Around $600
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZk-JXlOqno
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Around $600
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZk-JXlOqno
Does that price include the three stacks? :D :metalbang:Quote:
Originally Posted by twonabomber
I would have ordered it already if it did!
People get good Van Halen tone through all sorts of stuff including some cheap shit like the Epiphone Valve Jr. The real trick is knowing how to play like Ed. No black box is going to do that for you.Quote:
Originally Posted by Von Halen
Shit if I could get three decent stacks for $600 what a deal. It’s going to cost $600 just to retube a 100 watt head here soon.
Never bothered with any of the EVH gear.Quote:
Originally Posted by Nitro Express
I can fiddle around with my stock Peavey amp, stock Ibanez or stock Charvel and MXR/BOSS/Pro-Co Rat pedals and get an EVH tone.
People love the idea of a single magic box being able to replicate the sound the various bits of customized gear Ed used throughout his career made. As you say, though (and I agree), more of it had to do with what his hands were doing than the gear he was using.
I love power amp distortion. I was never much for the high gain preamp distortion thing. You can get great VH sounds cranking the shit out of low powered tube amps that have a Marshall style tone stack. I have a little 20 watt FUCH’s amp with just a volume knob and three tone knobs. I run it at 89 volts on a variac and crank every knob full up. I run it into a 2x12 with 25 watt green backs. Get the classic VH tone better than anything.
The Ratt is still one of my favorite pedals. I have a Ratt, a OCD and a Plush Cream in my gig bag. I can get my sound with any amp using those.
I only use pedals if I don’t have an amp that works for me or I have to keep the volume down. I have Fryette Power Station and you can use that to cut or boost the volume. It doesn’t thin out the tone like a static load box does. If I have that I just crank the amp and run a line out to the PA mixer.
But I have no use for the buzz box called the 5150. Ed ruined his tone using those.
A lot of Ed’s early tone comes from the speaker cab. You have to push the speakers and get that cab resonating.
If you can’t sound like Ed unplugged, nothing you plug into is going to do it. You have to get the sound from the strings and guitar. Everything else just makes it louder and tweaks the sound a bit.
You can’t polish a turd. If your golf swing sucks spending $10,000 in the pro shop ain’t going to help you.
I'm sure there's a certain portion of the market that buys certain brands hoping to sound "like" the artist endorser... that's fine and typical in the gear market.
But then there's others who are chasing their own sound and see the capabilities something like this pedal/effect can do for their rig and signal chain. The reference to EVH's live sound rig give you a real world application of it's use and capabilities. There's a lot of guitar players that love Eddie's work but have no interest and certainly don't have his playing ability... so they don't try to emulate Ed's compositions. I'm that way... but the gear aspects are interesting.
https://www.mojotone.com/Mojotone-Blackout-British-Head
If you want a really good old school 20 watt drive it to hell amp these are great. Hand wired, well built and one channel is like a Marshall plexi and the other is like a hot JCM 800. 6v6’s sound like EL34’s if you goose them hard. But this amp doesn’t mush out. The note definition is very good. Great for old school VH.
The 5150 amps are liked by country players because the clean channel is on the twangy side. Ed never used the clean channel. He was on the red channel most the time but the channel Ed never used sells the amp to some customers.Quote:
Originally Posted by ZahZoo
Fuck there is so much gear anymore it’s nuts.
I love my Pro-Co Rat distortion pedal.Quote:
Originally Posted by Nitro Express
My others (MXR Phase 90, MXR Distortion +, Boss Phase Shifter, Boss Digital Delay) are basically mothballed.
Olden-time stomp boxes.
The one other stomp box I used to love as much as I love my Rat was my DOD PDS 1000 Digital Delay. Lost track of it in the mid-1990s when I was moving around a lot. Am thinking of tracking down a used one online...I loved that fucking pedal. The BOSS one I got to replace it is good, but not the same.
When I first started playing, it was just before signature models and gear started hitting the market. You'd have players endorsing a line of guitars or amps or gear but it was along the lines of so and so uses these strings or Fenders or Marshall amps. This was, like, 1981 or so.Quote:
Originally Posted by ZahZoo
The first one I sort of remember being tied to a particular player was the Charvel Jackson take on the Flying-V which Randy Rhoads used, in that I think after Rhoads' passing it was named...was it the Rhoads V...something like that.
Like, obviously one could call Fenders or Gibson Les Pauls or Marshalls or Floyd Roses signature gear referencing the names of the manufacturers, but it wasn't until the mid to late 1980s that I remember, say, Fender putting out an Eric Clapton model.
When I first ventured in to electrics in 1970 there wasn't anything artist endorsed or signature models. I bought a used Univox hollow-body that was an ES-335 copy for $40 with my paper route earnings and traded a sting-ray bike for a beat-up Sears Silvertone amp. At 13, I was the envy of my buddies... and a nuisance to my neighbors! LOL
Wasn't much in the way of pedals affordable or widely available then. Sadly back then you could pick up used Strats and Les Pauls for a couple hundred bucks or less. They were just viewed as old crap rather than vintage gold mines. Still have a 2-12 speaker from a 1964 blonde Fender Bassman rig I bought at a yard sales for $60 when I was 16... my buddy up in Alaska still has the amp and won't sell it back to me... I've been hounding him for 40 years now and he won't budge!
