Recently when not working on my writing, grant application, or the new house, instead of recording music as I usually do, I’ve been jamming on my new amplifier, a Vox AC4tv. Here it is with my Fender Esquire (built by me from mostly American parts):
I picked this little hottie up when it was only three days out of the store from a guy who decided it was too loud for his guitar room. I can attest to the fact that it must be the loudest 4 watt amp I’ve ever heard. I wanted a tube amp with that Vox chime, but affordable and capable of home use. Well, I guess I can use it at home. So long as nobody else is at home. The AC4tv has only three knobs: volume (the more you crank it, the more it overdrives the tubes), a tone knob (crank it up and you get something like the Vox top boost chime), and a power attenuator (set for 4, 1, or 1/4 watts). At 1/4 watts the amp is loud enough at full volume to bug the hell out of my wife and make my daughter clap her hands over her ears. At 4 watts, however, it has the unmistakable jangle of a much bigger Vox and veritably shakes the walls. Certainly I can use this amp for small gigs, if the need arises (hopefully). It doesn’t have the power or “fullness” of my Ampeg from long ago, but that one was 20 watts (or so, who the hell knows) with a massive 15″ Jenson speaker. I could barely turn it up all the way and stand in the same building. I wish to hell I hadn’t gotten rid of it…. But this little Vox with its 10″ Celestion custom speaker nearly makes up for it. I’ll never get rid of it, unless it’s to trade up to an AC15… and even then, the AC15 isn’t as cute as this little cream tolex baby…
So now my project is to relocate my old effects pedals. As one can see from the picture, I have my mid 1980s Ibanez DML modulation delay. This pedal has an amazing sound. It saved the day back when I was using a crappy solidstate Washburn amp in college, providing a rich, warm depth to the tone, especially as I set it up with just a teensy bit of modulation. Through the Vox the result is absolutely heavenly. I thought it didn’t work when I first put a new battery in it, but with a little bit of fiddling, everything is back to the way it was 20 year ago!
I have no idea, however, what happend to my Ibanez SC10 Stereo Chorus or my MS10 Metal Charger. I can live without the MS10 if need be (the Vox overdrives on its own wonderfully), but I don’t want to. That little beast also contributed to its share of salvation back in the solid state days: it provided rich, deep, tube-like distortion at almost any level I wanted, making my little Washburn (which also had a 10″ speaker) sound almost like a tube amp. I do remember it failed on me once: at my solo for “Funk This College Life” during a gig at some bar (forget the name), it shorted out. If I do find it, I’ll have to open it up to see where the short is, because I never fixed it.
The SC10 is a must have, however. It provided the nicest, richest chorus any old style guitarist could want. If I can’t find it, I’ll have to search ebay… when I have some money again.
Once the past has been shorn up, of course, it will be time for a tremolo pedal, flanger, reverb….
