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What do you want Fresh or re-heated?
Bring me some fresh Mex. 27%  27%  [ 3 ]
Those two leftover slices in fridge look yummy. 73%  73%  [ 8 ]
Total votes : 11
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Post subject: Vintage or not.
Posted: Fri Apr 10, 2015 2:18 pm
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When I look back at music that has gone classic I see that much of it had a new sound, new for the times. It was fresh, 60's music even though much of it pop was at least fresh in sound. Yet when I look around at what sells and what people buy it all seems vintage. Fishman sells new technology pickups that sound "vintage", most of the body and neck styles have been around forever. Sure there are the garage operations that produce fresh gear but they seem to be lost in the noise of the big boys.

On one hand it seems that my music and the tone of my gear should be fresh, on the other hand so much good has come from the vintage stuff.

Are we starving for something new and fresh or are the re-heated left overs just fine.
Where are you? Writing something fresh, or re-heating a little AC-DC? Playing vintage style guitar or kicking over rocks looking for a different sounding pickup?


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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Fri Apr 10, 2015 3:04 pm
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BillWill wrote:
When I look back at music that has gone classic I see that much of it had a new sound, new for the times. It was fresh, 60's music even though much of it pop was at least fresh in sound. Yet when I look around at what sells and what people buy it all seems vintage. Fishman sells new technology pickups that sound "vintage", most of the body and neck styles have been around forever. Sure there are the garage operations that produce fresh gear but they seem to be lost in the noise of the big boys.

On one hand it seems that my music and the tone of my gear should be fresh, on the other hand so much good has come from the vintage stuff.

Are we starving for something new and fresh or are the re-heated left overs just fine.
Where are you? Writing something fresh, or re-heating a little AC-DC? Playing vintage style guitar or kicking over rocks looking for a different sounding pickup?


Welcome to the Forum BW. Questions and photos and gear info, these are a few of our favorite things. Cool post, you'll fit right in 8)
Nomenclature, a thicket in music if ever there was one. I liked your idea that fresh is fresh from 1K y/a to yesterday. Keep writing those fresh songs Bill. :D

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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Fri Apr 10, 2015 3:54 pm
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These guys certainly have a "fresh" sound. If only they had a guitar player :roll:
Quote:
1st listen - Wow this is just a jumble of nonsense
2nd listen - Wait, this sounds nice...
3rd listen - This is the best thing I've ever heard.



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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Fri Apr 10, 2015 6:11 pm
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My amps are modern, a Hot Rod Deluxe with Eminence Cannabis Rex 12" speaker, and an Egnater Tweaker 15 head through one of my 30 year old EVM12L speakers. My guitars are both old and new, but really old technology with Fender Noisless pickups, or Duncan Distortion, Duncan Little 59'rs, or Ibanez RG stock humbucking pickups.

I like all tube amps with no clipping distortion diodes, so that is also old technology.

I listen to 60's 70's music that is my favorite.

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Last edited by desertbluesman on Sat Apr 11, 2015 3:05 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Fri Apr 10, 2015 6:56 pm
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It's not so much that the music isn't fresh, It's that we aren't fresh anymore. The discovery of music is a formative process of youth. The music of our childhood resonates with us the rest of our lives.
It's a point of reference for each generation to identify themselves by, "their" music
Growing up in the 60s, all my music was fresh and new. Now I listen to the same songs and hear the echoes of previous musicians ingrained in them.
So don't worry about playing the same songs if it feels good. Just do it well and someday some fresh kid is gonna come along and , "discover" it all over again. Let him reinterpret it into something fresh.


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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Sat Apr 11, 2015 2:26 am
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I guess I'm the odd duck in that I like my music vintage, but I like my equipment modern...mostly for the sake of convenience and reliability.

Although I think there's something to be said for youth-oriented excitement and discovery being a part of what draws you to a sound, I also think there's some very practical music business realities that provided the platform for the discovery and creation of great music in the 60's, 70's, and 80's.

Record sales were big business back then and the record companies were rolling in money. So they "primed the pump" with new artists and spent significant amounts of money developing them. Especially in the late 60's and 70's when albums became the primary units being sold rather than 45's. In today's marketplace with no real money to be made from music sales, there's not much A&R budget for the development of new artists. So everyone is on their own to try and learn what it takes to create a professional act with professionally crafted music.

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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Sat Apr 11, 2015 5:54 am
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Hhhmmm...that's actually a really good question. These are of course, just my own personal opinions.

