Valve Jr and Acoustic-Electric

[Danno719]

This may be a real stupid question but I'm new to guitars. I have a Valve Jr., would it work with an Acoustic-Electric? If so how would it compare to and actual amp made for an A-E?

[TWANG]

It'll work fine. I use my taylor with it.

Is it a performance amp? Practice amp?

 

Generally acoustic electric players have preferred solid state amps. That's because you get things like effects built in, EQ designed for the typical bridge piezo, mic inputs for vocal or to enhance the guitar sounds.. mixable so it all helps to avoid feedback.

 

In short, solid state could be packed with features designed to help overcome the inherent problems with attempting to make a highly resonant and very sensitive acoustic instrument LOUD.

 

All a tube amp does is tone. *s*

 

Used in the right setting, which will be fairly low volume, your VJ will reproduce well the sounds you feed into it..

Are you using a preamp in the guitar or outboard.. and how good that unit is, as well as the pickup itself, whatever kind, start your path.

You know about starting off on the wrong foot.

 

If you are able to get sounds out of your guitar pickup and preamp that make you happy with a solid state amp, you're going to get

good sounds out of the VJ.

 

Of course, if you're using the combo, with the 8" speaker, it's not gonna be quite as good.

 

So it depends on what you're using alogether and what you're trying to do.

 

I get very nice warmth.. using a taylor 310 dreadnaught and a cheap piezo with no preamp at all. straight into my VJ.

I can flat pick finger pick bang chords play runs and it's smooth and warm and certainly loud enough for duo trio acoustic gigs..

 

recording with it would be acceptable, certainly.

 

There are very good amps out there dedicated to Acoustic sound reproduction. The hundred buck VJ can't possibly keep up with them all.

TWANG

[m-theory]

If you were to play very quietly, and not send too hot a signal to it, it would work fine. It does distort very easily, however, so you wouldn't likely have the headroom to play at much above parlor levels.

 

Btw, it's not features that make SS amps the main choice of acoustic players, nor would I say that players necessarily prefer them to tube amps. Tube amps can be crammed with every feature that a SS amp can be, including a full 32 bit DSP section, if that's desired.

 

The key reason why most acoustic amps are SS is cost. A very substantial SS amp can be had for $500-$800 all day long, while a similarly powered and feature-laden tube version would likely run $2000-$3000, or perhaps more. Rivera makes a stellar 55 watt acoustic amp that you can buy for a mere $2400. I'm willing to bet my Martin that it sounds a helluva lot more impressive than just about any $500-$800 SS amp out there, and I'm also willing to bet that if it cost $500-$800 instead of $2400, there'd be a whole lot of acoustic players using it instead of SS.

[cGil]

Excellent points you make there, M-theory!

 

FWIW, I've even used my "Beast"-mod VJr for my Fender Acoustasonic carbon fiber geetar. As long as I keep the amp mostly clean (w/NFB) and don't let the guitar's volume get too close to '10', it's smoother and more natural sounding like an acoustic should sound; far more so than what I get from that piezo pickup with my Ultrasound SS amp. Gotta love that.

 

However, I get my best results from my straight up, no-tone-pot, "Funk 47"-mod VJr's. Those amps are normally WAY too fat for my Les Pauls, but with NFB switched in, the lowered gain is perfect for the piezo and it cleans up those acoustic bottom boomies rather nicely. My Ultrasound amp is retired and has been gathering dust since last year.

 

Gil...

[bluefoxicy]

I've had luck with my Trio modded VJ, on certain settings my Les Paul Special II sounds like an acoustic unamped with fair bedroom-practice levels. Can't get it too loud though, but I can get it to fill the room with warmth.