sound. You're not gonna get it with a looper I feel. I also feel like the subtle difference you'd get between various circuits especially SS/tube changes drastically when you open them up wide all they way. Getting a good sound for a mic, vs getting that same sound but loud enough to sit in the natural mix over a heavy handed drummer. Jim has a point though. At the end of the day. If it gets the job done.. it's all Nike / Reebok. Sovtek mig 50h ... Friend had a line6 flextone 300w head... Dude... Why is you shit always louder than mine? Lol. 5881s son.
This seems like what I would expect. Coming from the audiophile world my expectation is that assuming there's nothing flawed with a given electrical component, and it's doing its job "correctly", it really shouldn't be coloring the output signal in any notable way over a comparably functioning component.
The things that do actually effect and color the signal are the parts that are explicitly meant to be manipulating the signal in concert with eachother. At the start of the video my gut instinct was "amps are different because their knobs/signal manipulation chain (tone stack, though I didn't know what it was called) are different".
Amps have a lot of active signal manipulation going on, so it makes sense that two amps would be different outside of the particular points where you can get their output curves to line up. And that a lot of the "signature tone" an amp is known for comes from the active efforts of engineers to give the amp that particular sound via signal manipulation, and not some special quality of the electrical components they selected. Which is just marketing.
These seems like the same story as the cab video. A lot of stuff effects the sound, just it's not some inherent quality of the components, but the active choices being made in the cabs assembly that effect the intended sound in the end.
Yeah, the takeaway here is to learn how fkin turn the knobs lol. EQ exists for a reason. I think this is an ad for EQ pedals lol.
Best gear video ever made, no contest
You're not just a musician. You're also a great scientist, videographer and editor. Hats off.
Science = Messing Around + Writing It Down.
@@victormaniaci2104 Well, with science there is a method to the madness of messing around. ^_^
Agreed, excellently cut video.
Jim congratulations for producing the best guitar related experiments in UA-cam. Thank you for being so creative, this is fantastic.
yup, watched it twice
All I can say sir is, THANK YOU. You've freed us from the amp curse and opened our eyes to the truth.
This was mind-blowing. I would be fascinated to know how the eq and switching works on your Tackle Box, if you ever felt like doing a sort of BTS summary of how you put it together!
I have tp admit as an electronic engineer you do a pretty good job of cutting through the BS I've been telling people for 30 years.
Agreed .
Top 3 things I learned from this video:
1. 'He's just a performer that doesn't know anything about circuits but ...'
2. 'Companies advertise their amps ...'
3. 'People on the internet describe things ...'
Lol in all seriousness, this is a great highly detailed video, thanks for sharing. Subbed.
I vowed to never buy another solid-state guitar amp and pretty much had my heart set on a Randall Diavlo tube amp head.
Then the Boss Katana 50 mk2 came out and after watching videos, reading reviews and hearing one in person, I purchased a brand-spankin' new one at Guitar Center.
To say I'm happy with it would be an understatement.
This is the comment I was looking for! I bought the same amp and use it for my electric and acoustic guitars.
Dude the number of engineers praising your experimental method is crazy. Well done.
Nothing else on youtube comes close to how impressive these videos are. I absolutely love your "fine, I'll do it myself" attitude. The amount of time and effort and money you put into this is insane. You deserve every ounce of praise and success you receive.
an ounce of praise and 10$ in his paypal B)
@_hit_me_official_rob_landes SCAM...
When the guitar community starts awarding its version of the Nobel, you’re first in line for this series.
Hands down.
I love your way of structuring the video by repeating the same phrases and making it clear that you are being as systematic as possible
I thank you from the bottom of my heart. You have an impeccable analitic approach to the whole tone myth. I honestly felt the whole thing crumbling down when roland introduced the blues cube back in the day. I felt like i lost my religion or something. I was such a tube guy yet i could not tell a fender from a blues cube eyes closed. I am truly grateful that you broke this whole tone thing down and made a comprehensive experiment out of it for us.