As a person who's primarily a classic rock and oldies musician, I guess I'm somewhere in between on all of this. Like many folks, I am a big fan of that vintage sound...folks like Clapton, Hendrix, Pink Floyd, Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, ZZ Top, Heart, Fleetwood Mac, ELO...as both a musician and a music lover in general, this has always been my favorite music. That said, I'm also a very big believer in making such material my own as well...as they saying goes, I like to "put my own spit on it". I've never really tried to sound like anyone in particular...when people walk away from one of my (my band's) shows, I really don't want people saying "wow...they sound just like so and so", I want people to remember our version of (insert given tune here).

As I'm sure is true with the majority of players out there, my own sound is certainly laced with my own influences. I've been told that here, even after 30 years of playing, people can still hear a lot of BB King, Beach Boys and Pink Floyd in my playing (at least as a guitarist). As we've seen on occasional threads on this forum, a great many people often pick up the guitar because of something/someone they heard in their younger days. Just as a singular example, I'm sure there have been many over the years who started playing guitar because they heard Jimi Hendrix and thought, "that's what I want to do"...and this certainly applies to many of the classic players of legends I'm sure. That said, I have to believe that our individual sound generally results to some degree from our influences.

On that note I would also add that even when I am doing my own original material, those influences still very much come through. With material I've written or tune my wife and I have written together, if one listens closely, you can hear a very "classic rock like sound" to the material...that's just the sound that I like personally. Again however I think that a GREAT many musicians over the years have this same attribute...their influences are often reflected in their own material.

Likewise, I have to say that as far as gear goes, mine is certainly a mix as well. Starting with guitars, as I'm sure a few folks around here know, my favorites are my mid 90's Mexican Strats. For myself personally, this is more about feel than sound...90's Mexican Strats feel good to me...they're a "good fit" if you will. With that however, another of the reasons I'm so fond of these guitars is also that it's really easy to change the sound on them as well. Of the 10 Strats I currently own (of various lineage), most of them have their own unique sound and their own voice...a few of them are certainly a bit "vintagy" while others do sound a bit more modern...and most of them have their uses to be sure. Which guitar I use at a given time mostly depends on the music I'm playing at that time and what kind of sound I"m looking for. Same goes for my amps as well...I have a few older vintage amps and a couple of more modern amps. The amp I gig the most with is my old Lab L5, however I would add that the reason I use this particular amp isn't so much that it sounds "vintage" as much as that it's a tremendously flexible amp (tone-wise). It works well for most of the styles of music I play and it works VERY well for use with my guitar synth, where I may be using a multitude of instrument sounds (particularly a lot of sax and piano/keyboard). It's also loud enough to use for any gig I've ever played...a place where many of my smaller amps fall short, LOL!!!

I guess to try and summarize all of that, whether I'm doing covers or originals, for myself it's about creating my own sound, however that sound does, in part, come from many of my influences as a musician and a great many of those influences are indeed vintage.

To wrap this all up, I'll simply leave you with the very wise words of the great Duke Ellington, "If it sounds good, it IS good".


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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Sat Apr 11, 2015 8:57 am
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Klowenst wrote:
These guys certainly have a "fresh" sound. If only they had a guitar player :roll:
Quote:
1st listen - Wow this is just a jumble of nonsense
2nd listen - Wait, this sounds nice...
3rd listen - This is the best thing I've ever heard.


I forced myself to listen to the entire POS twice. The revelation that it wasn't actually all that bad never came so I stopped trying to give it a chance. I did try though. Fortunately I have taste and therefore have a filter for this sort of shyte. MHO - YMMV

_______________

As to the original post, I prefer the sound of vintage amps or at least vintage style amps but I prefer newer guitars. I've played some very valuable guitars (due to their age) and was never convinced they were worth the exorbitant prices they command. I also remember that back in the day it was much more important than it is today to play each guitar before buying. It's still important to play before choosing but the differences between them are fewer now, commonly attributed to modern construction techniques and the consistency that comes with them. Some have said the new guitars are like cookies all cut from the same cutter. I'm OK with that so long as it's a quality cookie. Not so with the hand built nature of vintage guitars and the uniqueness each one had. Some were absolutely brilliant and others were a complete waste of perfectly good wood and steel. I am of the opinion that the ones that were brilliant will never, ever come up for sale; that the ones which do show up on eBay are the mediocre ones that got played but people can live without if they have to and that the ones which show up for sale still in pristine condition are the ones that were so bad nobody wanted to play them. They ended up spending decades in a closet or under Grandma's bed, completely forgotten (because they were so very forgettable) until somebody found them many years later and realised they could cash them in for some serious coin. If I wanted a vintage style guitar I would buy one of the new re-issues. Again, MHO - YMMV.

