GearDump

Next to Les Paul, Robert Fripp might be one of the most unique and innovative Guitarists of his generation. Fripp, has basically redefined Guitar Technique, Teaching, and Tone with every work that he has done. King Crimson’s early work included the mellotron which was an early form of sampling. The Mellotron was played like a keyboard. When a key was pressed down a piece of tape was played at a specified speed thus creating the illusion of an instrument being played at the specified pitch. Throughout the first few King Crimson records you can hear the mellotron playing string parts.

Robert Fripp’s keen interest in music technology has yielded a wide variety of tones. For Fripp tone is clearly a compositional tool. Larks’ Tongues in Aspic contains some of the heaviest fuzz ever recorded. Information about his equipment is quite scarce since Fripp is more concerned about composing music then actually playing guitar, though he is certainly very skilled. In the mid 1980’s Fripp started using the Roland GR-300 guitar synth. Even today he continues to use guitar Synths and a monster Rack to create diverse guitar sounds.

Fripp has used various fuzz boxes in his career similar in style to Muff style fuzz units. He suggests that his fuzzes are not as good as the current production muffs. In interviews he has specifically mentioned the Big Muff, Foxey Lady, Buns Buzzaround and the ColorSound Fuzz units. Upon actual examination it seems that the Buzzaround was the most frequent fuzz he used since it has such a unique sound in comparison to the other fuzzes he discusses. He is also known to use a rackmount Ibanez Digital Delay & Roland Space Echo. Though Fripp appears to be non-chilant about his equipment his mixture of Vintage and New equipment suggests that he takes an active interest in how good it sounds.

Fripp has used a wide variety of Amps. In the early days of King Crimson he used Marshall but later switched to Hi-Watt’s. As time went on he favored clean amps with a fuzz box for distortion. During the eighties he used the Roland JC-120. Nowadays he favors more of a more synth friendly rig with a Carvin Power Amp powering speaker cabinets.

Fripp takes some of the more common elements of the guitars such as string gauge and tuning very seriously. He has, since the 1980’s, used new standard tuning (CGDAEG) and consequently has used different string gauges to compensate for the changes in string tension. New standard tuning features prominently in his teaching a form of playing he calls guitar craft.

If you don’t know Robert Fripp I suggest you listen to Larks’ Tongues In Aspic. That record truly demonstrates his guitar prowess.

For those of you familiar with the Deja Vibe line of products that Fulltone has offered the MDV-2 shouldn’t be to big of a shock. For the rest, the MDV-2 is essentially a period-correct Uni-Vibe stand in. There are features and sounds unique to this pedal that really get to the core of what a real univibe can do. Just check out the proguitarshop.com video from youtube.

As is normal, Mike Fuller declined to comment on this story. Fulltone’s history with the Deja-Vibe started with the original Deja Vibe. It was later trumped by the Mini Deja-Vibe. The Deja-Vibe and Mini Deja-Vibe are great clones right down to the matching of original photo resistors and lamps. For those not in the know, Uni-Vibes are an optical phaser. They use photo-resistors and some lamps inside the pedal to actually create the phasing effect. The Dunlop Univibe that is currently manufactured has photo-cells to but they are nothing like the originals since those parts were no longer being made. Fulltone has apparantley started producing NOS parts for these pedals. The Deja Vibe 2 was the first pedal that Fulltone produced that came with a speed control. The original univibe had a speed control that plugged into the box (which was actually about the size of an echoplex). The Deja Vibe 2 somewhat resembled a Morely Wah pedal in that configuration. Early this year the MDV-2 was unveiled to essentially replace the entire Deja Vibe product line. The MDV-2 looks like a Fulltone Clyde wah except for it’s cream colored casing. Under the hood are the electronics of a complete Deja Vibe including all the controls, an LED and some modifications to the Speed Control circuit.

The Deja-Vibe 2 had a switch the user pushed to turn the speed control on or off. The MDV-2 has an ingenious always-off unless rockered slightly forward operation–the best part is Fulltone actually managed to make a true-bypass pedal with this configuration. I’ll spare the lecture on why you might not want true bypass for another article but if you’ve ever built or modded pedals then putting true bypass in a pedal like this would be difficult to say the least.

