Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

ratherdashing

ratherdashing

Kablamminator
Here's what I have:

- Mesa Mark V
- Fender Mustang I

Pretty hilarious when you think about it. Basically opposite ends of the price/quality/loudness scale.

Up until recently, I've been using the Mustang as my practice rig. I run the headphone jack into my Focusrite Saffire, which allows me to record + play through the monitors. The reason I do this is because even at the lowest volume setting the Mustang is too loud for night-time practice, plus the internal speaker is terrible.

Now, the Mustang sounds pretty, pretty, pretty good, but I love my Mark V and I hate that I can only play it at the rehearsal space 45 minutes from my house (in good traffic). Thus, I am thinking of getting an attenuator that has a line out, such as a Weber Mass 100.

Is this actually a good idea? It seems kind of stupid to attenuate a big amp down to a line out signal, but it also seems stupid to not play this amp much at all. Should I just stick with practicing on the Mustang?
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

Yeah I have two ways of playing quietly, using my Weber Mini Mass or using a Vox Amplug. I find other methods such as ipad apps, other modelers, cab sims and stuff not good or handy enough.
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

I have been in a similar situation until recently. I chose modeling because it was more flexible, I could easily record and play at the quietest level possible... plus I had access to a bunch of different sounding gear for very little cost.

But... I have two really nice vintage tube amps sitting dormant waiting for me to move back to the countryside (I'm downtown right now).

In my heart, I am a Marshall guy but my head has always said "Fender, Fender Fender!"

My two blackface Super Reverb and Princeton Reverb amps sound very Fenderish at normal volumes but when you crank them, they get into Marshall territory (especially the Super Reverb). That was my initial solution, play them loud and get the Fender tones when I pick softly and Marshall when I hit it hard.

But... I went into a mid-life crisis and started to go back and re-learn all of the stuff that inspired me as a teenager from my initial guitar heros. I went from a post modern sort of Sonic Youth meets The Posies type of sound to a butt rock maxed out Plexi or 70's Marshall tone.

So, I went searching for a Brown-Sound-In-A-Box where I could get searing tone with my Fenders on 2. I ended up borrowing a box full of pedals from my friends and set out to try them all and see what worked best.

I really liked the Catalinbread Dirty Little Secret but was torn between the Brownie, Pinnacle and King Of The Britains. Agileguy posted about the Weehbo JMP Drive and I completely changed my plans and went with the Weehbo.

Now, I have a extremely convincing Marshall tone with Marshall "feel" while using my Fender's tube reverb, preamp tubes and rectifiers for additional tone.

I did some recordings with my Zoom H4 but am going to try an SM57 or 2 mics straight into my computer via my DBX 386's SPDIF outputs into an M-Audio 192 card (the Zoom H4 didn't like to be a close-mic and I have too much environmental noise in my practice room to do an ambient recording).

Get a good high quality overdrive ($170+) that meshes well with your playing style and use it's level to control your amp's output is my ultimate answer for you... close-mic your amp with a 57 into your Saffire and voila!
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

TM18 sounds quite good at 1w, w/the v30 1x12. Not as good as at 5w or 18 of course. Buf for low.volume practice it still sounds better than the plethora of modellers and booteek amp in a box pedals I have owned.

That said, some of the booteek pedals are quite good.

I would also say, doing the attentuation bit with a big watt big bottle amp is going to be far less satisfying tonally vs a small tube amp attenuated. I know this from experience with my old JMP MV,and NMV Marshalls.
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

Use an amp sim plugin in a daw.
That way, you're recording direct, but still getting a quite workable sound.
When you get a chance that you can actually have some volume, Re-amp!
Even better if you can do it on a laptop - bring it to your jam space and re-amp it through your mark V?
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

Attenuators are meant to make it easier to get your amp cooking at reasonable stage volumes. In my experience, throttling a big amp down to home practice volumes sounds awful. I leave my big amps at the rehearsal space/studio and turn to modelers or my acoustic for playing at home.
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

Reckless Abandon said:
I use amplitube through phones or studio monitors
Click to expand...

This! I just use the free version and get the cleanest tone I can get then use my pedals from there. Not as good of tone as my Ceriatone but usable for sure!
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

I would go the baby tube amp way. Attenuators are not meant to go from hurricane to whisper. Moddeling you've got, the small tube thing is the only way left ;).
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

Playing electric at home, my vote is modeler, computer plugins, or a SS amp. I've tried several low watt tube amps for bedroom playing and they were all too loud.