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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Sat Apr 11, 2015 9:47 am
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"Vintage", unfortunately, is a marketing term that is as undefined as, "warm". It is an emotional term to target buyers that has no reference or technical meaning.
Real vintage amplifiers have lower internal gain structure than modern amps.
This was the era when guitar was played clean, without distortion. Low gain was not a problem because the wattage of all the gear was low. Good tone and clean headroom were the primary considerations.

Then Marshall and Mesa came along in the 60s and high gain distortion was added to the music. This forced amp builders to abandon cathode biased amps and go for higher power and gain.
Simply removing the 250 ohm cathode resistor and adding a bias circuit improved power output. The compressive soft clipping was lost
Then they raised the value of the negative feedback resistors and got much higher gain out of the power stage. The compressive effect of feedback was lost.
Larger output transformers allowed for more power in the same design. Multitap transformers also increased the core size. The bass choking effect of a small OT was lost in the changeover.
With few exceptions, Fender amps of today have internal gain structures 2-5 times higher than their namesakes from the 50s & 60s.

With the advent of solid state electronics, tube industries died and the metallurgy of tubes and transformers declined in quality. The experienced hands that crafted tone for 40 years retired and it was left to newbies to recreate tone with what was left of the industry.
Where it was common practice to isolate tube sockets with rubber in the mountings to prevent microphonics and vibration failures, that was forgotten and solid mounts to PCB is the norm. Where the old timers recognized that the electricity doesn't stay in the wires and carefully laid out amplifier topology so it didn't interfere with itself, the new engineers crammed too much circuitry into too small of a space and wonder why it had a tendency to oscillate or pick up radio stations and noise. Where the pine cabinets provided light weight and a resonant characteristic, MDF became the predictable choice for CNC milling and added dead sounding weight to the finished product.
We can't go back to the vintage era. If you are lucky enough to have an original or a faithful clone, count yourself lucky.
Technology marches on, but marketing stays the same. They still use terms to evoke an emotional response with little regard for reality. Buyer Beware.


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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Sat Apr 11, 2015 10:57 am
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TimsAudio wrote:
If you are lucky enough to have an original or a faithful clone, count yourself lucky.


I reckon I've been lucky......

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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Sat Apr 11, 2015 11:18 am
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BMW-KTM wrote:
Some were absolutely brilliant and others were a complete waste of perfectly good wood and steel. I am of the opinion that the ones that were brilliant will never, ever come up for sale; that the ones which do show up on eBay are the mediocre ones that got played but people can live without if they have to and that the ones which show up for sale still in pristine condition are the ones that were so bad nobody wanted to play them. They ended up spending decades in a closet or under Grandma's bed, completely forgotten (because they were so very forgettable)

I disagree with this premise, even though it is prevalent.

The guitars found in a closet or under Grannie's bed etc were there because whoever bought (or received as a gift,) didn't stick with it, and they were put there and forgotten along with the tennis racquets and karate gi.

It probably had nothing to do with the quality of the guitar at all, but rather with people dabbling and not sticking with playing guitar.

Those guitars are just as likely to be good, or a dog, as any other.

It was from a situation like this that I found a perfect silver face deluxe reverb for dirt cheap at a garage sale.

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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Sun May 03, 2015 10:19 am
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This is a topic with all sorts of possible answers.

I like both new and vintage in guitars and amps (with a preference for both differently).

I find the build of each varies. Some new guitars and some new amps are better built than the old, but the opposite is true also. Reliability is not a given.

There are some new amps that I love and many that I hate. As for old tube amps, there are those that I love and those that I like. I hate the weight and heat factor. Modelling is good and bad. The technology is not yet mature.

As for sound, I hate hum. Humbuckers and overdriven distortion are okay, but I prefer single coil, clean, reverb, wah, and fuzz over that. I prefer a separate spring reverb. It seems the market generally disagrees with my preferences, but for good reason as trends change.

With amps, even though some vintage amps and vintage guitars (or their clones) have increased in price, modern amps and some guitars have decreased in price or set a decent value for many to enjoy a reasonable if not terrific sound.

To summarize, I will say that I have a modern axe and a modern amp, but vintage would do me well all the same.

