Marshall DSL as a bass amp 😁

[kevham]

For giggles, I took my wee Marshall guitar head along to and rehearsal tonight and plugged it into my Ashdown 4x10 and used it as a rehearsal rig.

 

Instant valve warmth goodness on the clean channel and loud enough for the rehearsal room. I could probably gig this with PA support.

 

On the dirty channel it was just insane (in a kinda good way).

 

Certainly made me want to get a proper valve amp again.

 

[James Nada]

Yes, playing bass through a guitar amp designed for rock is a guilty pleasure.  Bonus pleasure playing through a guitar cab - with the added risk of blowing the speakers!

[Lozz196]

A band I toured with years ago used a Marshall guitar head for their bass, not sure about the cab but it sounded great.

[BassAdder60]

Wouldn’t the EQ points all be way wrong for bass ?

[DGBass]

I owned  DSL401 combo and it was a guilty pleasure playing bass through it. Lovely bright tone and being all tube had that sparkle thats difficult to really emulate on a sold state amp. EQ was fairly basic but a little graphic boost worked well. The crunch channel was very sweet sounding  and the stock speaker was a Marshall Celestion G12-100 so it could take a reasonable amount of bass. Curiously I enjoyed noodling with the reverb on. The verb isn't a common effect used these days on bass. Or is it?

[songofthewind]

I seem to remember seeing pix of Stanley Clarke playing through a Boogie guitar combo. Keith Richard was also in the photo. Long time ago.

[Downunderwonder]

Those things must be saving a lot of gigs from death by guitard.

[kevham]

On 14/02/2023 at 16:42, BassAdder60 said:

Wouldn’t the EQ points all be way wrong for bass ?

I've got decent active EQ on the bass and on my pedal board but I didn't really do much tweeking.

It sounded remarkably good.

[BassmanPaul]

On 14/02/2023 at 05:39, Lozz196 said:

A band I toured with years ago used a Marshall guitar head for their bass, not sure about the cab but it sounded great.

A lot of us back In the Sixties played through Marshall amplifiers. I had a JTM45, I think that's right - it was a long time ago, that had a pair of KT66s as outputs. As an experiment I tried a pair of 6L6WGB in the amp and preferred them so I left them in. I still have that pair of KT66 tubes in my tube caddy.

[NAS Bass]

There were always plenty of Marshalls on stage "back in the day". I don't believe that the Super Bass models were very different from the regular Plexi or JCM800's, in fact they are sought after by guitarists now. Difficult to use in a modern setting as the sound relied a lot on stacks of speakers with very little EQ option (and no pedals!) but players in the late 60's, 70's and up to the early 80's were getting some great sounds, albeit bloody loud. 

[asingardenof]

Mmm, I miss my Marshall Super Bass. Alas I had to sell it just as we went into lockdown in 2020 (I was robbed too, only got £900 for it! 😢) but it had just had a complete internal overhaul by someone who specialises in vintage valve amps so it sounded freaking amazing. 

[kevham]

Funnily enough, when I first took up bass guitar as a teenager, my first actual amp was a Marshall JCM800.

[BassmanPaul]

@kevham How Long did it take before you learned which way around to hold the bass?? ;D

[Dood]

On 01/03/2023 at 18:58, kevham said:

Funnily enough, when I first took up bass guitar as a teenager, my first actual amp was a Marshall JCM800.

 

Oooh Washburn Force ABT (B10?) ! I bought a blue one just the same from a local awesome bassist who also ran a Marshall stack of this bass gear, but his was the JCM 800 bass range. Still, such a punchy sound! Why do I need one of those basses again!!

[dclaassen]

I use a Fender Dual Showman on gigs with the stock 4 x 12 cab. You would know long in advance if you were going to blow a speaker. The sound is great for classic rock...warm and with the lovely and totally un-emulatable attack....

[kevham]

21 hours ago, BassmanPaul said:

@kevham How Long did it take before you learned which way around to hold the bass?? ;D

Bizarre story - I'm not actually left handed. The ONLY thing I do left handed is play guitar.

When I was a kid, my dad had a left handed Les Paul and it didn't lend itself to turning upside down so I learned to play it left handed. By the time I realised my mistake, it was too late!

