Talk to me about Bassmans

B

Billy Gibbons

New member
Tell me about 'em. What they sound like, what they're for, reissue vs. vintage, etc. Played with guitar of course. How do they take pedals? How do they feeeeel?

Thanks for the replies guys.
 
Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

The 59 reissue takes pedals well but I found it almost toooo dry sounding... really needs a reverb pedal in front. I have only heard the old silverface bassmans live and they sound amazing with pedals and fuzzes
 
Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

I'm guessing you are talking about a tweed style 4x10 bassman?

the reissues sound nice, but they are not particularly reliably built in that they use the same cheap PCB construction, board mounted jacks and pots etc of the hot rod series. When it comes time to work on them they are a bit of a PITA. They also have a particle board construction for the cabinet which is workable but you can get a much better sound with a solid pine cab.
Ceriatone make a much nicer amp with PTP construction and all high quality parts like sprague capacitors and CTS pots. If you go to the site, you can get a really sweet bassman clone built as good as the old original ones for not a lot of coin. Built to last and easy to work on if anything ever goes wrong.
http://www.ceriatone.com/productSubPages/AC5F6ABassman/5F6-A_kitParts.htm
http://www.ceriatone.com/productSubPages/AC5F6ABassman/5F6-A_Complete.htm
You can mount it in a proper pine cab and install the speakers of your own choice. There are plenty of great speakers out there you can choose from to tailor your sound to your own preference.
A close friend uses a bassman reissue for his gigs and ive had to do a few running repairs on it over the years. Incidentally, he replaced the 4x10 baffle with a 1x15 which sounds pretty damn cool.
Feel....well they feel great, but they are powerful amps so you cant expect a lot of power tube saturation at most club levels, so expect to use a pedal if you want overdrive at volume levels that don't upset the sound engineer (unless you regularly gig on really big stages).
Pedals...yes no worries at all.
The really cool thing about bassmans of course is the option to jumper the inputs and blend the bright and deep channels so you can always dial in a tone to fit the sonic characteristics of whatever room you are playing in.
A nice overdrive, maybe a compressor and an analog delay and you have a way cool rockabilly sound.
 
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Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

a lot of Pros use the reissues and the Hot Rod series (Coldplay, O'Brother etc) I don't think it is a big issue that it is not Point to point handwired and have solid pine cab. Just my 2 cents
 
Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

you are right...they work fine. Its not a huge issue, but that stuff is good to be aware of for someone in the market. I used a hot rod and a blues junior for a lot of gigs (the hot rod needed some burned out parts replaced) and jordan's bassman has been going strong for nearly 10 years of hard gigging (with some repairs along the way). Solid cabs and stuff are just a preference for me. Even PTP amps and things need repairs and nothing is perfect.
 
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Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

I play with a 68 silverface head version a lot. Its a great soumdimg amp that takes pedals incredibly well. Expect to need some sort of reverb for it.
 
Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

Sorry to interrupt gibson175's rant here but the reissues are not particle board cabs. The first 59RI series are birch plywood. The later LTD reissues are solid pine.

They are PCB construction however they are FAR better built than the HRD series amps. There's no ribbon cables and the tube sockets are chassis mounted as opposed to board mounted as they are on the HRD amps.

PCB is not in any way a reliable method to judge quality. Open up a Mesa and tell me what you find in there.

Now, I own an LTD and here are my thoughts:
- they're an excellent "clean" platform on which to build a rig
- pedals sound awesome
- lots of clean headroom. You need to get these things LOUD before they're going to give up the overdriven sound.
- they come biased a bit cold from the factory so it's a good idea to rebias the amp put of the box
- stock Jensen P10R speakers are ok at average volume but are harsh at high volume. I replaced mine with a pair of Weber 10A125 and a pair of 10F150's. It's a tone monster now!

They're great reliable amps that are simple and sound great on stage.
 
Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

I've got a 68 Bassman head.