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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Tue Mar 08, 2016 8:50 am
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I listen to (and try to play) music that lends itself to a "timeless" quality.

By that, I'm not talking about popularity, or a song that was a hit--I mean a song or performance that, if you didn't know the history of it, you wouldn't know whether it was recorded/released 40 years ago, 20 years ago, 5 years ago, or yesterday.

The only reason some songs sound "Old" (other than production values) is the fact that we associate that song to a time or place in history.

Due to the fact that it's associated with the 60's/Hippie/Vietnam era (either by being there, as my best friend/drummer was, or as in my case, by references in movies, documentaries, etc.) it's hard to listen to Hendrix's "All Along the Watchtower" without the mindset and context of that time (1968).

However, since the Armadillo Teen (born 2001) doesn't have that built-in prejudice (of having been there) and has not seen a ton of movies that use the song to frame the timing of a scene or a story (as in my case, since I was born in 1970), it's still fresh and new to her...that's what I mean by "timeless".

If you heard Adele's "Rolling in the Deep" without knowing it was recorded in the last decade, you could very well think it was some obscure Shirley Bassey-like song from the 1960's. That's timelessness.

The Black Keys are good at that, "it could be old, it could be new, I'm not sure" Vibe.

I write songs that people often think are some obscure old tune they've never heard before--and I take that as a grand compliment.

I choose my instruments based on the same premise--do they sound "timeless" in the sense I can play old or new songs with the variety of sounds/tones/whatever it produces?

Just as important is the "feel" of the instrument, the reliability, and (lastly) the looks...in the last category, I prefer a classic looking instrument, but it doesn't have to be perfectly accurate in specs. As long as it sounds, feels and looks good, it IS good!

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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Tue Mar 08, 2016 9:17 am
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BMW-KTM wrote:
Klowenst wrote:
These guys certainly have a "fresh" sound. If only they had a guitar player :roll:
Quote:
1st listen - Wow this is just a jumble of nonsense
2nd listen - Wait, this sounds nice...
3rd listen - This is the best thing I've ever heard.


I forced myself to listen to the entire POS twice. The revelation that it wasn't actually all that bad never came so I stopped trying to give it a chance. I did try though. Fortunately I have taste and therefore have a filter for this sort of shyte. MHO - YMMV

_______________

As to the original post, I prefer the sound of vintage amps or at least vintage style amps but I prefer newer guitars. I've played some very valuable guitars (due to their age) and was never convinced they were worth the exorbitant prices they command. I also remember that back in the day it was much more important than it is today to play each guitar before buying. It's still important to play before choosing but the differences between them are fewer now, commonly attributed to modern construction techniques and the consistency that comes with them. Some have said the new guitars are like cookies all cut from the same cutter. I'm OK with that so long as it's a quality cookie. Not so with the hand built nature of vintage guitars and the uniqueness each one had. Some were absolutely brilliant and others were a complete waste of perfectly good wood and steel. I am of the opinion that the ones that were brilliant will never, ever come up for sale; that the ones which do show up on eBay are the mediocre ones that got played but people can live without if they have to and that the ones which show up for sale still in pristine condition are the ones that were so bad nobody wanted to play them. They ended up spending decades in a closet or under Grandma's bed, completely forgotten (because they were so very forgettable) until somebody found them many years later and realised they could cash them in for some serious coin. If I wanted a vintage style guitar I would buy one of the new re-issues. Again, MHO - YMMV.

BMW-KTM, I agree with you 100%. The only thing is if you needed to listen to this twice to determine it's sh*t, I think your filter might be clogged. :)


Last edited by Minnesotastrats on Tue Mar 08, 2016 9:29 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Post subject: Re: Vintage or not.
Posted: Tue Mar 08, 2016 9:24 am
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Dredging up an oldie, Matt.

------------------------------------------

I haven't seen twelvebar around much but just in case he's lurking, I stand by my statement. There are several reasons why people may not stick with guitar and one of the really, really big ones is a lousy guitar. That's why I never recommend economy guitars to parents looking for a first guitar for their child and I always try to steer said parents toward a higher quality piece than the $179 special. I always tell them if they spend on better quality there is a much greater chance the child will stick with it but if they cheap out and buy crap it's almost a 100% guaranteed waste of money. I stand by my statement. There is a very high likelihood that a pristine vintage guitar is one of those dogs.

About the video - it occurs to me there was nothing fresh there anyway. Synthesizers and rap. What's new about either of those?

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