I almost always play small combo amps of 20 watts or less. But I wanted something with a bit more clean headroom for a possible upcoming project — and to demo my stompboxes. I’ve always enjoyed playing JTM-45s when I’ve reviewed them for guitar mags, so I ordered Monotone’s British 45 kit.
I’d previously had a great experience building Mojotone’s Marshall 18 watt clone kit when I reviewed it for Premier Guitar a couple of years ago. It turned out great, and I use it regularly.
Mojotone provides high quality parts, nearly labelled and organized in plastic compartmented boxes. But beware: The company provides no build instructions — just a layout diagram and a schematic. You need amp building experience or help from an expert. Click play for a slideshow about he build:
This is Mojotone's new offset head cabinet. (The amp chassis first in other Mojotone cabinets as well.)
The two power tubes can be either EL-34s or KT-66s. (I chose the latter, just for a new experience.)
The parts come neatly labeled and organized in plastic bins — a BIG help!
Warning: the kit includes no build instructions — just this layout diagram and a schematic.
I ALMOST managed to assemble it, but I needed a rescue at the end. (Thanks to Bruce Clement of BC Audio, a brilliant boutique builder here in San Francisco.)
Mojotone supplies their own branded transformers (which sound fab).
It's a turret board build. (The board and turrets are pre-made, as opposed to some kits, which require you to insert the turrets yourself.)
This is probably not a good first build — maybe start with a nice little tweed Champ kit?
The a plexi faceplate, which I left omitted. I also substituted my own knobs.
I nearly made it through myself. (Translation: I soldered everything together and it didn’t work.) So I had to hire Bruce Clement of BC Audio here in San Francisco to rescue me. (Bonus: Bruce loaned me one of his JTX50 heads. Man, it’s one of the best-sounding Marshall derivatives I’ve ever heard. It’s among his Octal-Plex series amps, which use octal preamp tubes in Marshall-inspired designs.)
I had a blast building and testing two Marshall 18-watt kits for a Premier Guitar story — and I emerged with new respect for this cool 1965 design.
These mini-Marshalls were neglected in their day, but are now treasured. The oft-heard claim that they provide plexi tones at reasonable volumes is only partially true — these are open-backed combos powered by a Vox-like pair of EL-84s tubes. But while they have roughy the same horsepower as the era’s Fender Deluxe and Vox AC15, their tone is undeniably ’60s Marshall. In the studio, they sound far larger than their actual size. And out of the studio, they’re still pretty darn loud.
I’ve never seen three 18-watts in the same place before.
Even though the Mojotone and Tube Depot kits I built share the same schematic (and identical cabinets, both made by Mojotone), the build experiences and final results differed greatly.
And just when I thought I’d scaled the Everest of 18-watt ecstasy, I get a real Marshall 18-watt reissue for an upcoming Premier Guitar review. Stay tuned.
Are any of you guys 18-watt fans? Any observations to share?
I just received from Warmoth all the parts for my next DIY guitar. I loved testing eight sets of P-90 pickups for Premier Guitar, but I don’t own any P-90-eqipped guitars.I will soon, though!
This one will be a bit of a platypus — as opposed to, you know, all my other other platypi. (The actual plural of “platypus” is “platypuses,” but “platypi” is more fun to type.) It’s built from Warmoth’s “split Jazzmaster” template, with a korina body, bound neck, Tune-o-matic/stop-tailpiece bridge, and a pair of hum-cancelling Fralin P-92s. Yeah, it’s kind of a stab-in-the-dark experiment, and not a inexpensive one. But hope springs eternal. Prepare to be bored with details!
I’ve also just received an amazing-looking pair of condenser mics from Portland, Oregon’s Ear Trumpet Labs. ETL kingpin Philip Graham’s business card identifies him as “proprietor and bricoleur.” Bricolage, of course, is the ten-dollar word for “making stuff out of junk and other found objects.” Dig the steampunk vibe of that repurposed hardware! I haven’t even plugged these in yet (though the reviews I’ve read have been stellar). I just like staring at them! But I’m going to try them out at my monthly Strung Out! show tonight.
Ear Trumpet Labs’ Edwina and Edna models: a higher calling for found objects!
Which brings me another of this week’s highlights: I got to perform last night with my dear friends Teja Gerken and Adam Levy. Teja is an astonishing acoustic fingerstylist and a fine composer. His vocabulary has hints of Bensusan, Hedges, and classical, but he’s molded those influences into a thoroughly unique sound. And Adam, who I’ve known since my Guitar Player magazine days, is equally renowned for his jazz work and for accompanying such singer/songwriters as Norah Jones and Tracy Chapman. (I get to play some of Adam’s cool parts when I gig with Tracy.) These days Adam’s focusing on songwriting, and he his sings his “smart Americana” songs (my description, not Adam’s) in a sweet, soulful voice. Man, what a treat to hear both of them up close. And tonight, Adam, Shelley Doty, and I perform at my local dive, El Rio. Can life get any better?
