Our resident Fender amp guru, Jens Mosbergvik, usually sings the praises of Fullerton’s classic offerings, but this time he switches sides to unpack his biggest gripes with the manufacturer’s legendary noisemakers.
Vintage Fender amps have a strong reputation among players in many genres. The brand is instantly associated with an endless list of great bands which created music that has stood the test of time. In terms of general tone, Fender’s original amplification strategy—which favors articulate, bright, transparent, and clean sounds—was a winning combination that myriad players still gravitate toward.
Through my previous columns in this magazine, I’ve shared the tips and tricks I’ve learned after playing, trading, and servicing old models from the California manufacturer. But today, it’s time for critical thinking. I’m switching sides to share the 10 most annoying things about vintage Fender amps. As usual, I will mostly refer to the black- and silver-panel amps.
“It breaks my heart that the original Deluxe Reverbs came with a weak and farty Oxford speaker, when it sounds so much better with a more punchy, clear-sounding C12N.”
Many of the critiques that I offer here ultimately advocate for simplification. All amp techs know that simple is good. Simple amps are lighter, smaller, cheaper, and have less things that can go wrong in the long run.
So, here is my list:
Two Jack Inputs
I’ve never met anyone who uses the second input. Back in the day, Fender thought we were going to swap guitars between songs without having to adjust the volume knob to compensate for the different pickups’ varied outputs. Wrong assumption.
Two Channels
I always use the reverb channel, even when using high distortion, at which point I simply turn the reverb down. Except for the Bassman, the normal channel is not needed at all. If all of the dual-channel amps were instead single-channel, like the Princeton Reverb, a lot of tubes and circuit components could be spared, leading to significant cost reduction and simplification of the production line. Even with the black- and silver-panel Bassman, I would prefer a single channel, as long as both the deep and bright switches were available. The only advantage with having a second preamp channel is the possibility to isolate the power amp section and the two preamp sections in diagnosis. But that still doesn’t make it worth it.
The Non-Reverb Amps
If I was Leo Fender, and I was looking to reduce costs, I would have trimmed my portfolio by eliminating the non-reverb Deluxe, Princeton, Vibrolux, and Pro amps. The rarer versions of these amps are no-frills, cool, and great value for the money. But there are reverb-equipped models that can do everything they do just as well and better. They’re not in as high demand, and they’re less profitable due to lower production numbers. Instead, I would have continued the Vibroverb after 1964, which would do the job as the only 1x15 combo amp in the portfolio. Just admit it: Everyone wants a Vibroverb.
Rectifiers
As another cost-cutting measure during my imaginary tenure as the founder of Fender, I would consider using a diode rectifier instead of a tube rectifier in all the bigger dual 6L6GC Fender amps. I like sag in tube amps, but I think very few players can really hear the difference between diode and tube rectifiers. Smaller amps intended for earlier breakup may have tube rectifiers, but they’re not essential there, either.
Glued and Stapled Baffles in Silver-Panel Amps
I wish Fender had continued the floating baffle in the early ’70s instead of the tightly glued and stapled-in baffles that are found in silver-panel amps post-1971. The screwed-in boards are much easier to repair and replace.
MDF Baffles
Medium-density fibreboard, or MDF, baffles are consistently the weakest point in Fender’s wooden cabinet construction, and eventually tear apart. I would much prefer a more dependable plywood pine baffle.
Small Output Transformers
These are found in both the Bandmaster head and the 1x15 Vibroverb—amps that deserve a firmer low end, and which should have the Super Reverb-class output transformer.
Lack of a Bright Switch
In my opinion, this is an essential EQ function that’s left off of Fender’s smaller amps, like the Princeton Reverb and Deluxe Reverb. Without it, these amps leave me no chance to enhance the details of fingerpicking on a clean tone setting.
Lack of Mid Control
This applies to many Fender amps. The bassy and flabby Pro Reverb would particularly benefit from a better mid EQ, with a much wider tone spectrum.
