How to make Dumble Steel String Singer Preset

austinbuddy

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(Re-posted excerpt from another thread post I made).

Steve Ray Vaughan was famous for this sound, and John Mayer goes for it. It is a super clean sound, and it's created mainly by using a Skyline (Dumble) tonestack preamp with an Amp SVT power section. It sounds best LOUD!

I'll probably do a video on it, but just wanted to get this out:

Set up a preset, use the Ampeg SVT Bass amp.

Turn the amp drive and master up to 6 each. Dial Bass back a little, Mid and Treble around 6.

Use the Rumble 4x12 EV12S M160 cab - Factory Cab # 106. Dial in proximity to taste (between 3 and 5).

Go to Amp GEQ -- boost the highs and lows, leave mids flat. If you use 5 band passive db for example, boost low and low mid between 1.5 and 2 db, and HMid and High in same range.

If you want raise the mids across the board ever so slightly (less than 1db).

Go into the preamp page. Set Tonestack to Skyline, or Skyline Deep (to taste). Then change to put the Tonestack in the MID position (important).

Dial in Preamp Dynamics to between 0.50 and 1.0, to your taste.

Put a studio or optical compressor after it, set ratio to between 1.5 and 2 (no higher) and make up the gain.

Add a dimension 1 chorus, with very small amount mixed like 7%

Get your Strat out. You now have in essence a Dumble Steel String Singer. It is VERY clean and glassy but with bite.

You can make it fatter by adding an FET drive before the amp like a clean boost -- low drive gain setting.

Tweak it to your own taste, but this will get you close. Have fun! Thanks to Brandon Montgomery of Bludotone Amps who helped me figure this out based on on his knowledge of the real amp.

P.S. There is a "SteelSings" preset contained in the bonus Classic Rock & Blues bank of my 700+ Naked Amps TonePack that is basically the preset enumerated above. Visit www.austinbuddy.com to learn more about all that.
 
Last edited:
(Re-posted excerpt from another thread post I made).

Steve Ray Vaughan was famous for this sound, and John Mayer goes for it. It is a super clean sound, and it's created mainly by using a Skyline (Dumble) tonestack preamp with an Amp SVT power section. It sounds best LOUD!

I'll probably do a video on it, but just wanted to get this out:

Set up a preset, use the Ampeg SVT Bass amp.

Turn the amp drive and master up to 6 each. Dial Bass back a little, Mid and Treble around 6.

Use the Rumble 4x12 EV12S M160 cab - Factory Cab # 106. Dial in proximity to taste (between 3 and 5).

Go to Amp GEQ -- boost the highs and lows, leave mids flat. If you use 5 band passive db for example, boost low and low mid between 1.5 and 2 db, and HMid and High in same range.

If you want raise the mids across the board ever so slightly (less than 1db).

Go into the preamp page. Set Tonestack to Skyline, or Skyline Deep (to taste). Then change to put the Tonestack in the MID position (important).

Dial in Preamp Dynamics to between 0.50 and 1.0, to your taste.

Put a studio or optical compressor after it, set ratio to between 1.5 and 2 (no higher) and make up the gain.

Add a dimension 1 chorus, with very small amount mixed like 7%

Get your Strat out. You now have in essence a Dumble Steel String Singer. It is VERY clean and glassy but with bite.

You can make it fatter by adding an FET drive before the amp like a clean boost -- low drive gain setting.

Tweak it to your own taste, but this will get you close. Have fun! Thanks to Brandon Montgomery of Bludotone Amps who helped me figure this out based on on his knowledge of the real amp.

P.S. There is a "SteelSings" preset contained in the bonus Classic Rock & Blues bank of my 700+ Naked Amps TonePack that is basically the preset enumerated above. Visit www.austinbuddy.com to learn more about all that.
Since I bought your preset pack, I'll be trying that preset later today!

Don't have a Strat, but I'll make do :)
 
....yup.., got lost in this one today to great delight. could this be the magic Dumble formula that @texaxe (sorry to hear he has taken his legendary rants elsewhere) often obliquely referred to but never shared....?
 