Apparently so! Yesterday Premier Guitar posted John Bohlinger’s piece on the Pixies, which includes a pic of Charles “Frank Black/Black Francis” Thompson’s pedalboard, with my grubby, hand-built Duh fuzz pedal front and center. I’d originally made if for Joey Santiago, the other Pixies guitarist, but I guess Charles swiped it. Hey, I’d be honored if either guy spat on the thing! They’ve been heroes since I first heard the band in a small San Francisco club back in ’88. (Everyone went to hear the Sugarcubes, but left talking about that awesome opening act from Boston.)
Frank Black’s pedalboard: Lookit! I’m Pixies-approved!
It’s funny, because I really was thinking “Pixies” when I sound-designed the Duh. I was going for “bubblegum metal” — a thick, heavy sound, but not a macho one. The tone is too fizzy and funny for 100% sincere heavy rock, IMHO. It’s more of a “greasy kid stuff” distortion. (Note to readers under 45: That was once the tagline for a “dry look” mens hair product, referring to the outdated coiffures that would return with a vengeance when punk broke a few years later.) It’s a vaguely Muff-like sound, but with less compression, less scoop, and one big, stupid knob. I also like building that circuit into guitars. Like this one:
So it’s been a grand week, but a hectic one. Thanks for reading this far. Next week I promise a proper post, and not another collection of … odds & ends.
It’s a holiday miracle! The 30-minute Bigsby tremolo installation.
Sometimes it pays to write for a guitar magazine!
My old pal and Premier Guitar colleague Andy Ellis hipped me to the Vibramate, an adapter that allows you to install a Bigsby tremolo on many types of guitars with no drilling or other permanent modifications to your instrument.
A Bigsby and Vibramate were a centerpiece of a cool makeover project the magazine concocted, transforming a beat-up ’70s Epiphone in a bitchin’ Bigsby-bedecked bombshell. Inspired, I decided to give myself the shakes for Xmas. I bought a Bigsby B7 and corresponding Vibramate kit and popped them onto my long-suffering Les Paul. Check it out:
Yup, this is the much abused ’82 Les Paul that I’ve used in many tonefiend experiments, especially the OCD-approved Pagey Project. What a journey this guitar has been on! Never a big Les Paul fan, I picked up the cheapest old one I could find because I needed it as a reference for the sound design work I was doing for Apple. Trust me — it was a thoroughly unremarkable instrument. But then I started playing with pickups … and alternate wirings … and replacement hardware … and after several years of hacking, I have an instrument I love.
Pity about the gold hardware though — I should have switched to chrome early on. It’s the downside, I suppose, of incremental makeovers. By the time I got to the Bigsby, I had to cough up extra cabbage for the vulgar finish. (My wife recoiled when she saw the Bigsby box on the counter: “Eww — what’s this gold thing?”)
The Vibramate bracket screws into the existing tailpiece bushings.
I’m no Bigsby expert. I’ve never owned a Bigsby-fitted guitar (though I’ve had a couple of long-term loan). It’s odd, because I like how they perform, look, and feel, and “bling cringe” aside, I love it on this guitar. It definitely changes the tone — though in spectacularly unscientific fashion, I replaced the previous roundwound strings with flatwounds while doing the installation, and it’s tricky to sort out which changes are exclusively related to that hardware, and which to the strings. The guitar feels brighter and more resonant. (I’m reminded of Ry Cooder’s dictum: The more springs you add to a guitar, the livelier the acoustic response.) The treble response is WAY different — I needed to lower the treble sides of the pickups to offset the face-slapping response of the high E string.
I’ve bored everyone to tears with my incessant testimonials to the glory of great flatwound strings. This guitar has never worn flats — I’ve kept it in roundwounds for writing product reviews, and for sessions where I specifically need a roundwound sound. But I’m loving the way they sound and feel here, so I guess I’ll have to select another Gibson-flavored guitar as a dedicated roundwound instrument.
The installation was a breeze. The quality of materials is superb. I also added Vibramate’s String Spoiler, a clever little bracket that clips onto the tiny nubbins that usually secure strings to a Bigsby. The Spoiler makes string changes way easier. I’m deeply impressed by the Vibramate products — even in frickin’ gold.
Oh — the demo tune is the late John Barry’s wonderful Midnight Cowboy theme. Berry wasn’t a guitarist, but he contributed so much to the guitar vocabulary through his scores, especially for the early James Bond films. I was privileged to interview Barry for Guitar Player back in the ’90s. What a cool and brilliant musician!
We’re far from the first to cover this ground. In fact, I should have mentioned a couple of great articles on Fuzz Face mods. We’ve talked about the technique of using sockets in your build so you can audition multiple components. Years ago DIYer Gary Burchett took this notion to its logical conclusion with the Multi-Face, a Fuzz Face with most of the components socketed. It’s definitely worth trying this. Meanwhile, this Instructables project by randofo explains how to create a super-versatile Fuzz Face using switchable components.
Trust me — despite the simplicity of the circuit and the sheer number of adventurous souls who have deconstructed and reconstructed it, it’s hard not to play around with it and find something cool and new. That too is a truth universally acknowledged!
