As a musician, you want to be heard when you play. How loud you need to be to “be heard” depends on your style of music, the size of your audience, and venue.We buy amplifiers by the number of available watts, and expect that to translate to loudness. And it does, but in unexpected ways.
Our ears and brains perceive sound on a logarithmic scale. Here’s a table of examples adapted from Wikipedia (“Sound power”*) The middle column is the power of the actual air moving against your eardrums.We sense a doubling of power, which is a 3dB change, as a just-perceptible change in loudness. A sound that seems “twice as loud” has to be ten times the power, a 10db increase. That’s why the middle column of the SPLs is in powers of ten. Humans perceive a jackhammer as about twice as loud as a chain saw and a machine gun as about twice as loud as a jackhammer. A full-blown rock concert might only seem twice as loud as a machine gun. 
The sound power is not the amplifier power you’d need to be that loud. Most amplifier power is wasted as heat in moving the speaker cone around; little of that gets radiated away as sound. The following table shows some speaker sensitivities as quoted by the makers, in sound pressure level (SPL) at 1W of amplifier power as heard one meter away from the center of the speaker, as well as the maximum amplifier power before they burn out. I computed the estimated maximum SPL column. 
[N.B. - These are not necessarily representative of all the speakers from the manufacturer. For instance, all Jensens are not always the quietest and all Fanes are not the loudest speakers. Due to overloading and other factors, these speakers may not sound exactly as loud as this projection shows.]
Remember that 3dB is just noticeable and it takes 10dB to be a factor of twice as loud. So at 1W, the most efficient Fane is not quite twice as loud as the lowest efficiency Jensen P12R, differing by +8dB SPL. If we wanted to make the Jensen sound as loud as the Fane is at 1W, we would need to drive the Jensen with +8db of power, which is 6.3 times the power, or 6.3W (trust me, that’s the way the math works out). The Jensen is loudest at its max of 25W: 109dB SPL. The Fane produces 109dB when driven with 4W. So if you replace a Jensen P12R in a cabinet with a Fane AX.12.150, the amp now sounds like it is now six times the power as it was before.
And that gets us down to watts and loudness.Watts don’t make loudness alone; the amplifier power and the speaker efficiency together make loudness. You can make an amplifier sound like it has more watts by using a more efficient speaker; or like it has fewer watts by using a less efficient speaker.
If you simply must have the tone of an inefficient speaker, be prepared to buy a bigger amp to keep your loudness the same, or to use multiple speakers and amps to get the loudness back. If you must have more loudness and don’t want to change your amp, consider more-efficient speakers. Greater efficiency doesn’t always mean better tone; it just gives you more volume.
Keep speaker efficiency in mind when you’re wondering about watts – you might make that 50W amp sound like it has 100W … or 25W.
*article found at: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sound_power&oldid=82695953
R.G. Keen
Cheif Engineer
Visual Sound
www.visualsound.net
Working closely alongside Yngwie, the MXR design team created a circuit that delivers clarity, expressive dynamics, and rich harmonics—all perfectly tailored for his light-speed arpeggios, expressive vibrato, and big, bold riffs. The control setup is simple, with just Level and Gain knobs.
"Want to sound like Yngwie? Crank both knobs to the max."
“This pedal is the culmination of 45+ years developing a sound that’s perfect in every possible way,” Yngwie says. “I present to you: the MXR Yngwie Malmsteen Overdrive. Prepare to be amazed.”
MXR Yngwie Malmsteen Overdrive highlights:
- Perfectly tailored for Yngwie Malmsteen's signature sound and style
- Simple control setup tuned for maximum impact
- Boost every nuance with superior clarity, expressive dynamics, and rich harmonics
- Dig into light-speed arpeggios, expressive vibrato, and big, bold riffs
The MXR Yngwie Malmsteen Overdrive is available now at $129.99 street/$185.70 MSRP from your favorite retailer.
For more information, please visit jimdunlop.com.