This preset is a good example of applying advanced parameters when needed. I never use Preamp Dynamics (don't feel the need), but with SV Bass it makes all the difference, adding dynamics to a rather flat compressed sound,

This will probably also work well with Tube Pre in presets for acoustic guitars.
 
This preset is a good example of applying advanced parameters when needed. I never use Preamp Dynamics (don't feel the need), but with SV Bass it makes all the difference, adding dynamics to a rather flat compressed sound,

I agree fully; I played with that parameter a lot experimenting with this preset and it does indeed make all the difference. I've added some Preamp Dynamics to most of my gig presets (anywhere from .2 to 1.0) to give them just a little more articulation and improved feel/touch, especially on my clean/mid-gain tones.

I'll say it again, this is an awesome preset and it's in my main bank now...great punchy clean full bodied tone and is awesome for funky type stuff. Thanks Austin for you contributions, you really get great tones and I appreciate the sharing of experience and knowledge. It's always very cool to see how others work with the AFX/AX8 and approach crafting tones.
 
It didn't sound like what I expected (whatever that was)... but it sounds great! I didn't pull out my strat, but was loving it w/ my 513. My main clean/punchy preset is a Vibroverb, it'll be interesting to compare.

I also set up the Y amp w/ the ODS Clean and essentially the same parameters so that'll be an interesting comparison too...
 
Thanks for sharing, and all your wonderful contributions to this forum, Buddy. Said that - Any suggestions for how to adopt this for a ES 335 type of guitar would be highly appreciated...
 
No use of Preamp Dynamics in the presets, Buddy?
Yek -- yes it was intentionally, because if you play like Stevie did 90% of the time (hard attack with mega string pressure) that's not what this amp does -- it's tight, low sag, instant response. I assumed people playing this Bonus preset would attempt to play like that.

But absolutely it makes great sense for players using it in other ways, or like for "Lenny" that is softer and more dynamic, to set the preamp dynamics to .50 to 1. Thanks!
 
Thanks for sharing, and all your wonderful contributions to this forum, Buddy. Said that - Any suggestions for how to adopt this for a ES 335 type of guitar would be highly appreciated...

Yes -- Snoop, I would suggest you turn the input trim down to maybe 0.5 and see how you like that, and to turn OFF the PEQ block in front of the amp off - it's not needed with humbuckers, as they put out mids.

Then tinker with B/M/Treble to get the last mile based on your guitar and its pickups. Let us know how that worked for you, and what else you might do to make it work in a way you like!
 
For interesting twist, I found swapping out the default power tubes for KT88's along with a bias tweak "opens" this amp mod up even more.

Killer for guitar with 4X12's or for bass with a good 1X15 ir.
 
Dr> Bonkers -- Cool! Could also play with the transformer match a little for open/tighter sound, depending.

A lot of us spend our time trying to recreate iconic tones we love from recordings or artists we love, but as Cliff has pointed out, another major and real beauty of the Axe-Fx is being able to design new amp tones in the digital realm, tones never heard in real world...it takes some knowledge to know "what parameter does what" (and I'm certainly not an amp expert) but it's kinda of fun....putting a Vox AC30 or Dr. Z tone stack into a Matchless just to see what happens, moving tonestack positions around inside amps, different tubes, that kind of thing. Sometimes it's hideous, and sometimes it can be amazing. I think that's the real frontier.

There is a harmonics control I have not played with yet in the amp block (defaults to zero) -- but I bet will be super fun. The dynamics control certainly is one of my favs!
 
Yes -- Snoop, I would suggest you turn the input trim down to maybe 0.5 and see how you like that, and to turn OFF the PEQ block in front of the amp off - it's not needed with humbuckers, as they put out mids.

Then tinker with B/M/Treble to get the last mile based on your guitar and its pickups. Let us know how that worked for you, and what else you might do to make it work in a way you like!

Thanks Buddy for getting back to me. Unfortunately it won't be until the weekend before I'll have a chance to spend some time experimenting with your suggestions. Will get back with feedback. Best - Snoop
 
Those of you who played with Scene 1/2 will also hear a big tonal jump, because the amp page's GEQ settings are a little more pronounced in that version for both the low and high end. Adjust to taste!
 
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