Re: Pictures of my rig from the Studio sessions....
Heya WhoFan,
Actually, both amps got used equally. I run the rig all at once and blend the tones. The DSL runs through the bottom cabs (with the G12-65's). The JCM800 runs the top cabs, one loaded with 70's, one loaded with 80's clones.
Regarding the "Marshall-less" cab - yeah, I actually did order a logo for it, and it's arrived. But that is a Line 6 cab, and doesn't have the little piece of wood to attach the logo on. And when I re-did that grill cloth, I put about 425,916 staples in it and am not looking forward to removing them all to re do it. Actually, I have to do that anyhow because I did a lousy job and didn't pull the cloth tight enough. It lines up even everywhere, but I pulled side to side whereas I should have pulled top to bottom (it's a slant cab). So one of these days I'll get around to doing it and all will be well.
Also, someone asked about the e609 mic placement. It's placed very close to the grill cloth and yes, it's at the center of the cabinet. Doing it this way, I'm getting a lof more of the "wood" tone from the cab. The way I run that rig is almost liked it's Bi-Amped. The DSL is responsible for all the low end heft (which it has in abundcance) as well as some of the lower mids and some high flavor. The JCM800 is pushing that pure screaming JCM800 tone. Combined, I really like how they sound.
Regarding the mic placement on the top cabs, I like the tone darker. Originally I had them center cab too, but that was too dark.
I only mic'd one of the bottom cabs because they're both running the same tone, same exact speakers. There's really not enough tonal variance there to warrant micing both. I run both cabs with the DSL because I really like how the amp responds to two cabs. We did try it with that head only into the one mic'd cab, and for some reason, the tone (in the control room) just wasn't there.
The two top cabs, however, are worlds apart tonally. I have beam blockers in both (well, duct tape and a 5 inch cardboard semi-circle at the center). The G12H-70's sound, well, you know. Interestingly, though, with the blockers, that cab sounds pretty **** good. The Classic Lead 80's clones are pretty dark sounding. Well, not really dark. In a lot of respects, they're very similar to the G12-65's in the two bottom cabs. But they're a little more "greenback-ish". As I don't really care for speaker cone breakup, the 80's give me that kinda sound without the breakup. Plus, I'm hitting it with half the power of a 50 watt head, so they're loud, but nowhere near being pushed to the breakup point.
Interesting thing I learned: Initially, since the speakers were all in an iso booth, I figured what the hell and experimented with cranking the masters of both heads. As we were tweaking, though, that pure TONE just wasn't there. I went back to where I run the amps on stage, and bingo, there was that magic (well, it's magic to me). That point is "2" on the 2204 and "3" on the DSL100. Both gain's at "8".
One other thing - my JCM800 had 6550's in it when I got it. About a week before recording, I took it to my tech for a retube, and he commented that it was missing something in the tone. I agreed. He recommended changing it over to 34's. We did, and "it" was there. For the record, the power tubes in both amps are JJ E34L's, and 8th Generation Chinese Pre tubes in both.
By switching the 800 over to the 34's, I'm getting a lot more "usable" high end now. Before the switch, I'd keep my presence on "2" and the highs on "0". When recording this stuff, the Presence was around "5" and the highs at "4" (I think, I'm not absolutely sure, and have gigged since then and tweaked around a little - but I know they were set substantially higher than before the switch). By "usable", I mean that before, the highs would take your head off. After the switch, they're a lot more pleasant.
