Is there a amp for both bass and guitar

[monradon]

Is there a amp that will play bass and regular guitar decent. My son plays in a small group and wants to get away from hauling two amps .

[UnklMickey]

what are you looking to do?

does he switch back and forth between guitar and bass?


or will the guitarist and bassist both be playing through the same amp simultaneously.


roughly how loud does it need to be?

what's the budget in $ and physical size?



unk

[dunkelfalke]

monradon said:

Is there a amp that will play bass and regular guitar decent. My son plays in a small group and wants to get away from hauling two amps .

afair vox ac30 was thought exactly for that
the simpler solution would possibly to get something like decent effect processors for both guitar and bass with amp and cabinet simulators and plug both straight to the poweramp or to an active monitor

maybe digitech gnx3000 for the guitar and behringer bdi21 for the bass

[sumgai]

monradon,

Your son may be playing in a small group today, but where will he be next year? And where will the group be, if he's still with them? Your purchasing decisions should take the future into account, at least somewhat, if you wish to avoid spending too little now, only to find yourself spending even more later on.

Personally, I'd say that if you don't need gobs of power, then most any Keyboard/Bass amp will work well enough. For the last 10 years, perhaps longer, most such amps have had parametric tone controls that have a lot of lattitude, tone wise.

If you do need power, then consider the option mentioned above by dunklefalk, the use of an effects/tone/simulator pedal and one or two active monitor/speakers. Of course, there are trade-offs between the two in terms of simplicity, variety of tonal options, compactness, and the costs involved.

My own choice would be something that I can recommend from personal experience, either a Fender Bassman 60 or 100. Fair amount of power, great tone for either bass or guitar, not real heavy, and not budget busters. The 60 watt unit has a 12' speaker plus a tweeter, and can be for found for less than $300. The 100 watter has a 15" speaker, and the same tweeter, usually findable at about $350. I use a pair of them for my GR-33, and when I hit that Hammond B3 with its Leslie vibrato spread across a stage, oh boy, look out! ;D


sumgai

[ChrisK]

I actually didn't buy my first amp (this time around 30 years later) until a couple of years ago. I used a PA that I got used cheap. Every guitar that I buy, I test in my lab with the same reference PA.

A keyboard amp is my suggestion. I play guitars, basses, and synths thru it.

I do have the Fender Rumble 100 ($239 GC clearance), the older one w/ the 15" and tweeter, I don't know about the newer Rumbles. My Bro' in law has the '59 Bassman reissue, we find it "looser" in sound focus than the Rumble. It's a great guitar amp, but although being the original Fender bass amp, the open back means that the speakers are acoustically unloaded below. Beware of 5 strings/low freqs thru it. After all, this ain't even a bass reflex (well, the open back's a biiiiig tuning port!).

[monradon]

Thanks for the good advice never thought of a keyboard/bass amp. He plays occasionly in nursing homes and plays the bass until he sings or they want a lead then he plays his guitar. We have power for the other stuff this is just for the really small gigs playing mostly old timey stuff and old country with a little bluegrass and get this his favorite rock and roll stuff is the older stuff how lucky can a Dad get.

[ChrisK]

Yeah, I really enjoyed (re)discovering all of my old hobbies w/ my son and daughter as they "grew thru". Few of them "stuck", but they know how to "play well" when playing w/toys.

True male joy is buying a new toy, and "it's for the kid, honey." (You've all heard the rational "it's for the house.")

In the end, we're all just "old kids" (pretenses aside) and "playing is".

[edsg]

seems like i've seen alot more older amps that were built for both guitar and bass. my old school had a 2-15" 50 watt vibration technology stack that had a switch to use it for guitar or bass.

[RandomHero]

Get a Fender Bassman. Designed for bassists, and effective for it, but revered by guitarists worldwide since the 50s.

[johan]

admin said:

Get a Fender Bassman. Designed for bassists, and effective for it, but revered by guitarists worldwide since the 50s.

I can only second that. Get a Fender Bassman top and get a seperate cabinet. I've played through quite some middle of the road bass amps, mostly valvestate. Now I'm playing guitar through a Blackface Super but when I plug a bass (any bass) into that, that is the bass sound I love. Crisp and clean yet as bassy as you like it..perfect note articulation.

My tech says I can't do much harm to the amp to play bass over it, but it will wear out the speakers faster. Probably somebody more informed than me can inform you about ohm-rating on guitar vs bass amps.

If you can a cabinet that can be switched from 4 to 8 ohms, that might be perfect.

hope this helps
j

[UnklMickey]

admin said:

Get a Fender Bassman. Designed for bassists, and effective for it, but revered by guitarists worldwide since the 50s.

yup,

Jim Marshall liked it so much, he reportedly used the 5F6 Bassman circuit for the first Marshall amp.

johan said:

...Now I'm playing guitar through a Blackface Super but when I plug a bass (any bass) into that, that is the bass sound I love. Crisp and clean yet as bassy as you like it..perfect note articulation.

My tech says I can't do much harm to the amp to play bass over it, but it will wear out the speakers faster. Probably somebody more informed than me can inform you about ohm-rating on guitar vs bass amps....

the impedance (ohms) ratings on speakers are not directly linked to differences between bass or guitar.

BTW: that super is a 2 ohm output (4, 8-ohm speakers in parallel)

so if you plug an 8 ohm cabinet into it instead of the internal speakers, it won't be loaded properly. plug such a cabinet into the ext speaker jack, and keep the internal speakers plugged in too.

better yet (for bass), would be to use 2, 4-ohm closed cabinets in parallel, instead of the internal speakers.

with the internal speakers and bass:
since you will be losing much of the bass, because the open back will allow the back wave to mix with the front wave, don't get too aggressive on making things loud, or you will fatigue the cones. they will actually fold or crease. then they will sound like flatulence.

but if you exercise a bit of moderation, you shouldn't have any problems.




unk

[vonFrenchie]

My SWR LA10 combo (standard Bass amp) works great with my guitar. It's a more recent amp compared to the Fender Bassman. I get an awesome tone. There is no distortion on though.

[rockdad]

Had to chime in when I read some April 2005 posts by Monradon and Chris K when discussing the children and passing down some musical abilities and the rational regarding the musical purchases we make today.
My teenage son is has been taking guitar lessons just under a year and I have been quite amazed as to how he is developing his abilities with the axe.
I have been down in the crawl space and dragged out my old combo organ, a Gibson G-101 (aka Ray Manzarek and the Doors) and my tubed Magnatone 12" 90W amp...(talk about weight and a real wood cabinet!...) talk about being rusty (not the instruments, mind you!..)
I did the same music lesson thing back then, joined a rock & roll band through the music school, got rather well, played local school dances, private parties, outdoor venues, weddings, etc.
Ironically, our band played at my wife's senior year high school dance. Our bass player was the first string quarterback at the local boys school, so at break time, we were swarmed by the high school "sweeties".
Come to find my wife & I were standing in that crowd, probably inches away from one another....15 year later we met at my job in the automotive field and married. that was 20 years ago!...