What Is Your MAIN RIG When Playing With Other Musicians?

[Dennisthe Menace]

The Title pretty much speaks for itself. What MAIN GEAR does everyone use when
you are playing with other Musicians at Jam Sessions, Gigs, Practice, etc....???

[KRamone27]

This is it for me amp wise. A Marshall JCM-900 high gain dual reverb head with a Behringer 4X12 cab with bugera speakers
And these are my two main guitars currently. The one with the stickers plastered all over it is a 1984 MIJ Fender Strat with nothing but Seymour Duncan JB Jr. pickup and 1 vol and 1 tone. The one on the right is a 2007 MIM Fender Strat with basically the same setup just with a full sized JB humbucker.

a close up

[dubtrub]

Well! Here's my main rig.... and NO I don't let anyone else play with, my main rig

Although I have many to choose from, as most everyone here does, until recently I would normally play a Jazzmaster or Strat with a '63 reissue Vibroverb. Depending on what venue I'd be playing, I can go bigger or smaller on the amps. However, with my recent custom built Mosrite clones I see no reason to ever go back to my Fender's other than bedroom playing. Ooops!

[Dennisthe Menace]

Well! Here's my main rig.... and NO I don't let anyone else play with, my main rig

Although I have many to choose from, as most everyone here does, until recently I would normally play a Jazzmaster or Strat with a '63 reissue Vibroverb. Depending on what venue I'd be playing, I can go bigger or smaller on the amps. However, with my recent custom built Mosrite clones I see no reason to ever go back to my Fender's other than bedroom playing. Ooops!

That's a darn GOOD REASON to go back to "Bedroom Playing!"

[KRamone27]

darn DUB! That's one heck of a rig. I think you need to build a clone of one of those next and give it to me.

[zak]

This is my favorite amp:



It's a 1961 brownface Super (with a brown Bandmaster face-plate) in a home-made blond tolex box with a single 4ohm 12" speaker. It's been my main stage amp for over a decade and it has been to heck and back in the back of a van over and over again and just keeps on taking more and more punishment without any problems. It's hard to describe how great it sounds. Sounds amazing on 2 and sounds amazing on 10, and all points in between. Also, despite its age, it is the most reliable amp I've ever owned.

Unfortunately it's not always loud enough, so these days I'm often stuck playing a blackface Dual Showman with a 2x12 cab:



You can see it above on the right, with a '65 Fender reverb tank next to it. That's usually my live rig these days, and after years of being spoiled by the brown amp, I'm not really satisfied with the Dual Showman. However the other guitar player plays through a Gomez replica of a brownface Showman (it's on the left in the photo above) with a 1x15, and our bass player plays through a Dual Showman with a 2x15 (his amp is second from left), and our Farfisa player blares through a 180-watt solid-state Leslie (hidden by the Farfisa in the photo) so I need the Dual Showman to keep up. Our bass player is actually wanting one of those 300 watt Acoustic heads, because he isn't loud enough (everyone is usually turned up to 7 or 8). I think we might have a volume problem.


Here are my favorite recording amps...none of them are loud enough to gig with.
This is an early 60s Kay (left) and a Silvertone (right) from 1949:



This is a 1961 Supro that sounds unbelievable...kind of a one-trick pony but that one trick makes your jaw hit the floor when you hear it:



This amp was mine for years and then I sold it to a friend and now it is back with me again. It's loud enough for very low volume gigging (that rules out my current bands haha) and it records beautifully. It's a mid-60s Premier 100R Custom (with the Premier 90 two-knob reverb tank circuit in front of the preamp). An extremely rare and unusual amp with top quality components and impeccable workmanship. The 12" Jensen and 2x6V6 power section don't give enough headroom for anything but very low-volume gigging (think drummer with brushes).
Next to the amp you can see my Tel-Ray Ad'n'echo oilcan delay, an early 60s oddity which sounds like nothing else.