“He learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult.” - Frank Herbert
Shocking how many people will not even try. Spend their entire life saying "I can't do that" while they sit parked in front of the TV drinking beer every night and weekend.
Wasn't Frank Herbert the brother of Mr. Wizard, Don Herbert?
I think this whole series is at once a massive myth busting session on all our gear tropes we've had as well a reminder that the things that inspire you to play best are the real things that sound best.
I forget who said it, but it was somebody really good... gear is for the performer. If having good gear makes you feel better, it will affect you in a positive way. If you are confident in your gear, you will play better. Kind of like when I cook food that I grew, and lovingly made. It may not taste better to anyone else, but to me it's so much better than I could buy. Might as well be olive garden to someone else.
I have a fender champion 40. I was never satisfied with the tone until one day I plugged some nice studio headphones in the amp and I was blown away. The tone as well as the effects I was using sounded completely different. Thats when I realized having good speakers actually matters a lot.
I think the biggest factor is the proximity effect if mic the amp and record it it'll sound 1000 times better. I use a Champion 20 for recording and I've been able to get practically any sound I want.
I have a Champion 40 and put a Celestion V Type in it. Sounds fuller and more lively.
i believe the headphone out is one with a Cab Sim that is why it sound better, Buy a better speaker is the easier mod for a combo.
I watched an Aaron Rash video (he does similar things to this), and he came to the conclusion that the speakers is 90% of what's important. And after seeing his results, it's hard to disagree
I love the "i'm just a performer i don't know anything about circuits" line more than you will ever know
Fantastic work man. I launched a career and reasonably successful company based on a similar understanding when modeling analog studio gear (eq's, compressors etc.). Inside all of that expensive gear, there is distortion, there is eq, and there are transfer functions... and that's it. The difference between a 'warm, pillowy' old LA-2a tube limiter and a 'bright, snappy' modern SSL compressor is nothing more than the number, order, shape, and degree of those three processes.
That doesn't make modeling easy --- it's often impossible to get things sufficitently emulated in a world where a 1% difference in sound can mean everything to the operator --- but it does make it simpler when you understand the variables and how to parse out their individual contributions. Well done!
High praise from The House of Kush. I still sit and watch your Clariphonic 'adding shimmer' video just for sheer, unadulterated pleasure! 🤣
Bring back the podcast please! Even if it's just playing drums through compressors and telling us the settings haha
Kush is in da House!
Dad
Part of what makes the problem more tractable is that the analog hardware is deliberately engineered so that the pieces are reasonably modular and there isn't a great deal of interaction between blocks. If the interactions between blocks were greater, it'd be a nightmare to get manufacturing consistency.
I can't believe how well you broke down where the tone comes from in an amp. I've taken college courses about electronics and I assumed this would be way too broad a question for someone who "doesn't know anything about circuits" to figure out. I am beyond impressed.
Common sense goes a long ways my dude.
@@DrMurdercock This isn’t common sense. This is serious inquiry and very good critical thinking skills.
@@lllULTIMATEMASTERlll THe man in the video used what should be common sense most people should have. Did he not mention 100x over, he does not know ANYTHING about circuits? Because he doesn't. He used deductive reasoning and common sense, which stems from being able to do critical thinking. Either way, it wasn't magic, it's a regular dude who decided to sort it out. My point is, ANYONE can do things like this, you just have to want to
@@DrMurdercock I think we just have different definitions of common sense. I tend to not like the phrase since what someone thinks is common sense may not actually be common sense.
But anyway, I agree. But you have to be really smart. Not just anyone has the brains to do this.
@@lllULTIMATEMASTERlll common sense varies person to person though, this dude just has a lot of common sense when it comes to gear ya know? Def not trying to argue or be rude or anything, there is too much of that on here
This video prof not only what is about, BUT also the fact that fortunately still we can find instructive and worthy videos on UA-cam
This why it's not as impossible as some people think that plugins are starting to sound real. The good ones are being modeled at the component level, which this man just proved is what really matters.