[kevham]

2 hours ago, Dood said:

 

Oooh Washburn Force ABT (B10?) ! I bought a blue one just the same from a local awesome bassist who also ran a Marshall stack of this bass gear, but his was the JCM 800 bass range. Still, such a punchy sound! Why do I need one of those basses again!!

Yes a B10. My first bass guitar. Bought for Christmas 1986 because the band I was in sacked the bass player and someone had to take over! Replaced in 1989 with a Washburn Status that I still have.

[Baloney Balderdash]

The Marshall JCM800 and especially the Hiwatt Custom 100, guitar tube amps, used to be, and to some extend still are, pretty sought after by bass players.

 

A Marshall JCM800 is part of Lou Barlow from Dinosaur J.'s 3 amp live setup, together with an old solid state Peavey bass amp and a vintage Ampeg SVT bass tube amp.

 

According to a rig rundown video Lou Barlow himself describes the functionality of this setup as the JCM800 being responsible for overdriven top end, the Peavey for clean mids, and the SVT for overdriven low end (not as in he runs a crossover or anything like that, just how he describes the basic character of those 3 amps respectively, and how he is overdriving the JCM800 and SVT, while keeping the SS Peavey clean).

 

Edited March 6, 2023 by Baloney Balderdash

[gjones]

Having played bass through a Marshall head before, due to faulty rehearsal room bass amps, I found them to be pretty bass light, even with the bass knob at max.

[grenadillabama]

On 14/02/2023 at 10:42, BassAdder60 said:

Wouldn’t the EQ points all be way wrong for bass ?

Yes,and it is hard to boost the bass eq a lot. Sometimes enough lows, sometimes too thin. The 412 cabinets sound good mic ed .

[Baloney Balderdash]

On 01/03/2023 at 19:58, kevham said:

Funnily enough, when I first took up bass guitar as a teenager, my first actual amp was a Marshall JCM800.

You look like a cartoon character in that picture, but guess that actually might had been your exact intention. 

 

Edited March 6, 2023 by Baloney Balderdash

[kevham]

On 06/03/2023 at 12:35, Baloney Balderdash said:

You look like a cartoon character in that picture, but guess that actually might had been your exact intention. 

 

I'm pretty sure I didn't know what I was doing. I was only 15 or 16 at the time. 😳

[Old Ozzie Guy]

IV been trying to find a Marshall Origin 50 Watt hd to try with bass..IV just started playing bass again, I played in 70s 80s, and used a Marshall jmp50or 45(can't remember) non master hd though a 2x15 bin. (box was only 120watt), but sounded like Jack Bruce (in my head anyway). 100 watt Marshall hds way too expensive for a gamble

[DGBass]

Something that came my way recently as a service and repair was a '71 Marshall Superlead 100w from a local contact who had bought it purely on spec without testing it.  This thread has drifted somewhat off the orignal 'DSL" theme as various Marhsalls that are not 'DSL's' have crept in so  I thought it worthy of a post. 

This particular amp hadn't been fired up in earnest for more than twenty years and needed little maintenance to get it working to a giggable standard. The thing that struck me most was the highly useable bass channel on the amp. My USA p-bass plugged straight in with no effects or anything to alter the sound was phenominal sounding. Transported me back to many a gig in the early eighties where all that you heard was a p-bass plugged into a Marhsall super lead or superbass with one of those curly coiled guitar leads that were all the rage at the time. Good times and a sound that is sadly missed these days.  it was a wrench giving this back to its owner but i couldn't afford to buy it from him. Pre 72 Marshalls are fetching ludicrous amounts of money these days. This one had late nineties JJ pre-amp valves and the power amp section had mid nineties winged C Svetlana's in the power amp section. All biased perfectly and sounded awesome. Orignal mains and output transformers and old school tag board. 

 

Edited March 10, 2023 by DGBass

[Old Ozzie Guy]

That's why I was enquiring regarding current "Origin"50 watt hd, I have played my 335 thru "Origin50"with a quad with greenbacks, and it was soooo much like my JMP (45or50), (definitely had 2 EL34s)

Anyway, back in the day,I played a bass with JMP into 2x15 Accoustic bass bin (box was only 150watts total)

Sounded gr8, I'm sure 100 watt give a smidge more vol / head room, but 100watt Marshall cost prohibitive (can buy Ampeg V4B for not much more. Origin hd relatively cheap!