I've had it modified a bit, mostly on the bass channel and in the power section, to get it sounding the best for what I do. I can get a great clean tone out of it and some awesome overdrive cranked up, but it's not a very versatile amp on its own. The beauty of this amp is how responsive it is to pedals. Hit it with a nice Marshall in a box type pedal, it crunches and grinds like a Marshall. Hit it with a tube screamer and it will get you classic blues-rock tones a la SRV. Hit it with a nice fuzz (especially muff based fuzzes) and it roars like a far more powerful amp (Sunn or something).

Modulations can sound wonderful with a bit of thought. Since Bassmans in general are usually not breaking up much on their own, it helps to think of your drive section as your preamp, and anything after it as your effects loop, the last pedal in line being the in to your power amp, per se. I have great success running a tremolo, phaser, delay, and reverb into my Bassman that way.

They're great amps if you can use them at at least good gigging volumes. Down at apartment/quiet home levels, they'll sound like pedals into a quiet amp, just like anything else.
 
Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

Agileguy_101 said:
I've got a 68 Bassman head.

I've had it modified a bit, mostly on the bass channel and in the power section, to get it sounding the best for what I do. I can get a great clean tone out of it and some awesome overdrive cranked up, but it's not a very versatile amp on its own. The beauty of this amp is how responsive it is to pedals. Hit it with a nice Marshall in a box type pedal, it crunches and grinds like a Marshall. Hit it with a tube screamer and it will get you classic blues-rock tones a la SRV. Hit it with a nice fuzz (especially muff based fuzzes) and it roars like a far more powerful amp (Sunn or something).

Modulations can sound wonderful with a bit of thought. Since Bassmans in general are usually not breaking up much on their own, it helps to think of your drive section as your preamp, and anything after it as your effects loop, the last pedal in line being the in to your power amp, per se. I have great success running a tremolo, phaser, delay, and reverb into my Bassman that way.

They're great amps if you can use them at at least good gigging volumes. Down at apartment/quiet home levels, they'll sound like pedals into a quiet amp, just like anything else.
Click to expand...


IF your location allows for it, the amp breaks up beautifully at "7" on the vol knob * add eVille smile here *
 
Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

I have 2 Bassman 70's and they sound different, 1 breaks up really nicely, the other is very clean. My plan is to use both heads, a radial Headbone, and my 4x10 cab. I have a rolling cabinet on it's way from a hospital remodel that will house everything.
 
Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

I had a 59 LTD and wanted to love it sooo much... Looked great, smelled great... sounded... awful. It also had a warped main board and Fender took it back and refunded.

.. I have other amps as well. But I got a Pignose G40V when my Fender 59 Bassman went **** up and actually, when they were side by side - the G40V did the Bassman 'brown' tone BETTER! Is same circuit/Tube config, although with an added Master vol is actually a copy of the Marshall JTM45.

So I kept it and lost the Bassman and got a Tweed Deluxe over net couple of years and get great Tweed 'Brown' tone at comfortable levels.

Best tones I get are the Pig and the Tweed Deluxe hooked up in stereo a (via my delay pedal set on mild reverb) and then you do get that Bassman Swirl effect!
 
Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

Sounds like I need to get my hands on one to try out sometime soon. How do they compare to the more contemporary Fender guitar amps, i.e. Twin Reverb and Deluxe Reverb?
 
Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

tweed anythings are nothing like the blackface/silverface era fenders like the twin reverb or deluxe reverb. I have a tweed deluxe and a deluxe reverb. both great amps but nothing a like.

the blackface bassman is nothing like the tweed bassman either. again, both can be great amps but they are very different
 
Re: Talk to me about Bassmans

tweed vs brown vs black vs silver. different enough sounds to have been different amp companies. My personal choice is the black or brown, as the tweeds have a pretty dry and wooly character and the silvers are starting to aim for ultra-linearity over character. The days before venue sound reinforcement must have been some rough, extremely loud days.
 
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