This guys video series on what gives guitars/amps their tone should be "required reading" for anyone who wants to pick up a guitar. It is mindblowing the amount of effort that was put into this, as well as some of the results. I have been playing for 28 years and my mind is still numb from the things I have learned tonight. Well done!
It's amazing. I wish I had seen this when I was 15. I wouldn't have spent so much time reading about gear, specially from dumb snobs who buy Marshall stacks for bedroom use, would have saved some money and practiced much more. Going digital was the best thing I could do in that regard.
Yes! 🙌
It's obviously satire, because every sound sample he uses for the comparisons is exactly the same.
@Anthony Liberti I think the point went over your head, sir. Lol. That is exactly what he was attempting to demonstrate. Throw each sound sample in a spectrum analyzer and you can note that the vast majority are visibly different but you can only tell using some software and some technical know how. I can personally vouch for this because I did exactly that, and a friend and I replicated some of these experiments though to notbthe same extreme and we arent luthiers or wood workers but we did try some using the same partscaster. The only misstep that I saw him take throughout this series of videos is the difference between having brass saddles and a brass nut as opposed to steel. I can close my eyes and pick the guitar thats brassed out from the ones with steel out of a line up, subtle as it may be, I was surprised that he didn't hear it. Maybe it's because I was listening in very expensive studio monitors 😆. Unnecessary for the level of studio I have but it's like buying a gold jet ski with spinning rims. Why? Because you can I guess. Haha. I like having true stereo and a center speaker. I run my TV audio through a compressor so the volume is consistent when there is dialog, action, quiet parts, etc. Commercials are not louder than the show and vice versa. I should make a video on how I managed that. I have 3 computers here with a central server and I do dork stuff. Obviously. Lol
words cannot describe how I'm feeling right now! my mouth was literally gaped open. This is one of the most important videos in sound production history! if there is another that is more important I believe it was one of the other tone videos Jim made! Thank you soooo much for this Jim. You are a legend in the making!
Calm down grandma
When he did the volume adjustment, that was a shocker to make the settings the same!
@@pillbilly8761 ok boomer
ditto
@Pillbilly "I won't use your youth and inexperience against you." -Ronald Reagan
I’m only 7 minutes in and I think it’s fair to say that you’re way more than just a performer! You’re a freakin treasure!
Your stuff is still criminally underwatched!
I watched this “episode” thrice in succession, not only because I was blown away by the fact that you were actually able to figure out what made those legendary amps sound the way they do, OR because you managed to put together an amp made purely out of Solid State pedals that, at least to my ears, playing from my phone, managed to sound exactly like those amps, but also because of the visuals, the script, the dialogue, the colours.. This was cinematic storytelling.
I’ve been playing guitar for 20 years and have worked in the music industry for 10. This video single-handedly blew my mind!
You. Are. A. Genius.
The way you have written the script, repeating some lines and changing the end based on context, is very musical. Extremely cool!
14:36 your tackle box amp is amazing. Please make a video describing how you made this.
This would be a fun project I would be interested in making for myself.
It's simply two Xotic rc boosts with EQ pedal before them and after them with SD pickup boosters into a power amp then into a cab with 12" V30 speaker(s)
@@cobowe what do the EQ knobs control? The EQ pedals?
There are no EQ pedals. He built the 3 different EQ systems of the amps. very basic circuitry, mostly the right values of pots and resistors.
@@wenjacklow Most "EQ" is just allowing some of the signal to flow to ground through filter capacitors, you can see some on the breadboard (white plastic thing with all the holes).
Yes but where's the rest of the owl?
I know what you're talking about, but I don't know how to make what you're talking about.
What this tells me is that finding the right amp is like finding the right guitar. 99% of it is how easily can you get to a tone you love? That’s why it works to use the same gear as your music heroes. You already love their tone, and it’s easier to get a similar tone with similar gear. It’s not because it’s inherently superior.
Man this entire series is so freaking awesome.