Most importantly, does the MDV-2 give those watery textures offered by the other Deja-Vibe products and does it come close to the original Uni-Vibe? In a nutshell, Yes. The MDV-2 actually sounds closer then the Dunlop “reissue” and is frankly the best main-stream uni-vibe clone on the market. It is slightly pricey but if you want those tones without the rediculous pricetag and maintenance fees the MDV-2 might just be the ticket. Hell, even Robin Trower, who has depended on a Vibe pedal of some sort has been spotted with each of the Deja-Vibe products at different times.  If you know Fulltone’s build quality, it is excellent. The parts are top notch, the boards are easy to work with for repairs and are amongst some of the most reliable designs on the market.

Fulltone MDV-2 at www.fulltone.com

Bitmo Modded Valve Junior

The Epiphone Valve Junior is one example of an amplifier with a rabid modification community. Players typically modify the circuit, speakers, and even the output transformers to get what some call boutique tone on the cheap.

When I came into possession of my Fender Hot Rod Deluxe I had no idea the difference the custom baffle and two 10″ Eminence Legend Speakers would have. I had never been that big a fan of the stock Hot Rod Deluxe sound but wanted one for the fender clean tones. The thing was monstrous, it could roar with overdrive or sing with a fuzz. I couldn’t help but wonder why the original owner parted with it.

Anyway, I’ve owned my fair share of modifiable amps–particularly the Valve Junior. I have been less then happy with most of those amps with basic circuit mods but I think if you have some major amplifier surgery done you could probably see a noticeable increase in performance. (continue reading…)

When Donald Leslie Invented the rotating-speaker cabinet he could not have known that droves of guitar players would desire one to alter their tones. From Peter Frampton to David Gilmour, legions of guitar players owe a large debt to Donald Leslie’s tonal curiosity.

There are many different ways to get those swirling spacious sounds these days. The Uni-Vibe was designed to emulate that sound and it spawned a whole series of phaser effects. This Month, we will focus on the swirling swami of rotating speakers & simulators.

After last nights roundup and the article on Alexander Dumble’s supposedly fantastic amplifiers I thought it only appropriate to revisit that subject matter with a look at two of the great dumble clones on the market.

Fuchs Audio ODS

The first examination is pointed at Fuchs Audio. Fuchs makes a range of other amplifiers and pedals but among them is the ODS or Overdrive Supreme (not to be confused with Dumbles Over Drive Special). This unabashed clone of a Dumble sounds fairly tasty too based on the clips I gathered on youtube. The Fuchs ODS actually comes in a variety of shapes and sizes. When I say a variety I mean it, the amp can vary from 20 watts all the way to 140 watts and comes in either a combo or stack version. It’s not clear what Dumble Fuchs got his hands on, but those guys have sure made a lucrative business out of it. Many discussion forums have been spent lampooning his handy work, but as they say, the proof is in the pudding.

Kind of like the Fulltone OCD, this amp has undergone some revisions over time. Several years ago they went into production on the SLX version of the ODS. The SLX changed some of the internals to modify the tonality of the amp. Fuchs offers conversion for pre SLX ODS amplifiers. There is also now an HRM Variant of the amp which allows for Post Pre-Amp EQ. Many Modern amps incorporate this kind of preamp for wider tonal shaping.

The Fuchs has some interesting options that may or may not be related to the actual dumble. For one it can come with an optional power supply to run pedals on your board. This little option costs an extra $200, but in some clubs where you only have a few outlets it could be a life saver. Fuchs also uses a fancy DC power supply scheme that apparantly reduces the background noise of the amplifier. That is certainly a nice feature that High Gain amps should really have! There is also a Triple Drive Supreme which is loosely based on the ODS SLX version. This is a 3 channel monster that incorporates Dumble tones into it’s channels. I have not heard any of these three amps except in clips and I must say, compared to a Dumble they are very close.

