2 Variac's clip

[ttowne]

Jnew

We are on the same page and I hear what you are talking about as well. Sounds very good!

[jnew]

LATENCY! That's a great description.

[plexified]

Ah , Hey J , caught your real time here . Pretty cool , here is an other example or two . Billy Gibbons used to use the Marshall power blocks or power amps with it being fed from the JMP-1 pre amp. Here he used a 25 foot cord to the power amps to soften her up a bit . Just pure analog latency. I told of Ed using the digital realm for control of it during the RIpley years where he would use a digital processor for a lot of stuff and one setting was to use delay . Not echo , just Latency . Here he used 10 milliseconds to split a signal and fatten it up . Same signal with another that was 'late' hence latency. We have all been late to class for sure , so we are all on the same team here . Late is great ! Try it with a digital delay and take a signal and use 100% blend . In other words you have your signal and one that is 100% under your control , blended . WIth your digital delay . Here you use one millisecond at a time and progress to realize in the digital realm anyway the 'sound' of it . It comes to a sweet spot and eventually gets ultra fat and then slaps back and then echos. Latency . We like analog because it sounds so natural , sooo , we find ways to do it without ones and zeros and it kills . With J doing the dual variac thingy he introduces latency , anolog and you have natural byproducts like the shimmmmmer and the Push comes Shove vibe that just drones and oozes natural stuff. Not digital stuff. Its more fun and we get the reason why Ed was so elusive with this stuff. Would you want to just 'give it up' ? I would not . But I would just shut up not send you to the races by telling stories. I guess he just wanted to have fun and that , to me , cost a lot of honest players a lot of grief. The few guys that did know what was happening were contradicted by Eds interviews that were so far from the reality of it all . 140 volts , turning up the variac , ? man he hurt a lot of kids worlds doing that dung stuff. That's the stuff I have a problem with. He put people in a situation to just flat out destroy their stuff and put them in unsafe scenarios and to me , that is NOT COOL .

[jnew]

Yep. I get that now. And I also agree that the variac to 140VAC was not a cool thing. Sometime in the late 80's, I was living in North Hollywood and bought a variac. I brought it to the apartment and cranked my Peavey Butcher at 140VAC. I played it for a while and the amp survived no problems. Rugged little bastard to say the least but I didn't like what it did for the tone. Mind you, I'm sure bias was out of whack but I didn't know shit about amps so I didn't do anything about that. But, when I dropped it to 90VAC, I caught on to the effect that had and believed from that point forward that the voltage was lowered, never raised. And of course now I better understand all the dynamics of all that stuff.

Time for me to crash. Amp tinkering to commence when I wake up fresh tomorrow.

[rgalpin]

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_so ... D=13186163

@ 1:53 on your clip...

that sassy little walk down the scale... if you listen to the album, that one little fill there says EVERYTHING about how this tone you are getting close to here is made up of a perfect balance between "hardness / headroom" and "squish / compression"

i think we can hear that you are a little on the squish side of the fence - but you are right on top of the color and shimmer and sustain aspect of it - that's why i am looking forward to hear how we can add hardness and headroom so that when you hit that little sassy run it will have the expression we hear on the album. SOME of that expression is fingers and technique but CERTAINLY not ALL of it is.

@ 00:41 here for a quick and easy reference:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ke3ua0kLhYA

actually, after listening to this reference, i think you are even closer than i originally thought! great work. more clips!!

also checkout 10:23 to 10:27 of the solo in Secrets.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VDF-pf-RPlY
that little scale / flurry right there @10:23 to 10:27. it's as much about the nuance and the touch of the amp as it is about the notes - probably more. same sound - you are right there in it i think. GRAIL II. is it coming from that 2nd variac? sure seems like it.

[JimiJames]

yes.

[mightymike]

Holy crap James your tone is to die for. Crappy playing my ass. Well done!!

[jnew]

Cool man. When our schedules line up again, you can play it. If you have one of your amps with you, well what can I say. EVEN BETTER

[JiMB]

Edgy and spongey at the same time, love that!

[fivecoyote]

Sounds great, congrats! Loud I think it would sound dead on or very close.

[jnew]

Thanks guys. They'll be more to come on this.

[mightymike]

Cool man. When our schedules line up again, you can play it. If you have one of your amps with you, well what can I say. EVEN BETTER

I can't wait. It's going to be a badass tonal reference day.

[jnew]

[rgalpin]

Don't tease me. I thought that post was going to be a new clip James!!

[jnew]

Well, here you go. Just a shorty with the amp as is, before I start jump in and making changes. First half is the amp straight to the cab without the 2nd variac. You can hear it fade out when I hit the standby about half way through the clip. From there on it's through the 2nd variac. A true apples to apples as Roger asked for. Some squeals in there as I stood too close to the amp which is upside down and exposed to the noise in the room. First variac is at 85VAC BTW. Has a little more gain and headroom than that last clip.

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_so ... D=13193294