
These before and after photos show the rough condition that our columnist's '65 Super Reverb arrived in, and the worn-but-dignified look of his restoration. Of course, a shiny red ES-335 with a Bigsby pretties things up, too.
Our columnist shares a love story about his longtime passion for the 1965 heavyweight that’s his No. 1.
Let me tell you the story of my first vintage Fender amp, which I call “No. 1"—the 1965 Super Reverb that I consider the greatest guitar amp I've ever heard and played.
When I was a teenager, in the late '80s, I had a 25-watt Fender Sidekick and a bigger, 2x12, 40-watt Marshall Valvestate. They worked well for the Gary Moore and Jeff Healey blues-rock licks I was into then. When I moved to Trondheim, Norway, in 1998 to study at the university, I went back in time and listened to classic blues from Muddy Waters, Buddy Guy, Albert King, B.B. King, and Freddie King. I learned they all played Fender amps, at various times, and when I saw Stevie Ray Vaughan's legendary Live at the El Mocambo concert film, where he played a Vibroverb and a Super Reverb, I knew I had to get a black-panel Super Reverb. So I got in touch with a local guitar shop called Tre45, and they helped me find a Super Reverb in the U.S.
A few months later, I paid €1,400 for a beat-up Super Reverb dated January 1965 that came via boat. The amp looked real rough and had large cuts in the aged brownish grille cloth. It had replacement Mojotone speakers with weighty ceramic magnets and large speaker coils. The shop installed a heavy-duty step-down transformer in the back to cope with 230V, making the amp extremely heavy. Despite the weight and rough looks, I loved it. It played twice as loud as my brother's 1968 transition-era Super Reverb with original square-magnet CTS alnico speakers. Back then, volume and punch meant everything, and I hadn't yet developed an appreciation for the CTS alnicos, which later became one of my favorite speakers. Neither did I have much experience with how speakers affect tone. My No. 1 sounded louder, more mellow, and creamy compared to a typical black-panel Super. Because of my amp, my brother sold his precious, vintage-correct '68.
Twelve years later, in 2010, I started trading Fender amps on a larger scale, finding them on U.S. eBay and importing them to Norway, where I swapped power transformers and did basic service like tubes and cap jobs. I eventually developed a taste for vintage-correct tone and pursued amps in original or mint condition. I was eager to learn, and systematically A/B-tested all black- and silver-panel Fender amps, with all possible speakers and circuits. I also experimented with newer replacement speakers from Weber, Jensen, Eminence, Celestion, and WGS, and tried all kinds of circuit mods.
"Because of my amp, my brother sold his precious, vintage-correct '68."
I decided to replace my Super's Mojotones with a set of vintage-correct speakers for an authentic pre-CBS sound. I found a 1965 Super in really poor technical condition and swapped the grille cloth and the factory-original CTS ceramic speakers into my No. 1. Now my amp was restored to original condition, with speakers with matching manufacturer date codes, and, more important, it sounded better! The new-old speakers added more clarity and crispness, which I particularly enjoy with a Strat's out-of-phase, quacky tone in the in-between pickup positions.
Other amps have caught my affection, too. Not surprisingly, I find the narrow-panel Fender Bassman a great amp, but unfortunately it lacks reverb, which is a big deal to me. Same goes with the Marshall JTM45 and JMP50 amps from the '60s. They have great crunch but lack some transparency and clarity when used with closed-back 4x12 cabinets. I've also had the pleasure of owning and playing some popular boutique amps, like the Two-Rock Custom Reverb, Victorias, Headstrongs, Bad Cats, and others. Compared to vintage amps, they are more robust and have high quality materials and components that survive longer on the road. I also like how the solid, thick cabinets in some modern amps produce a tight low end. All the boutique amps I've tried sounded good, different, and had more tone options than my Super Reverb, but when I played those amps for a long time or at gigs, I found myself confused with all the tonal options and I end up dialing in a sound as close as possible to a Super Reverb. I can't help it. That is how a guitar is supposed to sound, in my ears. And nothing sounds more vintage Fender than a black-panel Super Reverb, in my humble opinion.
If you haven't played one, try the huge tone and dynamic response within the big and airy 4x10 speaker cabinet of a Super. It offers a pure, natural, and transparent tone and connects with your guitar in a physical way when you crank the amp a few meters behind you on a larger stage. If you need a little more crunch and early break-up, add an Xotic RC Booster and see my April 2020 column, "How to Get Big Tones on Small Stages."
[Updated 9/3/21]
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Metalocalypse creator Brendon Small has been a lifetime devotee and thrash-metal expert, so we invited him to help us break down what makes Slayer so great.
Slayer guitarists Kerry King and Jeff Hanneman formed the original searing 6-string front line of the most brutal band in the land. Together, they created an aggressive mood of malcontent with high-velocity thrash riffs and screeching solos that’ll slice your speaker cones. The only way to create a band more brutal than Slayer would be to animate them, and that’s exactly what Metalocalypse (and Home Movies) creator Brendon Small did.
From his first listen, Small has been a lifetime devotee and thrash-metal expert, so we invited him to help us break down what makes Slayer so great. Together, we dissect King and Hanneman’s guitar styles and list their angriest, most brutal songs, as well as those that create a mood of general horribleness.
This episode is sponsored by EMG Pickups.