No Jensen C12N Speaker in Deluxe Reverbs
We all know how awesome the Jensens sound in the early black-panel amps, like the C10N in Princetons and Vibroluxes, the C10R in Supers, or the C12N in the Pros and Twins. It breaks my heart that the original Deluxe Reverbs came with a weak and farty Oxford speaker, when it sounds so much better with a more punchy, clear-sounding C12N.
So, there you have it: my list of 10 grievances with Fender. If you have more to add, please share your thoughts in our social media channels.
How Indigenous’ Mato Nanji gets roaring Hendrix-inspired tones from his Fender 75s.
from his own heart or from that of the Nakota Nation, to which he belongs.
“I learned a lot about guitars, amps, and pedals from my dad," Nanji explains by phone from his home on the Yankton Sioux Reservation in South Dakota, where he grew up and still lives—at least when he's not touring the world with Indigenous or as an essential performer on the Experience Hendrix Tours. His father, Greg Zephier Sr., was also an accomplished guitarist and a member of the band the Vanishing Americans, who opened for Bonnie Raitt and other notables.
“My dad would bring home new gear and new music all the time, and once he brought home a Fender 75 and said, 'Hey, check this out,' and I was hooked," Nanji says of his favorite-model amp. “It sounded different from the other Fenders we had: a little darker, a little warmer, a little fatter, and bigger."
Currently Nanji owns two 75s: a 1x15 combo and a head, which he uses to power a Fender 4x12. “I had a 1x12 combo first, but I got the 15 because it has a little more kick with a bigger low," he relates. “Sometimes I use both of my 75s in the studio along with my Super Reverb, with its four 10s. The combination of all three is really awesome."
The 75 series has more functions than typical early '80s Fenders and were among the last designs for the company by famed engineer Ed Jahns, who spearheaded Fullerton amp building before Paul Rivera took the reins in 1982. Both men had a similar bent for innovation, and their designs are sometimes confused for one another's.
Jahns designed the first Fender amps with push/pull tone controls and was also behind the legendary 435-watt Fender 400 PS. The 75 was made from 1980 to 1982 and can scale down to 15 watts with the flip of a toggle. The faceplate controls, from left to right, are a bright switch, a volume dial for the clean channel, treble, mid, and bass EQs—all with pull-out boost, a lead drive dial, reverb, a lead level, and a master volume. The tube array is three 12AX7s, two 12AT7s, and two 6L6 power tubes, but the rectifier is solid-state. The combos came with 8-ohm Electro-Voice or Fender Blue Label speakers made by Eminence. These amps aren't as collectible as many vintage Fenders, despite their sonic virtues, and can be found for $500 to $1,300, depending on condition.
Nanji likes to use only the lead side of his 75s and sets the dials on 5—all the way across. “Right in the middle is where the sweet sound is," he notes. “I like to keep the core tone clean as much as I can, and then use a few pedals to overdrive it." Although a TS808 is his longtime go-to, he also favors a Mojo Hand Tone Factor and a vintage Fuzz Face for snarl options, and a Prescription Electronics COB (Clean Octave Blend) fuzz for more radical colors.
To hear Nanji's potent tone in full, listen to “C'mon Suzie" from 2003's Indigenous. In addition to his 75s, that track features the rotating sound of a Leslie cabinet—like Hendrix used on “Little Wing." (Onstage, Nanji gets that swirl from a Tinsley Audio Sir Henry pedal.) The guitar on that song is the one that's always over his shoulders: a '60s reissue Stratocaster, which recently got a Custom Shop neck that was a gift from Nanji's Hendrix tour compatriot, Kenny Wayne Shepherd.
The fat, gorgeous guitar tones on Indigenous' “C'mon Suzie" are among Mato Nanji's favorite sounds that he's recorded.
That first time I heard Nanji live, he was using his 75 head on two 4x12 Fender cabs, but in recent years he's relegated his 40-year-old amps to the studio. On the Hendrix tours, he powers up the Marshall JCM800 that's provided. “Everybody says it's really loud, so they block it off with Plexiglass, but I can't tell when I'm onstage and feeling it," he says, chuckling. Just before touring stopped, he'd been using a Legacy Steve Vai signature head—a gift from Carvin—with Indigenous, for its reliability and the Marshall-like tone of its EL34 power tubes.