Jim, please keep doing this.
Definitely agree. Clones, small amps, "based on".. becomes a lot more meaningful when you know just how close you can get without having the actual gear. In the end it comes down to how comfortable is the guitar and do you like the looks of it, have roughly the right sounding pickups in it, have an amp based on the circuit you like most, and choose the right speaker! Nobody needs multiple thousands worth of gear just to love the tone of it.
❓🤔❓While I agree that you should choose the same equipment used by your musical hero, I'm having trouble figuring out precisely what equipment MY hero is using. Here's a short 42 sec video of him performing his signature riff. After your mind is blown by his sheer skill and awesomeness, maybe you can determine what he's using. BTW, I'd recommend fast forwarding to the 20sec mark, then strap yourself in for the ride! 😁
ua-cam.com/video/2MI-_jWAmlE/v-deo.html
Yes sir . I believe it’s all dynamic s ...
Following your guitar heroes can lead to some logistical challenges - for example, my guitar hero uses a 50W JCM 800 that's way too loud for home use into a Peavey cab that they don't make anymore.
But I think this video shows that you don't need the exact same gear. A "Marshall in a box" pedal is really all you need to get that Marshall sound - as his Marshall in a tackle box demonstrated.
@@alextimo
Is there really a "Marshall in a Box" pedal? Also, is ^his tackle box thing homemade, or is that like a store bought thing? Fortunately, following my "guitar heroes" is MUCH easier, because they don't use expensive or hard-to-find amps, because they don't use amps at all, because they aren't guitarists, they are drummers, and it's their drumming style that I want to learn, because I'm a drummer, NOT a guitarist... 😁
Good deal. You got it right. I mod amps and know how circuits work and you found the secret to the amp tone. But I still only like tubes and I am an old dude so makes sense.....keep playing. More important than anything.....
As a kid I remember saying to my dad "only Marshalls have that midrange sound, nobody else can match it." My dad said "yeah, bullshit. It's just an amp," or words to that effect. Turns out we were both right. Seriously the driving force behind all of this is called Confirmation Bias: people want their previously held beliefs confirmed so they feel like they're in control. Even when you know about that, it still happens to some extent.
Well it might be true that only Marshalls have "that midrange sound", but it turns out it's not because people can't match it?
@@RohannvanRensburg Absolutely. Fenders are very mid-scooped and Marshalls are not, Fender could have easily duplicated this but chose to stick with what they're known for. My analogy is, if you want a Michael Thames classical you pretty much have to get him to build it. Not everyone is capable of doing what he does. If you want an amp that sounds like a Marshall, you copy the circuit.
It's also, The Appeal to Authority, Social Proof, and The Illusion of Choice. The same reason people argue over which is best; Pfizer, Moderna, or J&J.
@@TheKitchenerLeslie What a shit comparison.
Just fantastic.
Always you around here
@@nenntmichbond around where?
this is why I season my eq + distortion in the circuit, NOT my tubes!
@@aragusea I am still amazed at how often your fans find you on non-food related content lmao
Absolutely logic driven approach. This is just how other people earn their PhD from the university. I hereby confer to you the degree doctor of tone 😂 Great Video again!
Hey Jim, great video. Just wanted to touch on one or two points:
The whole "solid state distortion sounds like garbage" is actually based on early transistorized amps that had crossover distortion due to the amplifier class (you can make a tube amp that sounds equally awful, but people are smart enough not to), and/or due to clipping distortion from BJT transistors, which have a different distortion profile than tubes do. In modern solid state amps (or distortion pedals), the crossover distortion is eliminated through using better amplifier classes, and they use JFET transistors in the distortion stages which have essentially the same distortion profile as tubes.
