From: Tom Ball Date: Sat, 28 Feb 1998 17:41:12 -0800 Subject: Re:'65 Fender Deluxe
Robert wrote: >Hi all you amp experts. I've got a '65 Fender Deluxe amp, not a Deluxe >Reverb, but just the Deluxe. I've never been able to get real great >tone out of it. >Does anybody out there have any suggestions how to set (via the knobs) >it up to sound fat, alas, I haven't found that magic potion. ____________ Hi Robert, Well, you're going to get twenty different answers to this question...from twenty different folks who have twenty different ideas about what constitutes "great tone"...but, for what it's worth, here's my two cents:
IMHO, (1) firstly, you need reverb. I don't mean need, I mean NEED. Since it's not built into your amp, you should probably consider either swapping for another amp that has it, or picking up an outboard reverb unit. The best (but unfortunately most costly) outboard reverbs are the early '60s Fenders, but there are other options, and there's a couple of fine reissue-type tube outboard reverb units available these days (by Kendricks and by Fender.)
(2) What kind of mic are you playing through? If you're blowing through your vocal mic, you might want to try a harp mic. Try a few out before you settle on one, but a few suggestions might be (a) Astatic JT-30 crystal. (b) Astatic JT-30C ceramic. (c) Hohner Blues Blaster (which is really just an Astatic JT-30 painted blue.) (d) Shure 520 Green Bullet. (e) any vintage bullet-shaped high-impedance Turner, Shure, Electrovoice, Lafayette or Astatic. All of these are small, bullet-shaped ham-radio style mics that work good for harp (if terrible for vocal!)
(3) Roll your treble down. Way down. To, maybe, 3 out of ten.
(4) Roll your bass up. Way up. To, maybe, 7+ out of ten.
(5) If you do all this and none of it helps, sorry to say you might need a different amp!
Good luck and let me know how it goes,
in tunes,
Tom _________________ Tom Ball & Kenny Sultan http://www.bassharp.cpm/tomball.htm
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