Fender and Vox tone controls - how to set?

[abstamaria]

We have a new Fender Bassman 15 TV-front bass amp. This has a tube (valve) preamplifier and a solid state power amp. I was reading up on the amp in the web and came across this:

"On a contemporary amp, tone controls are Cut/Boost, with a setting of straight-up noon representing the center point. But the TV Fifteen has the passive ’50s Fender tone stack, where Bass and Treble controls are boost-only and the midrange is cut-only. For a flat EQ, put the Bass and Treble chicken heads at about 3 and the Middle all the way up to the full 12."

I'm assuming that's correct advice. My question is which other Fender amps work that way? The tweed Twin Amp? The Twin Reverb?

I'm wondering now whether the Victoria Victorilux amps, which are based on 50s Fender circuits, have a passive tone stack as well.

Finally, I recall the suggested setting here for Vox amps (for early Shadows) is for the bass and treble controls to be set to zero. Is that because those controls are boost only? Or because we really need to cut bass and highs?

I'm sorry for these very academic questions.

Many thanks,

Andy

[roger bayliss]

Here is some advice I heard before Andy and I certainly heard Charlie Hall mention it as well

First set up your amp to get the sound you would normally use at the volume you want to play at. Next turn all the EQ controls, (bass, middle, treble and presence if fitted) to 0. Turn the guitar volume up and select the neck pickup. Play an E chord at the bottom of the neck concentrating on the low E and A strings. Now sweep the Bass tone control from 0 to 10 and back a few times. You should hear a point somewhere between these two point where there seems to be a 'hump' in the tone where the bass really kicks in. Reduce the sweep to home in on this point and that will be the 'sweet spot' for the bass control. Now select the middle pickup, On a Telecaster select the in-between or middle position. Play an A chord at the bottom of the neck concentrating on the D and G strings. Sweep the Middle control the same way as you did for the Bass and again home in on the 'hump'. For the Treble control select the bridge pickup, play a D Chord, concentrating on the B and top E strings, and repeat the procedure.

Once the peak spot hump is reached for each control they generally say increasing it beyond that just makes say the bass louder when adjusting the bass and the sweet spot is the optimum point.

There was also a formula for some Fender amps that was something like 6, 6, 3, 2

Here is what they say

It was some time in 1979 when one of the "big guys" showed me how to dial in
that Fender or Music Man amps that always seemed to be on stage wherever you
play: "Easy" he said. "It's the magic six". Volume to 6, Treble to 6, Middle to 3
and Bass to 2 (6, 6, and 3x2=6). Bright should be on, reverb set for two and
master volume (if one) set so that you can be heard above the drums without
drenching the vocals. "The rest of the knobs you can just ignore" because no one
used tremolo in late 70's and the footswitch was always disappeared…
The effect was almost like having the key to Holy Grail - I have to admit that he
was right and I joined the Magical Six Choir.


read it here

http://www.singlecoil.com/docs/magic-six.pdf

[abstamaria]

Many thanks, Roger! I will try that.

Best,

Andy

[Bluesnote]

Thanks for that info Rodger. I've never been good at setting the amp to the the sound I want, there was always too much of one and not enough of the other and so on. I tried that method of yours on my Valvetronix 15 and it worked out great. I always had way too much bass on the amp and it kind of gave some unwanted sounds on certain notes on the neck, now thats been eliminated with your info
All these years playing and I only find this out now
And they say you cant teach an old git new tricks
Hugh.

[abstamaria]

I posted the same query on Charlie Hall's and the Perth Shadows' forums, and also received very helpful advice there. Regarding Vox,
I am taking the liberty now to quote below a message posted on the Perth site by Paul Rossiter, who developed the TVS echo machines that Hank Marvin is now using:

"For the early Shadows tunes (probably up to early 1961) Hank used AC15, AC30/4 and the pre top-boost AC30/6 amplifiers, all of which had a basically flat frequency response with just the option to boost the top end with the so called "bright" setting or cut the treble with use of the "cut" control. After that he used amplifiers with the top boost tone stack that gives a dip in frequency response around 800Hz, the depth of which depends upon the particular setting, in addition to cutting/boosting the bass and treble to a varying degree. However, if the bass and treble controls are both turned fully off the dip vanishes and the frequency response is then fairly flat, just like the earlier amplifiers. So a top boost channel can be used for both the earlier and later tunes just by adjusting the controls accordingly. The dip is largest with the treble and bass controls fully up and the cut control similarly near maximum to tame the top end a bit, and is the best setting for tunes like Atlantis.

The original Fender tone stack also gives a dip in the mid range unless the treble and bass controls are both turned to zero and the mid (if fitted ) at maximum in which case the frequency response is fairly flat. So a Fender amp with such a tone stack can emulate the frequency response of a Vox fairly well, though the actual voicing (and sound) of the Fender amplifiers is quite different. However, some modern Fender amps use a different tone stack that is not quite as useful in emulating the top boost Vox response.

All this is very apparent if you use a plotting programme like Duncan's Tone Stack Calculator, that I see has been mentioned in a similar discussion on one of the other sites.

Hope this helps,

Paul”

The link to the tone stack calculator is on Charlie Hall's site, in a thread statrted by me on the same topic.

My best,

Andy

[abstamaria]

I wrote Frank Glionna on the question I raised in this thread. Frank runs Music Gallery, a guitar store in Chicago, and has been very helpful on technical points, such as the availability of flat-wounds in the 50s and so forth. I have no connection with his store, but he has supplied Customshop guitars to our musical company and, recently, a Victoria Victorilux amp.

This is what Frank wrote:

"The Fender Re-issue amps, 59 Twin, 65 Twin all have the same tone circuit. This was standard among all Fender amps during that time frame & other amps such as Marshall, Vox etc. This is still quite common with guitar amps. It wasn't until companies like Mesa Boogie & others that offered tone pots that started in the middle & would either boost or cut that frequency.

The Victoria is old school. Just like the Fender amps. The pot might be a little more sensitive on the Victoria making it easier to dial in the tone you like but it works the same way."

As suggested above, there is no substitute to experimenting with the dials, but it is good to know what the baseline is.

My best,

Andy