Blog: What's the Best Amp for Playing Blues?
- Thread starter Evan Skopp
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SeanPalmer
New member
Re: Blog: What's the Best Amp for Playing Blues?
No Fender Champ or Dumble??? Whats a list of blues amps without Champs or a Dumble Triple S?
No Fender Champ or Dumble??? Whats a list of blues amps without Champs or a Dumble Triple S?
Falloffthebonetone
New member
Re: Blog: What's the Best Amp for Playing Blues?
Twin Reverb is my favorite.
Twin Reverb is my favorite.
IM4Tone
New member
Re: Blog: What's the Best Amp for Playing Blues?
I love my BDRI, but surely the Peavey Delta Blues 1X15 should be mentioned....wonder why 'no love' for those? :dunno:
:bigthumb:.....However
I love my BDRI, but surely the Peavey Delta Blues 1X15 should be mentioned....wonder why 'no love' for those? :dunno:
Andrew Lamprecht
Minion of One
Re: Blog: What's the Best Amp for Playing Blues?
The best amp for the blues is any amp you can find, with a side of heartbreak.
The best amp for the blues is any amp you can find, with a side of heartbreak.
FuseG4
Our Neighbor Totoro
Re: Blog: What's the Best Amp for Playing Blues?
Can you think of any amps that just don't do blues well at all?
I mean in some ways, tones that sound too muddy or buzzy for other genres may work fine for blues. Blues often conveys the feeling of troubled times, worried minds, lost love or money, and all that stuff. Tone that might be downright awful for other genres can still pretty much go a-ronk, a-ronk, a-RONK, a-ronk to the I, IV, V just fine, no? You can still do your pentatonic and blues scales and use some clever turnarounds, and there's some blues.
Most of bad blues tone comes down to "pilot error" and not being able to dial it in or not being able to play period. You can find the blues in a champion 600, you can find it in an ENGL Powerball, you can coax it out of a Marshall MG, you can do it with an amplug.
Blues is such a varied genre, but you can do the I IV V and the blues scale on *almost* anything if you have the blues on your mind and in your heart and in your hands.
In contrast I can't pull metal out of a stock fender twin with no pedals.
Can you think of any amps that just don't do blues well at all?
I mean in some ways, tones that sound too muddy or buzzy for other genres may work fine for blues. Blues often conveys the feeling of troubled times, worried minds, lost love or money, and all that stuff. Tone that might be downright awful for other genres can still pretty much go a-ronk, a-ronk, a-RONK, a-ronk to the I, IV, V just fine, no? You can still do your pentatonic and blues scales and use some clever turnarounds, and there's some blues.
Most of bad blues tone comes down to "pilot error" and not being able to dial it in or not being able to play period. You can find the blues in a champion 600, you can find it in an ENGL Powerball, you can coax it out of a Marshall MG, you can do it with an amplug.
Blues is such a varied genre, but you can do the I IV V and the blues scale on *almost* anything if you have the blues on your mind and in your heart and in your hands.
In contrast I can't pull metal out of a stock fender twin with no pedals.
FuseG4
Our Neighbor Totoro
Re: Blog: What's the Best Amp for Playing Blues?
It may be why so many guitarists (and so so SO many novice to intermediate guitarists, like ME!) love playing the blues, it's predictable to a decent extent, most other guitarists seem to be able to play blues too, and it doesn't require much skill or gear to get it going at a passable level.
In short there's no "best blues amp"
It may be why so many guitarists (and so so SO many novice to intermediate guitarists, like ME!) love playing the blues, it's predictable to a decent extent, most other guitarists seem to be able to play blues too, and it doesn't require much skill or gear to get it going at a passable level.
In short there's no "best blues amp"
Archer250
Well-known member
Re: Blog: What's the Best Amp for Playing Blues?
That is... The most inane thing I've read this day. The blues is definitely not easy, at least not for me. The phrasing, the dynamics, the groove, they must be all right.
It may be why so many guitarists (and so so SO many novice to intermediate guitarists, like ME!) love playing the blues, it's predictable to a decent extent, most other guitarists seem to be able to play blues too, and it doesn't require much skill or gear to get it going at a passable level.
In short there's no "best blues amp"
That is... The most inane thing I've read this day. The blues is definitely not easy, at least not for me. The phrasing, the dynamics, the groove, they must be all right.
FuseG4
Our Neighbor Totoro
The basics of blues is not hard. Playing thoughtful, original, or masterful blues is way difficult. But playing one or two licks over a basic I IV V can still be just fine for blues! It does not need to be complicated to be good! It does not even need to be dynamic to be passable!
You have an idea in your head of what good blues is. But you can bang 4/4 down strokes of E A B7 pretty crappily on an acoustic with no lead lines or embellishments and it can still be blues!