I would say artist branding started with KISS. With recorded music losing its value artists have to have a few side gigs going. Merchandising is more important than ever.
My first real good guitar was a 72 Les Paul Custom. The music store had a whole rack of used Les Paul’s and they were cheap because nobody wanted them. I picked up a silver faced Fender Champ and then got an overdrive pedal. Actually it was a good setup. That Les Paul was a boat anchor. The Champ would be worth $800 today. The Les Paul would probably fetch around $3,000. Not a bad hobby when what you buy goes up in value. Wish my skiing equipment did that.
Fender was about to go under and some investors bought it and put a focus on the brand’s nostalgia. The Custom Shop was started and you started to see signature models.Quote:
Originally Posted by Terry
Signature stuff sells well and you can charge a premium.
I have an early Yngwie Malmsteen signature Strat and it’s a collector’s item now. I could sell it for more than what a new one would cost. I did buy a new one. Better pickups. The old one sits in the wine cellar.
i used those pickups to upgrade a Kramer Focus 3000. Awesome pups!
What was different about Yngwie issue? Scalloped fretboard? Pickups?Quote:
Originally Posted by Nitro Express
Nowadays, it seems any artist signature equipment is way overpriced with a huge mark-up just because it has the artist's name, and it's barely (rarely?) better than the regular issues.
Brass nut, special stacked pickups, scalloped neck, nitrocellulose lacquer finish. It’s a Fender Custom Shop guitar. It’s US made so that right there adds to the price and the fit and finish is immaculate. It’s a higher grade guitar than a player Strat made in Mexico. Now I have a few Mexican Strats and they are pretty good but not in the same craftsmanship and fine tuned setup as the Yngwie model. If you play and compare them it’s apples to oranges.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mushroom
From the 80's or 90's? When did they start making signature models?Quote:
Originally Posted by Nitro Express
Fender was about to go tits up in the 80’s. They had become a dated brand like Gibson. What can bring a brand or style back is a popular player. Slash made Les Pauls cool again and Stevie Ray Vaughan being popular motivated Fender to make a signature model. It puts your brand back in style. If someone wants the high end guitar you offer a cheaper alternative. But the motivation of the cheaper purchase is the high end.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mushroom
It’s all marketing strategy. I own several Gibson’s. Are they better playing than cheaper guitars. Not really. I have a Charvel San Dimas I picked up for $500 on sale years ago and it plays and sounds great. I will never lose money on my Gibson’s. I have two acoustics that have increased in value. Pretty well.
So if you enjoy nostalgia, can afford it, you can get a Gibson, play around with it and get your money back out of it and maybe come out ahead. You can play that game but there is a higher cost of entry.
PRS makes great guitars but they don’t hold their value. They don’t have the nostalgic mojo. They don’t have the history. You are going to lose money on a PRS.
Life is just a bunch of games.
They definitely don’t have the name or history like Gibson. The most valuable models are from the 80’s, and the singlecut models before the Gibson lawsuit, or private stock. I own two customs from 1999-2003. I can sell and make a profit, no idea about profit margin. But they would be too expensive to replace today, perhaps a little overpriced. But a very good Gibson Les Paul seems way overpriced to me; the name being the biggest factor.Quote:
Originally Posted by Nitro Express
I took a tour of Gibson when I was in Nashville. The guy who over saw the production of the Wolfgang guitars at Peavey and was overseeing Gibson’s production. He was very knowledgeable about guitars.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mushroom
He said the Gibson headstock breakage problem could easily be fixed by making a joint at the top of the neck and changing the wood grain direction. Gibson makes their necks and head stocks out of one piece of wood. This is actually more expensive than using two pieces because you waste more wood.
He said Gibson can’t change anything because the customers complain. They want old school guitars that break easy and have laquer finishes that fade and crack. They want hand wrapped binding that the paint has to be scraped off by hand.
You can actually make a more durable guitar cheaper using modern manufacturing techniques. Gibson does that over at Epiphone in China. In Nashville they are going to build an old school guitar warts and all. Then charge more. They were busting ass to keep up with orders. So somebody still wants them. They make their acoustics just north of here in Montana.
It really boils down giving your customer base what they want and that might mean making overprice, outdated shit to someone who’s desires are different.
PRS was very well aware of that headstock breakage so their headstock angle is less. Basically, lay the guitar flat on its back, the top of the headstock does not touch the plane. Gibson won’t fix that. But once that headstock is broken and properly fixed, it’s stronger. I heard some people intentionally break it to fix it. With that said, I still want a Les Paul.Quote:
Originally Posted by Nitro Express
Les Paul’s are great. My first real good guitar was a 72 Les Paul Custom. Wish I still had it. I’ve owned Gibson’s since 1977. Never had a head stock break or any other major problems. If you baby them and keep them in a case they are fine. If one comes inside from cold temperatures you want to let the case warm up. Exposing a cold Gibson to heat can crack the lacquer finish.
I like a Les Paul Standard with a 60’s neck. The 50’s neck is too big and I don’t care for the modern asymmetrical necks.