Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

[kmcguitars]

Anybody else experience this problem? My Laney converted to a 2204 sounds amazing with any Humbucker guitar I have, But I plug my Strat in it sound's hollow and flat? I've had this problem with other Marshall's B4, But that was useally to bright and shrill. 1st thing I'm gonna do is change the speaker (right now it's a Peavey Alnico) Maybe Not a bad speaker but wrong
for this application. Next I may have to mess with the tone stack? (i.e.) take
the .068uF out and try a .022uF. I already tried a few different tubes in VI.

[SlyFoxx]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

I've had the same problem only in reverse. My 1973 fender pro reverb sounds like God with single coils but not so good with humbuckers. My guess is that it has to do with the difference in the Z of the pups.

[itbepopples]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

I've found that most BF Fenders don't sound as good with humbuckers as they do singles. They don't sound bad....just not as chimey and open (which is the way I like my cleans).

[That90'sGuy]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

Hughes & Kettner Triamp. The cleans needed the thickness of a humbucker to really round out the channel (otherwise it was a bit too thin for my taste). The overdrive and distortion channels also took to humbuckers, but singles just weren't completely there.

Bad Cat Hot Cat. This amp had the thin, jangly bright clean tones and a thin, raw distortion channel so humbuckers are a necessity.

Both of those amps had to go because I love single coils too much than to settle with an amp that couldn't rock with them.

[greendy123]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

Those amps may require beefier single coils to get good tone. For vintage pickups I guess usually fender amps work best with them or older vintage style amps.

[Gearjoneser]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

Some may disagree, but I don't think modeling amps sound that great with single coils.
Solid state tends to be a little noisier, which exacerbates the natural single coil hum, and the size of the tone is a little narrower than most tube amps. If I unplug a strat or tele from any modeling amp, then plug it into a Fender tube amp, it's like night and day.

[HamerPlyr]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

Some may disagree, but I don't think modeling amps sound that great with single coils.
Solid state tends to be a little noisier, which exacerbates the natural single coil hum, and the size of the tone is a little narrower than most tube amps. If I unplug a strat or tele from any modeling amp, then plug it into a Fender tube amp, it's like night and day.

I've found the same thing to be true, too, much to my chagrin. It's as if the modeling amps need to be pushed harder to sound like the tones that they're modeling, and only humbuckers get the job done properly.

[adrian]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

I had a MusicMan amp (RD 112) from the early -80s. Sounded great with my Les Paul, but my Strat sounded thin and dirty. I´ve heard that Leo and the other guys at MusicMan used a Les Paul when they were testing the amp, because Leo had signed a contract saying that he should not be involved in competing products for 10 years. Even after that period he was careful. Finally I changed to a Fender Blues Deville, and suddenly all my guitars sounded great.

[JeffB]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

Some may disagree, but I don't think modeling amps sound that great with single coils.

I agree for the most part and was going to post pretty much the same thing.

The only modeler that my strats have sounded decent through are the Valvetronix, and I think that's just cos the closed back adds a bit of punch. The POD XTL is too finicky. I was able to dial a great Blackmoor and great early 80s Gary Moore tone on the XTL at low volume but they would just fall apart at above "TV level".

[loudriver23]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

I have noticed this phenomanon with my Mesa Mark IV, my Ibanez 335 sounds perfect while my strat sounds a bit thin.
Gives me a good excuse to pickup an old Bassman!!!!!
Loudriver

[Pink Unicorn Horsey]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

Going along with SlyFoxx's direction, I've found that my Vox AC30 sounds way better with single coils than it does with humbuckers when I'm going for a clean sound. The humbuckers just don't clean up through the Vox.

[75lespaul]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

I've had great success with my single coils through my Vetta--as long as I've taken the time to program the patch with the strat. My Carl Martin Plexitone pedal however...awesome with my humbuckers, unfrigginbelievably bad with the strats.

[itbepopples]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

I have noticed this phenomanon with my Mesa Mark IV, my Ibanez 335 sounds perfect while my strat sounds a bit thin.
Gives me a good excuse to pickup an old Bassman!!!!!
Loudriver

I played a '72 strat into a Mk IV and it was fu*ckin badass sounding. I could rip artificial harmonics out of any fret on any string. I've never had a setup that could do that but i think about that tone every day.

[Hot _Grits]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

My new vox cooltron big ben od sounds much better with singles than humbuckers.

My Vibrolux can be a little tubby clean with humbuckers. I think the thinner blackface sound is the way to go if you want fender cleans with humbuckers.

[Guitar Toad]

Re: Amps that are NOT! single coil friendly

Is this it: I read where the real difference, in the 60's, between Fender amps and Gibson and others, was that Fender were originally the only high gain amps built to compensate for the lower output of their single coil strats and tele's. Gibson built their amps specifically with lower gain for higher output humbuckers. If that was really true back then, is it still true today?