Overall it looks as if Fuchs has become interested in developing a product that goes beyond the standard Dumble design to incorporate more modern & luxurious appointments.

TWO-ROCK

If FUCHS is the king of ODS clones then Two-Rock is not a clone at all but something unique and different. Alexander Dumble crafts his amps by hand and takes many months to do it. Two-Rock offers handbuilt amps with about 1/12th the lead time. Finding a Two-Rock demo, or clips that don’t have John Mayer in them, can be difficult. Overal the amplifier does the Fender on steroids sound very well.

In the clip you can see how bell like and clear the clean tones on this amp can be. When cranked the amp never gets to gainy or saturated. SRV did use a Dumble just not an ODS. He had what he called “king tone consul” which was a Dumble SSS. The SSS is basically an attempt to make an amp with pure headroom right up until ten. SRV would often mix this with his overdriven amps to get more clarity. Anyway, This amp accomplishes the drive sound that SRV used a lot of the time with some clarity and snap that simply couldn’t be accomplished with only a Vibroverb. If anyone knows of better Two-Rock clips I’d be happy to post them up here (and get you some exposure!) because frankly there are hardly any of decent quality.

The biggest problem with Two-Rock is since they are still all hand made amps by a handfull of skilled artisans they are incredibly expensive. I have seen Two-Rocks go for upwards of $3,000 on Ebay. I know they do go for less at times, but that is an incredible price to pay to get a piece of Dumble’s designs. Also, almost everything in the Two-Rock line bares some Dumble resemblence, so even their tiniest amp which for a time was around 20 Watts is very Dumble-esque.

Two-Rock has some hefty endorsers. Joe Bonomassa has played through one and allegedly thinks the Fuchs is less forgiving. He has even gone as far to mention that his two-rock may be broken since it has very little clean headroom. John Mayer is the most obvious Two-Rock endorser though he also owns at least one Dumble amplifier too. He has interchangeably used Two-Rock and Dumble amps on stage, likely because he doesn’t want his Dumbles to be damaged during touring.

If what Bonomassa believes is true, the Two-Rock is the hard-rock version of a Dumble where the Fuchs is more versatile. Either way both amps are filled with Tasty tone and are at price points that induce mortgages.

Edit: I just found some great information on Bonamassa’s Boards. He explicitly says don’t bother spending $40,000 on a dumble and talks about some of the clones he’s used:

I like the Two rock amps for a very direct tone. I prefer the custom signature reverb 1 with the presence knob over the CSR 2 with the contour. I dont know why but I do. They do a very good ^ type of tone. Not a lot of lows or highs but great mids that blend well with the Marshall Jubilee. I have two of them and I actually like the European one better. Its a little cleaner. Joe and the guys over there are really nice and helpful. A very honest amp. You hear your good days and you hear your bad days very clearly. The VanWeelden is a bit more true to a Overdrive Special I think. Its rounder and has less gain, although Peter makes this pre amp called a gainland which is so great. Peter’s amp is top notch and built like a tank.. You must get the Twinklelator though. The compression that the outboard tube effects loop creates is beautiful and so Robben Ford ish.. The Carol Ann is the same situation a most expertly built Dumble style amp that is does the full saturation with high articulation thing. The main difference between Alan’s amp is that he uses EL 34s instead of 6L6s. The Red one with the Eric Johnson tweak is my favorite of the two I have. Its all what you like. The amps that I have described are not cheap but do that thing very well. I will say that “Thing” is not for everybody. Some people prefer less articulation and more compression, some dont like all that midrange that you get. I hope this helps… I will say this. I just played a gig with Robben Ford and he had his Dumble ODS and TC 2290. I also saw him with two reissue twins and he sounded the same. Great!! Save $40,000 on a real Dumble that may or may not be authentic and buy yourself a nice 3 series BMW. Girls will dig the car better than the black box with Vox grille on it.
Just my thoughts
Thanks Joe Bonamassa

You can view the post at: Joe Bonomassa’s Official Forums