This split-chassis Danelectro-made Silvertone is one of my favorite sounding amps, and although it is moderately louder (2x6L6 and a beautiful 15" Jensen) than the Premier pictured above, it still isn't loud enough for me to gig with regularly, unless it is a venue with really great monitors and I don't need to rely on the amp to hear myself onstage (and that rules out about 90% of the venues we play haha).



The split-chassis design is really effective for reducing hum and noise (when this amp is idling with the volume on 10 and nothing plugged into it, it is dead quiet) and that makes this an ideal recording amp. The extremely flimsy cabinet construction makes it a poor candidate for anything else. Here's a clear view of the split chassis, with the back panel removed:



I have some other cool amps but these are my favorites for gigging and recording.

The rest of the stuff I use depends on which band I'm gigging with.
With the surf/garage band it's usually the Mosrite into a Fuzzrite clone, an overdrive and the reverb tank into the amp.
With the rockabilly band it's a heavily modified '59 Gretsch 6186 into a Roland Space Echo straight into the amp.
For punk rock the Gretsch or an old Danelectro plugged straight into the brown Super turned up to 10 is a pretty glorious Johnny Thunders kinda sound.

For recording I use all kinds of other crap that is too unpredictable for the stage, like a Rangemaster, a really demented sounding Shin-ei Companion fuzz, the Tel-Ray oilcan echo, some weird Japanese fuzz-wahs, a couple of different SuperFuzzes, a solid-state Echoplex, an 80s Ibanez analog delay pedal (for flying saucer noise effects) and some other crap I'm probably forgetting.

[dubtrub]

I love it. Did you build the amp cab and conversion?

http://a644.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/im ... 9144db.jpg

..........and a VERY nice collection of vintage gear. Or, is that vintage gear museum?

What's the story on the black guard Tele?

[zak]

Did you build the amp cab and conversion?

The cab was built and tolexed by my friend who sold me the amp - he'd bought it as a disembodied chassis and put it in that box. The cabinet is really expertly made and accurate looking, right down to the angles and everything.

is that vintage gear museum?

Oh no, definitely not a museum! The only rule around here is "if it does not get used, it gets sold" - all this gear needs to earn its closet space in my apartment, I only keep the stuff that doesn't gather dust.

What's the story on the black guard Tele?

It's a "parts-o-caster" - BIG Japanese 50s reissue V-neck, a 70s (I think) body, pots and caps and wiring out of my drummer's '51 Hudson Commodore's dashboard radio, and a Jason Lollar pickup. It started out as a Tele but I rewired it as an Esquire and yanked out the neck pickup. It's my "stunt" guitar haha. Set up real low & light, so that if your picking hand attack is intense enough, the strings clatter against the frets for maximum hillbilly effect. It's the only guitar I own that can be played comfortably in this position:





When I do that with my Gretsch I get a sore shoulder, and when I try it with the Mosrite I usually end up hitting myself in the head with the guitar.

[Haole Jim]

Warning!

Auld thread dug up from the archives...but the subject is interesting.

Only playing out is as church bassist. Rig is tres basic. Line 6 LD-150 1-12" transistor amp and either: Ibanez "lawsuit" (Gibson) Thunderbird IV copy, Line 6 Variax 700 or Fender Standard Precision Bass, in that order of numbers of uses. The T-Bird is just so comfy and easy....

210 Masses and services, to date. Audience weekly, anywhere from 350 to 1400. Usually 5 songs plus Mass parts. Holidays can go 10+ pieces with preludes.

Depending on who shows up, 4-10 vocalists, piano and/or organ, clarinet, trumpet, flute, sometimes acoustic guitar."Pickup band" in one of its loosest interpretations.

[jfine]

Carvin TL60 w/three single-coils, or Hallmark 60 Custom, into a Tech 21 Trademark 60 212 combo amp with a Dunlop volume pedal in the FX loop--channel-switching and reverb from the amp.
I just noticed all those "60"s, and I just turned 60 about a month ago. Coincidence? Spooky, eh, kids?