Ideas on Blues tones

Dendrite

Dendrite

Inspired
The other guitarists I play with are playing through Fenders. And, though the AX8 has got some great Fenders in it, I'm trying to stay away from them and have a different nice, crunchy, bluesy sound. Always good to have your own voice in a mix...

Marshalls are a bit aggressive to my ears. I've landed on the CAE3+ recently, and I'm generally enjoying it. But I'm still kinda shopping...

There are 1K ways to skin this particular cat. So what are everyone's favorite go to setups for blues?
 
Have you tried the Brit JM45 Jump (A Marshall JTM45), it's not very aggressive, and I could blues away on that all night.

Otherwise there are lots of good choice - staying totally away from anything with a Fendery flavour, there is the Voxes (my current favorite is the top boost model), the Trainwrecks (Wreckers) /13, the Morgan AC20, the Carol-Anns (I remember the Tucana being great).
 
All great choices. I really like the Badger! It is very sensitive to pickup volume and pick attack - making it easy to go from clean to dirt. Loads of fun! Guitar makes a huge difference too...I prefer the Badger with my ES446 (thin hollow body humbucker) over my solid body single coils.
 
Dendrite said:
The other guitarists I play with are playing through Fenders. And, though the AX8 has got some great Fenders in it, I'm trying to stay away from them and have a different nice, crunchy, bluesy sound. Always good to have your own voice in a mix...

Marshalls are a bit aggressive to my ears. I've landed on the CAE3+ recently, and I'm generally enjoying it. But I'm still kinda shopping...

There are 1K ways to skin this particular cat. So what are everyone's favorite go to setups for blues?
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Lots of different blues tones... But since you mentioned the CAE3+, try the Clean model and push the MV up around 7 or so.
 
A great SRV tone can be achieved with a 50w Plexi with a strat/single coil type guitar using neck PU. I turned on the bright switch and didn’t need to mess with tone controls too much. Gain at about 10 o’clock and volume about 8. Use the guitar’s volume knob anywhere between 2-8 depending on how much dirt you want. The Plexi has great touch sensitivity so you can really play use dynamics and get really expressive. Played with a Clyde wah it’s captures the Hendrix/SRV and just sounds nasty (in a good way). Had hours of fun.
 
Don't give up on the Fenders too quickly for blues.

The Bandcommander with xformer match turned down a little bit, output comp set to feedback mode, and a post cab block 5-band passive GEQ with a frowny curve, is a very dynamic responsive amp.

For me, even more than the crunch, I want miles of clean headroom, so that I get real nuanced, when I play the blues. That really sensitive dynamic feel is what I go for.

In front, one of many dirt pedals add some nice stuff too. Like the SDD preamp.
 
Hiwatt, Morgan AC-20, Trainwreck

And also...these amps sound to me better than their similar versions from other brands. Not judging anyones choices but I dont know why i would choose an ac30 or ac15 when you have a Morgan in there...though i have a real ac15h1tv in real world:) (yes if it wasnt a fortune i would get a morgan or similar).
 
Mine right now are the Vibroverb, Komet, Soldano 100, and Vox. But yea, there are so many that would work for blues...
 
Semih Yanyali said:
I dont know why i would choose an ac30 or ac15 when you have a Morgan in there
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I've heard this before, but it's never rung true for me. The Morgan definitely provides a great Vox normal channel tone, but it's not doing the Top Boost tone. I can't get close enough to U2 using the Morgan model, but why even try? The Top Boost model is there.
 
JRFarmer said:
I've heard this before, but it's never rung true for me. The Morgan definitely provides a great Vox normal channel tone, but it's not doing the Top Boost tone. I can't get close enough to U2 using the Morgan model, but why even try? The Top Boost model is there.
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it's all preference...I personally don't know why you'd pick the AC20 or the AC30 when the DC30 is there, lol
 
Thanks for all the thoughts! Some great ideas I'll have to play with.
The CAE did well this weekend. Ended up with a clean boost of some kind in front of it. Rolled the bass all the way out on the amp, left the cut switch alone because the cut sounded like it sucked more low end out than the knob did at zero- go figure. Had a +3db filter boost post amp to goose my mediocre solos. And a wah (sadly, only used on 1 of 20 songs). Had a lot of fun!

Except when I had zero signal at the front of the 14th song... after 2 minutes I finally found that the tip of the instr cable had gotten ever so slightly pulled out of the back of the AX8- grr.

And when I played bass and couldn't hear it. I gave the sound guys The Look and they, in return, gave me The Shrug. It seems they had no signal to work with... intermittent bad volume pot. Now replaced. I guess that happens when the pot is 30 years old!
 
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curious said:
A great SRV tone can be achieved with a 50w Plexi with a strat/single coil type guitar using neck PU. I turned on the bright switch and didn’t need to mess with tone controls too much. Gain at about 10 o’clock and volume about 8. Use the guitar’s volume knob anywhere between 2-8 depending on how much dirt you want. The Plexi has great touch sensitivity so you can really play use dynamics and get really expressive. Played with a Clyde wah it’s captures the Hendrix/SRV and just sounds nasty (in a good way). Had hours of fun.
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What cab did you use for SRV tones? I ask because I can imagine that amp being super bright with the bright switch on and the gain at 10:00. Love to see a screen shot of the amp
 
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