I've been though Fender BF and SF champs, Fender 600, a Valvetrain tweed Princeton copy, 5 watt Marshal, Fender Blues jr, and a Vox AC4tv. Most of them with attenuators as well and all the results were lackluster. They sounded great with some volume but couldn't replicate it at a lower level or with the attenuator. The Vox was the easiest to overdrive with the 1/4 watt setting, but it was still to loud.
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

I have a THD Hot Plate and occassionally use the infinite variable attenuate knob to bring it down to night time playing level. It chokes the tone a bit, but I attribute that more to the Vintage 30s not moving air than the amp not being able to breathe. So it's usefully that I still get my tone to a degree and can play at 1am without problems.

That said, I recently played the Blackstar ID60 digital amp and thought it sounded great at low volumes. The tube select knob really makes the amp useful while still being digital. I'm seriously thinking hard about one of the Blackstar ID series amps. You might want to check one out.
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

speed2dirt said:
I have a THD Hot Plate and occassionally use the infinite variable attenuate knob to bring it down to night time playing level. It chokes the tone a bit, but I attribute that more to the Vintage 30s not moving air than the amp not being able to breathe. So it's usefully that I still get my tone to a degree and can play at 1am without problems.

That said, I recently played the Blackstar ID60 digital amp and thought it sounded great at low volumes. The tube select knob really makes the amp useful while still being digital. I'm seriously thinking hard about one of the Blackstar ID series amps. You might want to check one out.
Click to expand...

They got the "feel" right, I'm pretty impressed with mine. (Granted I've always gotten along with modellers and solid state amps.) The power tube emulator knob does give it a bunch of different *useful* sounds. (I figured I'd just leave it on 6L6 or something but I've experimented with all of them and found a few that I liked.)
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

I like baby tube route. I use a blackstar ht-5h, and you can get greezy at low volumes. I leave the Mark IV at the practice spot, it gets dirty at low as well but the mark low and blackstar low are far apart. Would loooooove a 5153 infant series.
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

Play unplugged. It's amazing on how much better you can learn to play when you JUST use your hands
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

speed2dirt said:
I have a THD Hot Plate and occassionally use the infinite variable attenuate knob to bring it down to night time playing level. It chokes the tone a bit but I attribute that more to the Vintage 30s not moving air than the amp not being able to breathe.
Click to expand...

+1

I have a THD Hot Plate. I have also used the Infinity setting. In my case, this was for recording purposes. In my opinion, as with DAW plug-in amp simulations, something physical does seem to be missing from the playing experience. This has some influence on how I attack the guitar strings.
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

Bludave said:
Play unplugged. It's amazing on how much better you can learn to play when you JUST use your hands
Click to expand...

I do that more often than not. I need to spend at least SOME time playing through an amp though.
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

My suggestion is to use the MKV but run an attenuator for 3 or 4 db of cut. This is tiny you still will have the master very low but usually its cracked just enough that the amp sounds ok. Sure you cant get power tube saturation like this but its enough that the amp is breathing and feels right. I do this with my MKIV or other amps if need to be TV level quiet. You can also consider sound proofing your practice space a bit. That made my neighbors happier when I put down a heavy rug and hung some foam on the wall by the adjoining condo. maybe your wife wont dig with it not sure what your situation is but its an idea
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

Small valve amp, without a doubt. I have rewired many old valve radios and record players to be the original 1960s Vox AC4 circuit, with the EF86 preamp, which is darker and makes the little amp sound like a big amp instead of a toy. My Laney VC15 sounds great for late-night, low-volume playing (set clean, pedal if i want dirt).

With a baby valve amp, you still get the response to the playing touch, and the amp isn't choked by an attenuator. It's just like the real thing, but less ... because it is the real thing. Everything else is an artificial version. You don't play a lesser guitar to practise at home, so why compromise the sound, feel and response of the rest of the chain ?
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

I went the modeler route. Here are the issues I had with other volume management approaches:

Attenuator: Most speaker cabs I've used don't sound good at low volumes. The best of them still need to get up to 75-80 dB before they sound right to em. Amp feel is compromised at high attenuation levels.

Reamp into guitar cab: Better than an attenuator IME but speaker sound still an issue.

Reamp through speaker sime into small PA:This would work well with a good speaker sim but I don't care to spend that kind of $$$ on a high end speaker sim.

Iso Cab:Miked sound vs. amp in room. Dependent on mic/cab. Don't get to use "usual" cab so might have to re-dial things in.

Low Power Amp: Unsatisfying clean tones.

I went down the modeler path about four years ago so I haven't tried the latest/greatest of any of the above but I've been so content with my digital rig that I haven't cared to investigate.
 
Re: Home practice: model, attenuate, or baby tube amp?

Not a dammm thin g wrong with the mustang. Even has a Mesa model I believe.
 
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