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Cleanest amp?


uk_lefty

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On 01/07/2023 at 13:45, Bill Fitzmaurice said:

Note that where the 30 watt Ampeg is concerned the reason it was gig worthy is the natural compression of valves. Without compression it takes a lot more power to stay clean. By the same token using a compressor with SS allows a lot less power.

 

This is part of the little TE Elf's magic.

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If you can plug your mobile or a cd player into it and it sounds the same as listening through decent headphones then it's pretty clean.

 

My first bass amp was an old valve job ..not a hope. 

 

Then a carlsborough cobra, sounded transparent but you couldn't play a cd player through it. Harsh and middy.

 

then a trace gp12smx ... great with electric bass but only worked LOUD, just about HiFi though. 

 

Now a pjb flight case that's so linear that when I loaned it to an acoustic guitarist to play through, her mum said "oh, I thought she was going to use your amp"...she was using my amp.  What goes in comes out and there's not a lot of EQ to change that.  Great with double bass, perhaps a bit "unexciting" with electric bass.  But I love the raw sound of my bass so that's fine ( not going to be playing death metal or slap tho).

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  • 1 month later...
On 19/06/2023 at 14:04, tauzero said:

 

GR Bass AT500 or AT800 Cube.

I've got a GR Bass AT Cube 500 on the way. Should be here in a couple of days. I'm really interested to see how it compares to my current Fender Rumble Studio 40 or what I remember of the Rumble 200 combo that I sold before moving to 230V land.

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On 18/06/2023 at 19:34, spyder said:

Acoustic Image or Phil Jones amps are super clean.

I was surprised we got that far without a mention of PJB. IMO about the cleanest head anywhere - provided clean means totally uncoloured so the sound of your bass (it's native sound the way you play it) - nothing added or taken away. That's my own take on 'clean'. 

Worth a look on the secondhand market too as they are not to everyone's taste so good deals to be got.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 23/06/2023 at 10:41, BigRedX said:

IME bass guitars require a degree of dirt to make them sit properly in most band mixes

This. If you were to isolate the bass in all those brilliant classic 70's chart tunes it will be ever so slightly distorted, usually a P bass run direct into a valve pre amp on the board......and yes it kinda places it perfectly in the mix. Even Jamersons P bass on the Motown stuff is purposely distorted.

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On 19/06/2023 at 09:53, uk_lefty said:

Sorry guys, busy weekend... For me "clean" means a hi-fi sound. So, maybe clean isn't the word after all?!?!  I just mean no grit, drive or distortion, that super-flat fat bass sound with crisp highs, sterlie but not lifeless... All these words could mean different things to different people so... think of a Darkglass amp with it's drive on? Now think of the opposite. 

EBS Reidmar are the first amps that spring to my mind.

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On 18/06/2023 at 12:12, Waddycall said:

You could always go for a rack mount channel strip and power amp

 

 

+1 for this. I had a Focusrite Platinum Trakmaster and the sound was cleanliness personified. A superb bass preamp if purity is your thing.

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At work we bought a QSC PLX 3602 power amp off ebay (£200 I think) - laboratory quality clean (which is what we needed) and effectively limitless power into tiny impedances.  Plumb a sans amp into one of those beasties ......

 

.... and the next problem is finding a clean speaker 🙂 🙂

 

Schlepping a rack mount power amp and pre, plus a separate cab around is not ideal, I agree.  Hence my super portable little PJB combo.

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