UPDATE [06.16.2013]:Build instructions updated to v02.
The Fuzz Face has inspired countless spinoffs since Ivor Arbiter unveiled the device in 1966. Some introduced meaningful improvements. Many didn’t.
The goal of this project, created by my friend Mitchell “Super-Freq” Hudson, is to create a pedal very similar to the original. It’s a great way to explore one of the iconic sounds of ’60s rock (and lots of ’60s-influenced rock).
You can order a kit from Mammoth for $45. (Disclosure: Neither tonefiend nor super-freq has any financial stake in these kits. I simply asked the Mammoth guys to create one for your parts-sourcing convenience. All necessary parts are readily available from other vendors.)
But before you attempt the project, please be aware of some of its quirks. (And if you’re curious, you can read about how I customized the pedal I used in my video demo.)
Most sentient guitarists love Hendrix, but not everyone is equally fond of his signature distortion pedal.
So what’s your take on the Fuzz Face?
I used to hate them — but only because my sole exposure to them was via the crappy reissues of the ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s. They sounded so brittle and harsh! Not till this century did I encounter the pedal in its original incarnation.
What a difference!
Vintage-style Fuzz Faces produce tones that are warm, rich, and unbelievably dynamic. It was like the first time I tasted a vintage-style daiquiri. Like the Fuzz Face, the classic daiquiri is a delicate concoction made from a few simple yet complexly interactive ingredients — nothing like those nasty blended drinks that taste like Slurpees spiked with Everclear.
Here’s everything I love about vintage Fuzz Faces, compressed into 60 seconds:
My DIY version is based on inventor Ivor Arbiter’s original 1966 schematic. That’s also the basis for a new DIY project created by my stompbox-buildin’ pal Mitchell Hudson, who runs the cool DIY site Super-Freq. We’ll both be posting it on our sites in the next few days. You can source the parts on your own, or order a kit for less than $50 — not as cheap as some of our other DIY projects, thanks to its two relatively pricy germanium transistors.
Most lore about “mojo” stompbox parts is utter nonsense, but there is something harmonically unique about the germanium transistors used in ’60s fuzz pedals, including original Fuzz Faces. (See my “Germanium Mystique” post/rant for more info.) You don’t need germanium for a good fuzz sound — there are many great tones available via silicon transistors, integrated circuits, and digital modeling. But one problem with those god-awful Fuzz Face reissues was that they often simply substituted high-gain silicon transistors for germanium ones without modifying anything else in the circuit. The result was more gain, but at the cost of harsh, excessively bright tones and inferior dynamic response.
In the last decade or so, builders have wised up. Numerous manufacturers offer authentic ’60s-style replicas. Meanwhile, the DIY community has created countless variations, many of which use post-germanium parts to great effect. These days it’s pretty easy to find a Fuzz Face that doesn’t suck.
I’ve build many Fuzz Face variants, but until Mitchell created his Fuzz Face project, I’d never done a strict original, with positive-ground wiring, PNP transistors, and few latter-day “refinements.” (Don’t sweat it if those terms mean nothing to you — they’re all explained within the project.)
Anyway, that’s the circuit you hear in the video above. It’s not a fuzz for all seasons — it doesn’t have a ton of gain, and its loose, spongy distortion is unsuitable for metal and modern hard rock. But I love its warm, non-macho timbre and phenomenal dynamic response. It’s simple, classic, and delicious, much like this.
I've got a Tweed Champ kit, and I'm not afraid to use it. Or at least not VERY afraid.
I’ve got a Tweed Champ kit, and I’m not afraid to use it. Or at least not VERY afraid.
Why do they make amps so damn loud?
It’s not just a cranky question from a guitarist who’s drawing depressingly close to the “Get off my lawn!” years. I ask sincerely: Why?
Big amps make total sense — but only if a) it’s 1969, b) you’re playing venues with Jurassic sound reinforcement, and c) you’re a guitarist in danger of being drowned out by Keith Moon or John Bonham.
Okay, end of harangue — I’ll have time for that when I’m chasing kids off my lawn (after I move to the suburbs and GET a lawn). But as I get psyched up to build this review model of Tube Depot’s Tweed Champ kit in the coming days, I figured I’d ask what folks are using these days to get cool amp tones in their bedrooms and basements. Not dedicated practice amps, necessarily, but great-sounding stuff that happens to be ultra-low-wattage? Name your petite-amp poison!
Anyway, I’m stoked about this kit. I’ve already completed a few amp clones from Ceriatone. They were fun to build and sounded great. But I can tell right off the bat that this Tube Depot kit has at least one major advantage over its Malaysian cousins: This one comes with a fabulous 40-page instruction manual. (Most clone vendors simply link you to a schematic.) Having created a few step-by-step instruction manuals myself, I can testify how much painstaking work these entail. Hats off to Tube Depot’s Rob Hull for doing it right!
Details and build report to follow. But now, let’s talk tiny-amp tone!
Most sentient guitarists love Hendrix, but not everyone is equally fond of his signature distortion pedal.