There's also a subtle type of distortion that you missed in your test protocol. With tube rectifiers and amplifiers, you can run into a phenomenon known as space charge depletion. This is where the electron cloud around the cathode gets drawn away by high anode currents. If you have a tube PA amp that's playing both drums and guitar, let's say, and the drummer plays a really hard hit while the guitar is wailing away, the momentary impulse of amplifying the drum hit will cause space charge depletion and temporarily reduce the available anode current for amplifying the guitar sounds. The end result is a short ducking effect in the amplified audio immediately after the drum hit. This phenomenon is worth mentioning because it does not occur in solid state devices, though you can simulate the effect fairly easily by adding a few extra passive components.
Anyway, the reason that all this amplifier snake oil still exists is because the people who know better (the EEs designing the amps) have a vested financial interest in perpetuating the mythology. If everyone realized that you could throw $20 of transistors and passives into a box, shake it around, and pour pure sweet tone out into the speakers, a lot of companies would make a lot less money.
Are you able to prove that with some measures ? If it's not the case, that's pure religion. You believe it or not?
@@jmasson3272 Yes, I can.
@@Nicoya so please, make a video to prove this. It will be great
@@jmasson3272 I might someday, got other videos I want to make first though.
@@Nicoya you must do it, to prove your point of view with undeniable proof
For someone who doesn't know electronics or circuits you made quite one of the best scientific/engineer study on the guitar shape and amps sound investigation I have seen and ever searched for. Awesome video. You got a subscriber!
Dude.... WHAT???? Wtf did I just watch?? I'm honestly blown away, you seriously deserve a nobel prize for all of your tested videos. Thank you so much for busting sooooo many myths regarding electric guitar tone, can't wait for the speaker test!
*btw, you should consider mass producing that tackle box amp and start selling them, I would definately buy one and I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be the only one!! haha
Yeah, wouldn’t work because it would sound like shit. It’s fake. This video is bs :).
if he sells that tackle box amp he needs to start worrying about his safety lmao
You are a gift to guitar community. The order and chain of effects replicating the sound...brilliant!
Paul Reed Smith is setting up a sniper perch outside of the Lill home as we speak. Duck and run Jim! Duck and Run!
This is my favorite new channel. Aside from the knowledge gained,experiments etc. the editing and pacing of the videos are remarkable. ✌️
About 25 years ago, I was in a bar where a three-piece band were starting to set up. They were (to me then) old guys - in fact about the age I am now - and I paid only scant attention. They were set up inside 10 minutes, and started to play. They were brilliant: hard hitting and energetic. The guitar player had a telecaster of some sort and a superb tone, and wrung the neck of the thing. I went to talk to them after the show, to see how the guitar player got that tone. I found he had a Korean Telecaster worth about $150 new, absolutely bone-stock. So, was it a boutique amp producing that fabulous thick tone? Nah, it was a 30w Sessionette (a British all-transistor combo from the early 80s). To cap it all, he also had a deformed thumb on his left hand, permanently curled over so he had to play with the thumbnail against the back of the neck.
It’s what you play, how you play it... and the gear is there mostly to get you in the moment so you can enjoy yourself. If you can do that for a couple hundred bucks, you’ve cracked the code.
Great video, Jim. One of the best I’ve ever seen on UA-cam. Love your channel. 👍
Ww
Beat up Partscaster Tele and Sessionette owner/user here says .. Yay \0/ 👍
When I lived in San Diego, there was a guy who played guitar better with his feet than most can with their hands. 🙂
Sessionettes were great amps. The guy who made them (Stewart Ward?) clearly understood good tone.
After owning over 30 amps this is why I went to modeling. The tonal differences are so small that in a recording its very hard to tell them apart.
In a studio environment you can go so far in shaping the sound of your amplifier in post production, it's actually amazing. When that power was brought to modellers, there really are now no limits to how you can shape your tone.
Same here. I haven't owned quite as many amps, but I'm absolutely in love with my Helix and honestly don't think I'll buy another guitar amp again. Between the unit itself and the plugin versions for the studio I'm completely satisfied.