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The legendary German hard-rock guitarist deconstructs his expressive playing approach and recounts critical moments from his historic career.
This episode has three main ingredients: Shifty, Schenker, and shredding. What more do you need?
Chris Shiflett sits down with Michael Schenker, the German rock-guitar icon who helped launch his older brother Rudolf Schenker’s now-legendary band, Scorpions. Schenker was just 11 when he played his first gig with the band, and recorded on their debut LP, Lonesome Crow, when he was 16. He’s been playing a Gibson Flying V since those early days, so its only natural that both he and Shifty bust out the Vs for this occasion.
While gigging with Scorpions in Germany, Schenker met and was poached by British rockers UFO, with whom he recorded five studio records and one live release. (Schenker’s new record, released on September 20, celebrates this pivotal era with reworkings of the material from these albums with a cavalcade of high-profile guests like Axl Rose, Slash, Dee Snider, Adrian Vandenberg, and more.) On 1978’s Obsession, his last studio full-length with the band, Schenker cut the solo on “Only You Can Rock Me,” which Shifty thinks carries some of the greatest rock guitar tone of all time. Schenker details his approach to his other solos, but note-for-note recall isn’t always in the cards—he plays from a place of deep expression, which he says makes it difficult to replicate his leads.
Tune in to learn how the Flying V impacted Schenker’s vibrato, the German parallel to Page, Beck, and Clapton, and the twists and turns of his career from Scorpions, UFO, and MSG to brushes with the Rolling Stones.
Credits
Producer: Jason Shadrick
Executive Producers: Brady Sadler and Jake Brennan for Double Elvis
Engineering Support by Matt Tahaney and Matt Beaudion
Video Editor: Addison Sauvan
Graphic Design: Megan Pralle
Special thanks to Chris Peterson, Greg Nacron, and the entire Volume.com crew.
Katana-Mini X is designed to deliver acclaimed Katana tones in a fun and inspiring amp for daily practice and jamming.
Evolving on the features of the popular Katana-Mini model, it offers six versatile analog sound options, two simultaneous effects, and a robust cabinet for a bigger and fuller guitar experience. Katana-Mini X also provides many enhancements to energize playing sessions, including an onboard tuner, front-facing panel controls, an internal rechargeable battery, and onboard Bluetooth for streaming music from a smartphone.
While its footprint is small, the Katana-Mini X sound is anything but. The multi-stage analog gain circuit features a sophisticated, detailed design that produces highly expressive tones with immersive depth and dimension, supported by a sturdy wood cabinet and custom 5-inch speaker for a satisfying feel and rich low-end response. The no-compromise BOSS Tube Logic design approach offers full-bodied sounds for every genre, including searing high-gain solo sounds and tight metal rhythm tones dripping with saturation and harmonic complexity.
Katana-Mini X features versatile amp characters derived from the stage-class Katana amp series. Clean, Crunch, and Brown amp types are available, each with a tonal variation accessible with a panel switch. One variation is an uncolored clean sound for using Katana-Mini X with an acoustic-electric guitar or bass. Katana-Mini X comes packed with powerful tools to take music sessions to the next level. The onboard rechargeable battery provides easy mobility, while built-in Bluetooth lets users jam with music from a mobile device and use the amp as a portable speaker for casual music playback.
For quiet playing, it’s possible to plug in headphones and enjoy high-quality tones with built-in cabinet simulation and stereo effects. Katana-Mini X features a traditional analog tone stack for natural sound shaping using familiar bass, mid, and treble controls. MOD/FX and REV/DLY sections are also on hand, each with a diverse range of Boss effects and fast sound tweaks via single-knob controls that adjust multiple parameters at once. Both sections can be used simultaneously, letting players create combinations such as tremolo and spring reverb, phaser and delay, and many others.
Availability & Pricing The new BOSS Katana-Mini X will be available for purchase at authorized U.S. Boss retailers in December for $149.99. For the full press kit, including hi-res images, specs, and more, click here. To learn more about the Katana-Mini X Guitar Amplifier, visit www.boss.info.
Snark releases its most compact model ever: the Crazy Little Thing rechargeable clip-on headstock tuner.
Offering precise tuning accuracy and a super bright display screen, the Crazy Little Thing is approximately the size of your guitar pick – easy to use, unobtrusive and utterly dependable.
Housed in a sturdy shell, the Crazy Little Thing can be rotated for easy viewing from any angle, and its amazingly bright display makes it perfect for the sunniest outdoor stages or the darkest indoor studios. You can clip it to the front of your headstock or on the back of your headstock for extra-discreet usage – and you can easily adjust the display to accommodate your preference.
As the newest addition to Snark’s innovative line of headstock tuners, the Crazy Little Thing is rechargeable (no batteries!) and comes with a USB-C cable/adapter for easy charging. Its display screen includes a battery gauge, so you can easily tell when it’s time to recharge.
The Crazy Little Thing’s highly responsive tuning sensor works great with a broad range of instruments, including electric and acoustic guitar, bass, ukulele, mandolin and more. It also offers adjustable pitch calibration: its default reference pitch is A440, but also offers pitch calibration at 432Hz and 442 Hz.
Snark’s Crazy Little Thing rechargeable headstock tuner carries a street price of $21.99. For more information visit snarktuners.com.