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Permalink Reply by Vince Clarke on July 3, 2012 at 9:40pm

i busk more than play gigs, so batteries are the way forward for me. i run a couple of pedals into a Vox mini 3 and sometimes run that into a Xion tailgator portable PA for more noise. anyone else?

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Permalink Reply by Swamp Dawg Primal Music on July 6, 2012 at 4:43am

I'm leaning towards a VHT Special 6 Ultra combo, seems highly rated and easy to destroy with mods. Anyone with experience with these? Again, it'll be mic'ed, so I just need stage volume.

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Permalink Reply by Ron "Oily" Sprague on July 6, 2012 at 5:45am

Swampy,

Just looked up the Special 6 Ultra. It looks pretty kewl; reviews I'm reading say the amp has a darker tone than a Fender clean. I like the idea you can mod it and use diff tubes. Let us know if you get one, and post audio / vid files when you do ;-)

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Permalink Reply by Swamp Dawg Primal Music on July 6, 2012 at 8:13pm

Ordered the S6U combo, along with a Danelectro Spring King reverb pedal and Artec delay. Lots of mods possible for everything, to keep my bank account dry! Man, my JuJu pup and Old Lowe stuff's gotta get here- the wife's going away so I can build the new git and jam! I'll be using my Crate GT15R combo for low-fi voice and the stomper. Should be a good mic'able stage setup. I think I'll have to actually record something, maybe a Fang cover...

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Permalink Reply by Swamp Dawg Primal Music on July 6, 2012 at 8:36pm

Actually, I think the distortion on the Ultra may be a bit much for the CBG, I almost went for the much simpler standard Special 6 head/cab, but the effects loop looks handy.

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Permalink Reply by Vince Clarke on July 6, 2012 at 9:05pm

good call, many more possibiliies.

love my spring king, id never appreciated before how much of a massive difference to the sound of any guitar the tone knob would have. I havnet done any mods to it yet though.

The distoriting may be a little much for a cbg, but wheres the fun if you cant make a dirty racket? Besides, you could always use some form of preamp to get the output of the cbg into the realm of regular guitar pickups and get some clarity from the amp

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Permalink Reply by Swamp Dawg Primal Music on July 6, 2012 at 9:56pm

The amp looks to be pretty adjustable in the gain department, and probly the only mod off the bat will be a channel footswitch (it's advertised as 1 channel, but it has 2, you just have to pull yer plug and put it in the other hole). I also wonder about the eq section, but I'll play with it first. I'll be running a JuJu single coil, not a piezo, though I may use one of my gits with a rod piezo, also. Anyways, coming from hardcore/punk/metal, I have no fear of distortion. As for tubes, I'm no cork sniffer, and have noticed that my broken in stock Valve King head and Crate 4X12 beat the poopy out of most boutique amps that I share the stage with, mostly because I take time to do a proper setup and EQ, so I'll probly leave them alone as long as they last, then swap 'em for easy to get and cheap JJ's.

I found a neat mod for the Spring King to adjust the delay and feedback. Let me know if it interests you.

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Permalink Reply by Wayne Sorbelli on December 22, 2012 at 3:50am

Personally i find any small watt all tube amps are the best for CBG's in a live situation (don't forget to use a nice noise suppressor like the BOSS or MXR smart gate!!!

happy holidays and peace

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Permalink Reply by Busyhands Slim on December 22, 2012 at 8:49am

I've been playing a Fender Acoustisonic 150 for the past several months and I've come to like it a lot. (I sold off all but one of my Fender tube amps.)

It's lightweight, plenty loud and has two channels. One is a "clean" channel that just amplifies your instrument. It's good for acoustic guitar sound, and has a few digital effects you can add in. The other has more effects and the same clean output, but adds three modeled tube amps (Fender Blackface, Fender Tweed and Marshall). Those get progressively louder and more distorted, so you can change your volume and tone easily by twisting a knob. It also has tilt-back legs, which I've grown fond of.

I also auditioned the Fishman Loudbox amps and they're quite nice for acoustics, but the dual channels and modeled amps made me go for the Fender.

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Permalink Reply by DarkMark on December 26, 2012 at 1:18pm

'71 silver face twin reverb (rewired to blackface specs),'69 Ampeg B25B bass amp, '84 pignose 7/100

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Permalink Reply by Ice Bob on December 26, 2012 at 4:19pm

every cbg i got takes a different approach to amping hands down the best swiss army knife amp i got is my micro cube any thing from acoustic sounds to distorted to hi gain clean. i got a peeve blues classic that sounds great clean or dirty with magnetic pickups but my piezo cbgs sound to raspy in it same with my fender princeton. but they all love the micro cube. not much to carry stick a mic in front of it or plug it into a PA..i also have a bugera v5 that sounds good on the magnetics. the big question is how loud are you if its for a band with a drummer you need more amp .thats why i got the 50 WATT Peeve. but i love the little cube in my duo upright bass' canned drums and CBG. small lots of different tones useable effects. maybe a step up to a bigger cube heres a clip of my recorded with the computers built in mic the cube is clean with reverb  i think its on fender mod      http://www.cigarboxnation.com/video/cigarbox-guitar-im-a-blues   heres a piezo acoustic pickup thru the cube with a little chores    http://www.cigarboxnation.com/video/cigar-box-guitar-peaceful-eazy   one more dirty distorted sounds         http://www.cigarboxnation.com/video/free-ride-by-dan-hartmanedger im sure the VHT are great amps this one is $!20 US. i got the bass one to we gig with them plugged direct into a PA. best to try them out with your guitar to find the best match for your CBG and you and how your gonna use it. there are lots of great amps out there freind this is what works for me

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Permalink Reply by Wayne Sorbelli on December 27, 2012 at 3:35am

I have to agree as far as the cube for most cgb's i've been playing.  I have a small music store and carry a cool dude (Katfish Karash) handmade cbg's and since this thread started I've tried a few different amps - at first i thought the all tube small watt type amp was the BEST - but turns out it was the best ONLY on that ONE particular cbg - when i started changing cbg's i noticed one of the best sounding amps for ALL cbg's was the Roland Cube - any Roland Cube was just as good - any watt

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