And you can notice that as a musician or producer, but any real difference if it exist, would never ever be noticed by the audience. No classic song that we know would´ve been less if it was recorded through a different amp, pick up, guitar, or anything in the signal chain
Amplifiers are really there for the performer. The audience doesn't really care what created the sound, as long as it sounds good. If what inspires you is a modeller, that's what matters.
what are your top3-5 good modeling amps?
I think what you’re doing is beautiful you’re taking us all away from the consumerism from the hype and taking us back to music and why we love it in the first place… Because it sounds good
I just watched all of his “Tested” videos and I’m blown away. Literally destroyed everything I thought I knew about electric guitar and amps. 😂 i’m in the market for a new electric guitar and amp, these videos drastically changed how I’m going to approach shopping for them.
As a gear obsessed musician, I find your content astounding! This video is particularly eye opening, as someone who was previously convinced that I needed an amp of each power tube type if I wanted to have a complete tonal palette. 🤦🏻♂️
Thank you for putting this stuff out! It's truly enlightening!
Please explore COMPRESSION and add it to your tackle box to achieve that final piece of "tube tone". Compression at the end of the chain is generally what happens in a loud tube amp.
Ive been using something like your "tackle box' for a couple years now, I don't miss tubes at all. Happy to see this become part of the main stream discourse about "tone"
He is using solid até pedal which also compress but ina rather diferente way, doing It would only make the difference bigger
You may notice that the actual tube amps compress a bit and the SS amp does not, but tube amp compression is different than signal level compression. Tube amp compression starts to cancel the note fundamentals in the OT, and maybe in the tubes to varying degree, while generating harmonics. The speaker Z curve also affects the midrange so the bass and treble remain more dynamic when the amp is driven harder. It's why tube amp overdrive sounds more lively, but some SS amp designers have emulated that behavior.
@@GCKelloch You might want to do what that guy actually do, take an amp and do some measuring. You might find out that the compression effect actually happen in the long tailed pair phase spliter, power tube and OT only doing figuration there. Just measure by yourself.
@@lolaa2200 Tube tone gurus do not like measurements.
@@lolaa2200well, the guy did a great job. but playing a loop does not account for dynamics, and that is where the difference happens.
Thank you Jim! I am totally blown away with your videos.
An EE here; the amps tone mostly comes from the circuit. It's pretty simple. What's not so simple is that "the circuit" could mean anything. By swapping an EL34 (tube) amp to an 6V6 amp (and adj. the bias, etc), you will not notice a real difference. But if you change some resistors and capacitors, forming for example the tone stack, you definitly hear a difference. It gets even more obvious if you change the bypass capacitor on the cathode of any V1 tube. Let's say if there isn't any capacitor at V1 cath. and we put in a 22µF to gnd. With that, we push the tube much harder and also alter the low freq. response; the amp will get way more low end into the following stage. It is rediciulus if people change tubes for more low end or more "punch" or more "pronounced highs"... This is so subtile, just turn the bass pot or presence and you get the same. All in all, it is WAY more about the whole circuit as just one or two components.
This might be the most mindblowing guitar-related video I've ever seen.
This and a production run “Tackle box” built into a cab with easily exchangeable speaker is what the world needs! I subscribed because of this video.
Why not reach out to amp company’s or pedal company’s (JHS could be one, they love busting myths too) and make this happen?
It would be awesome to see an in-depth look of The Tackle Box! Please!
I was just thinking that JHS would make a killer The Tacklebox!
I don't think amp companies are gonna like this guy much
Where does this leave us? Is what I thought after watching this brilliant expose - yes that’s a great idea, and the options it opens up for configurations is amazing! Love to see it made
I think this video and the other videos like it help to build an argument for amp sims, since it's the same idea of stripping away bits that don't really matter while maintaining a largely comparable tone.
I love this, the JHS tacklebox
you've probably made the most important videos for anyone on the search for "tone" on this platform. love your content.
Best music related video I’ve seen in a long while!! Super great job!! Appreciate your work! And your tackle box!