Built on powerful dual‑engine processing and world‑class UAD modeling, ANTI 1992 High Gain Amp gives guitarists the unmistakable sound of an original "block letter" Peavey 5150 amplifier* – the notorious 120‑watt tube amp monster that fueled more than three decades of modern metal music, from Thrash and Death Metal, to Grunge, Black Metal, and more.
"With UAFX Dream, Ruby, Woodrow, and Lion amp emulators, we recreated four of the most famous guitar amps ever made," says UA Sr. Product Manager Tore Mogensen. "Now with ANTI, we're giving rock and metal players an authentic emulation of this punishing high gain amp – with the exact mic/speaker pairings and boost/noise gate effects that were responsible for some of the most groundbreaking modern metal tones ever captured."
Key Features:
- A complete emulation of the early '90s 120‑watt tone monster that defined new genres of modern metal
- Powerful UAFX dual-engine delivers the most authentic emulation of the amp ever placed in a stompbox
- Complete album‑ready sounds with built‑in noise gate, TS‑style overdrive, and TC‑style preamp boost
- Groundbreaking Dynamic Room Modeling derived from UA's award-winning OX Amp Top Box
- Six classic mic/speaker pairings used on decades of iconic metal and hard rock records
- Professional presets designed by the guitarists of Tetrarch, Jeff Loomis, and The Black Dahlia Murder
- UAFX mobile app lets you access hidden amp tweaks and mods, choose overdrive/boost, tweak noise gate, recall and archive your presets, download artist presets, and more
- Timeless UA design and craftsmanship, built to last decades
For more information, please visit uaudio.com.
- YouTube
MonoNeon, aka Dywane Thomas Jr., came up learning the bass from his father in Memphis, Tennessee, but for some reason, he decided to flip his dad’s 4-string bass around and play it with the string order inverted—E string closest to the ground and the G on top. That’s how MonoNeon still plays today, coming up through a rich, inspiring gauntlet of family and community traditions. “I guess my whole style came from just being around my grandma at an early age,” says Thomas.His path has led him to collaborate with dozens of artists, including Nas, Ne-Yo, Mac Miller, and even Prince, and MonoNeon’s solo output is dizzying—trying to count up his solo releases isn’t an easy feat. Premier Guitar’s Chris Kies caught up with the bassist before his show at Nashville’s Exit/In, where he got the scoop on his signature 5-string, Ampeg rig, and simple stomp layout, as well as some choice stories about influences, his brain-melting playing style, and how Prince changed his rig.
Brought to you by D’Addario.
Orange You Glad to See Me?
This Fender MonoNeon Jazz Bass V was created after a rep messaged Thomas on Instagram to set up the signature model, over which Thomas had complete creative control. Naturally, the bass is finished in neon yellow urethane with a neon orange headstock and pickguard, and the roasted maple neck has a 10"–14" compound radius. It’s loaded with custom-wound Fireball 5-string Bass humbuckers and an active, 18V preamp complete with 3-band EQ controls. Thomas’ own has been spruced up with some custom tape jobs, too. All of MonoNeon's connections are handled by Sorry Cables.
Fade to Black
MonoNeon’s Ampeg SVT stack isn’t a choice of passion. “That’s what they had for me, so I just plugged in,” he says. “That’s what I have on my rider. As long as it has good headroom and the cones don’t break up, I’m cool.”
Box Art
MonoNeon’s bass isn’t the only piece of kit treated to custom color jobs. Almost all of his stomps have been zhuzhed up with his eye-popping palette.
Thomas had used a pitch-shifting DigiTech Whammy for a while, but after working with Paisley Park royalty, the pedal became a bigger part of his playing. “When I started playing with Prince, he put the Whammy on my pedalboard,” Thomas explains. “After he passed, I realized how special that moment was.”
Alongside the Whammy, MonoNeon runs a Fairfield Circuitry Randy’s Revenge (for any time he wants to “feel weird”), a literal Fart Pedal (in case the ring mod isn’t weird enough, we guess), and a JAM Pedals Red Muck covers fuzz and dirt needs. A CIOKS SOL powers the whole affair.