Some blues songs are better than others if by better you mean the phrasing compliments the mood, the timing drives the song, the dynamics keep your interest, etc. But there is no rule regarding these things. If it sounds good, it is good. You can sound good with the bare basics of the blues progression and the blues, major and minor pentatonic and knowing the basics of 4/4 and 3/4 time.
Compare that to how there is no "the metal scale" or "the jazz progression". There is no "hey other guitarist play hard rock in A" but you say play blues shuffle in A and most guitarists seem to get the idea.
In some ways I agree with you. As guitarists you and I may have a high standard as to what constitutes good blues. But all you did was basically insist that you know what blues is and I don't. But I absolutely maintain that blues at its core is not difficult and does not require great skill or knowledge, blues shuffles are usually part of every "beginner's guitar course" because it is not complicated, and you can always work on making the guitar weep and wail and add other chords to the I IV V and you can go from whisper to scream but those things are certainly not necessary for the average person listening to identify the song as blues. You are loading down the definition of competent blues playing with your ideas of what good blues is. Im just saying the basic blues form is widely taught and not difficult to play well. The basics of blues in my opinion are easy but they are still blues.
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FuseG4
Our Neighbor Totoro
Re: Blog: What's the Best Amp for Playing Blues?
There is a valley between the basic stripped down blues and the masterful blues of say Mr. Clapton for instance. It's where you recognize that you can get out of the rigid blues shuffle with the blues scale in the first position, and you begin to add your own touch, your lead lines with other scales or chromatic notes, your turnarounds, other chords, key changes, effects, dynamics, and so forth. It takes time to develop those skills and until you perfect what you are adding to the blues outline it may sound bad.
But if you try to tell me a blues shuffle with just a handful of licks from the blues scale isn't blues, and if you try to tell me that it's difficult, I'm gonna just say we're going to have to agree to disagree.
There is a valley between the basic stripped down blues and the masterful blues of say Mr. Clapton for instance. It's where you recognize that you can get out of the rigid blues shuffle with the blues scale in the first position, and you begin to add your own touch, your lead lines with other scales or chromatic notes, your turnarounds, other chords, key changes, effects, dynamics, and so forth. It takes time to develop those skills and until you perfect what you are adding to the blues outline it may sound bad.
But if you try to tell me a blues shuffle with just a handful of licks from the blues scale isn't blues, and if you try to tell me that it's difficult, I'm gonna just say we're going to have to agree to disagree.
FuseG4
Our Neighbor Totoro
Re: Blog: What's the Best Amp for Playing Blues?
Yeah I mean, like, there's no hard and fast rules for "this is blues and this is not" or "this is good or bad blues" , it's highly subjective and it's not like I have the definitions of what blues really is or is not or if it's easy or not while I did make it sound like I had the answers.
But as a matter of practicality, Smokestack Lightning is a heck of a lot easier to play than Eruption, isn't it? And Smokestack Lightning will sound good on a lot of amps. Eruption may not sound great through a clean roland jazz chorus (and may not sound right without a tremolo??)
So, that's where I'm coming from, that kind of thing.
Yeah I mean, like, there's no hard and fast rules for "this is blues and this is not" or "this is good or bad blues" , it's highly subjective and it's not like I have the definitions of what blues really is or is not or if it's easy or not while I did make it sound like I had the answers.
But as a matter of practicality, Smokestack Lightning is a heck of a lot easier to play than Eruption, isn't it? And Smokestack Lightning will sound good on a lot of amps. Eruption may not sound great through a clean roland jazz chorus (and may not sound right without a tremolo??)
So, that's where I'm coming from, that kind of thing.
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TimmyPage
New member
Re: Blog: What's the Best Amp for Playing Blues?
I get that this list was designed around modern amps that people can buy (Eg I totally understand the lack of dumbles and actual vintage amps). I think modern blues players have already got it wrong if they're thinking 'best blues amp', considering how much of the greatest blues in history has been made on whatever was around. If all they could get was a dirty old harmony weirdo guitar and a pignose amp, that was their tone. Its the weirdest genre, along with jazz to be thinking in absolutes or 'bests'. Its 100% around the player, if you gave Buddy guy a jackson kelly and a randall satan, it would still be the blues.
I get that this list was designed around modern amps that people can buy (Eg I totally understand the lack of dumbles and actual vintage amps). I think modern blues players have already got it wrong if they're thinking 'best blues amp', considering how much of the greatest blues in history has been made on whatever was around. If all they could get was a dirty old harmony weirdo guitar and a pignose amp, that was their tone. Its the weirdest genre, along with jazz to be thinking in absolutes or 'bests'. Its 100% around the player, if you gave Buddy guy a jackson kelly and a randall satan, it would still be the blues.
everdrone
New member
Re: Blog: What's the Best Amp for Playing Blues?
yes! lots of talent with the masters. special gear not required.
yes! lots of talent with the masters. special gear not required.
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