I love Jim's tests/comparisons - Pragmatic, and no hidden agendas. This is part of why I've used Modelers for decades. I'm interested in the tone, and not brand names, or hype, etc. My ears are the arbiters of what I like. Learning how to dial in those sounds is my responsibility. Thanks Jim 😎👍
I was really unimpressed with my Axe Fx after a while - and then tried it in a different room, through a different audio interface. Now I can’t stop playing it. Really helps to spend time with your gear
Your videos are the dose of objectivity that guitar culture needs. It’s hard to make solid decisions when all you can find are marketing terms and anecdotal evidence.
I've never played around with the order of effects when recording into my DAW... an obvious and free place to play. Thanks for all the fun I'm going to have.
Wow! I was not expecting this... mind blown, thank you!😢
That little janky box you made would actually be a hilariously convenient tool for finding the right tone for a song.
Also, brilliant work on everything in this video.
That "little janky box" is really a modeling amp with three amp models, kind of like a Boss Katana. So we have these convenient tools already in the form of modeling amps - from the Katana to the Helix and Fractal and others.
@@alextimo I'm not a musician myself so i wouldn't know. But that's gotta be really useful I'd imagine.
@@pumello It is. The Boss Katana is pretty amazing, particularly for newer guitarists. At an entry-level price you have an amp that can go from clean to blues to rock to heavy metal, and add effects on top of that. Pretty incredible that we have something so versatile and affordable.
I would LOVE a deep dive into how you exactly wired that breadboard and theses 4 pedals ! Absolutely amazing content !
THIS
Also any information about the EQ and distortion settings for each one of them, as it could be easily replicated in a DAW
Wonderful video Jim! I have been tinkering with effects pedals and building amps for nearly 20 years and knew the most differences we hear are a result of the amount of distortion and where they happen, however I would have never thought you would be able to get very similar tone to the stock tube amps by stacking a few pedals and a breadboard. That was really impressive. The main difference between cleaner sounding amps (fender deluxe) vs overdriven/compressed amps (marshall) is the fact the deluxe reverb has the tone stack which significantly attenuates the guitar signal, right after the first gain stage whereas Marshalls quite often have the tonestack after in later gain stages. The only thing I would say though is that I have noticed tonal difference between cathode biased and fixed bias as well as tube rectified vs ss rectified, and to my ears both cathode bias and tube rectifier add SAG to the tone. The problem is that SAG can't be experienced by playing a single note and letting it ring, it usually requires a few notes/power chords to be played and with some strenght in the guitar picking. Sag using my own words to deacribe is not a tonal change but the momentary inability to consistently drive the speaker with the same power and it is more pronounced when low notes are played. Thus giving the impression the tone is loose rather than tight. Having said that I wish you had tested the bias and the tube rectifier with that in mind. Cheers!
Love your search and questions and attempts to solve tone and sound in guitars. It's great
I watched this with my wife (who has absolutely no interest in guitar amplification) and we were dying laughing. This is such an eye opener.
Very well done Jim! I have been meaning to make a video about how amps pretty much all sound the same for years... I am glad that I don't have to do that now!
Probably one one the most precious video I've seen about amps and tone for years... since I'm still losing myself in constantly searching for the tone I like.
It put things into perspective and makes me want to calm down a bit.
Such a great great work there.
Thank you very much and bravo !!0
You are brilliant my man thanks!🙏🙏🙏
This is absolutely mind blowing to me. I love that you specified that you were a performer and did not know about circuits to the point it was almost annoying. Simply because establishing that but absolutely nailing the tone of all 3 amps makes your discovery all the more impressive. Kudos to you!
I think it was sarcasm all along. Man literally built himself an amp.
And best of all, he took the wind out of the sails of all the keyboard warrior "experts" would have been shouting "You don't know about circuits!"
Modern tackle boxes do not sound nearly as lush! :) Love what you are doing Jim
Great video, you invested a lot of time making it straight to the point and very informative. Your tackle box is nothing short of amazing, it nailed every tone dead on.. Well done.
This was REALLY cool. Thank you for sharing the journey.