But he's lost no fondness for his 75s. “I'm in and out of the studio working on songs as much as I can, although the studio where I work is shut down a lot, and there aren't many alternatives in South Dakota," he relates. “But I'm pretty close to finishing an album that I'd like to get out next year."
Does artificially breaking in a guitar by “exciting” it really work—at least in the manner we hope it will? And what does that have to do with cheese?
As musicians, we all know the effects of music reach far beyond just fun and entertainment, whether it's helping with depression, influencing our basic mood, bringing people together, or one of myriad other reasons.
But then there are those surprising finds. Swiss cheesemaker Beat Wampfler partnered with a research team from the Bern University of the Arts in Switzerland to improve the taste of his Emmentaler cheese. There are a lot of factors, like humidity, temperature, and nutrients during gestation, involved in the cheese's final taste and aroma.
However, the primary objective of this project was to determine whether one could taste what those wheels of cheese had been listening to during their six months of gestation. The choice of music for each wheel of cheese ranged from The Magic Flute by Mozart to Led Zeppelin's “Stairway to Heaven" on a 24/7 loop. The team also incorporated some hip-hop by A Tribe Called Quest and EDM from Vril, among other varying genres. And, of course, there was also an untreated control group.
After the aging of the music-infused cheese, the team conducted a blindfolded taste test in a standardized experimental design, performed by several specially trained food-sensory researchers. The final outcome? The experts determined the hip-hop-laced cheese came out on top, with the strongest aroma and taste. Meanwhile, the arts team learned more about the scientific field of sonochemistry, which looks at the impact of sound on chemical reactions in solid bodies and plants.
The first experiments exposing plants to music started in 1962, and the many that followed found that classical music could enhance both the growth and yield of plants. In 2004, the rather anarchistic TV show MythBusters set up a similar experiment by exposing plants to several music styles, as well as positive and negative talk. The plants apparently didn't care whether you talked nicely to them or not, just as long as you did so. In the end, heavy metal music was the victor, with the most growth.
As entertaining as these “studies" are, I hope they don't lead anyone to seriously believe any cheese or plant has any sort of musical preferences. The topic, however, shows a few similarities to musicians who believe their instruments have to be “played in" for optimal tone, or that vintage instruments are superior simply because they've been played for so many decades.
With that belief, there is, of course, a market for devices to speed up the process of breaking in basses and guitars, mainly by attaching speakers to the instrument close to the bridge. It's interesting that when devotees of the process/technology argue its merits and how it all works, they often refer to the influence of sound on plants. First and foremost, there is a huge difference between a system of living cells and a guitar's wooden body. One consists of cells transporting all kinds of fluids and nourishments—it is well known that vibration can significantly stimulate division and cell-membrane fluidity—while the other one is a dead tree, plain and simple.
One company's process suggests using white and pink noise to specifically trim it to your preferred personal sound. Pink noise covers all audible frequencies with higher amplitudes in the bass register than the equally weighed white noise. So, if you want more bass from the instrument, simply extend the exposure time to pink noise, right? But they also say the process can be even more specific if you play the music genre to the instrument you plan to ultimately use it for, and to “make it loud, but never let the signal distort." Following this logic, wouldn't that mean bad news if you plan on playing death metal? And is my instrument ruined if my band members prank me by secretly playing Wham's “Last Christmas" to my bass on a loop?
The theory behind the process is that feeding external vibrations within the resonance range reduces internal tensions, and that the applied energy remains in the material and raises even more over time. This is partially true, as all the applied vibrational energy is heating up the body, but it also implies that you can store this energy to let it drain out via the output jack once you plug in.
To me, the whole played-in idea is simply a psychological effect, where every minute spent with your instrument deepens your relationship with it. It's similar to how hugging a tree feels like reconnecting to nature for some, while the tree couldn't care less. It's not that applying vibrations to wood can't have influences on its mechanical properties. But if so, it's way more likely to be a treatment to soften the tops of acoustic instruments, which might allow for stronger movements and a more dynamic reaction to the strings. With electric solidbody basses and guitars? Not so much. That said, if you can spend the cash, feeling better might be enough of a reason to give it a try!