COVERING THE TONAL BASES PART 2: AMPS BY PAUL “TFO” ALLEN
One year ago, my column [“Covering The Tonal
Bases,” March 2011] focused
solely on guitars. A year later, I
am continuing the exploration
of the sonic palette—this time
focusing on amplifiers. Like most
guitarists, I own several different
amps. That way, depending on
the style of music I’m playing on
the road, I can achieve the different sounds I need.
Mesa/Boogie TA- 15
Most amps do one particular
sound extremely well and
the rest of the tones are usu-
ally just okay or downright
bad. I think it’s a big part of
the reason that many guitar-
ists own a bunch of differ-
ent amps. The TransAtlantic
TA- 15 from Mesa Engineering
is the screaming exception to
this idea. In the same way a
champion triathlete is effective
on wheels, on foot, or in the
water, the TA- 15 is a work-
horse in just about any musical
context. Between the amp’s two
channels, I can obtain a lot of
classic tones.
When I need high-gain
tones, I simply flip over to the
red channel. I can get to a tone
resembling a late ’60s, 50-watt
Plexi on the red channel with
the 15-watt setting and dimming the master and bass.
From there, I set the treble to
2 o’clock and the gain to 10
o’clock. If I need something
more modern sounding, I’ll
utilize the 25-watt mode and
switch the red channel into
the “HI 2” setting. I also boost
the gain to 3 o’clock and add a
little more treble than I use for
the Plexi-type tone.
1966 Ampeg B- 15 N
Have you ever picked up a
strange guitar and found all
the tones to be weak and
anemic sounding? Whenever
I encounter a guitar with this
thin-type quality, I usually
pair it with my B- 15 N to add
some bulk and muscle to the
instrument’s sound. The B- 15
N is a really good amp for
trimming out those unwanted
frequencies that bulge out
from certain instruments. For
example, the ringy trebles of
12-string guitars can often
overpower the rest of the frequencies, resulting in a lack of
fullness to my ear. To achieve
a great, even sound with a
12-string instrument, I’ll run
it into a B- 15 N with the
treble set at 2 o’clock and the
bass at 10 o’clock.
An interesting thing about
my Ampeg B- 15 N is that
it has three inputs. When I
need to dial-up some aggressive overdriven tones, I’ll join
channels 1 and 2 with a patch
cable and plug my guitar into
the second input of channel 1.
This allows me to take advantage of all six of the amp’s control knobs. I set the volume
knobs to around 3 o’clock and
cut the bass way down on both
channels. Most of the time,
I’ll set the treble pretty high
on one channel and position
the amp’s other treble knob
to noon. This adds a bit more
dimension to the sound than
setting both trebles to the
same position.
Top to bottom: The Mesa/
Boogie Trans-Atlantic 15, Bad
Cat Lil’ 15, 1966 Ampeg B15-N,
and Soldano Astroverb 16 offer
a wide variety of tones for different applications. Photo by
Paul “TFO” Allen
Bad Cat Lil’ 15
Many of us Nashville guitarists use the word “spongy” to
describe the tone that lives
right where an amp begins to
breakup between its clean and
overdriven sounds. Listen to
“Days Go By” by Keith Urban
if you want to hear what I’m
talking about. When I need to
get that spongy tone, my Bad
Cat Lil’ 15 is usually the first
place I start. It’s a 1-channel
amp that is sonically similar
In the same way a champion
triathlete is effective on wheels,
on foot, or in the water, the
TA- 15 is a workhorse in just
about any musical context.
For a ’ 65 Deluxe Reverb
kind of sound, I’ll set the
TA- 15’s green channel to
15-watt mode and switch to
the “normal” setting. I then
move the volume and treble to
1 o’clock, and set the bass and
master to 2 o’clock. To get a
Vox AC- 15 vibe happening, I’ll
use the same settings just mentioned, except I switch to the
“top boost” setting and knock
the treble back to 10 o’clock.
to Bad Cat’s Black Cat and is
perfect for getting those rockin’
“in-between” sounds.
The other tonal zip code
this amp can deliver is the
gritty, Jimmy Page sound that
can be heard on Led Zeppelin’s
“Heartbreaker.” The setting of
the cut knob is the key to getting a clear sound out of this
amp and its placement is heavily dictated by which guitar I
am playing.
Soldano Astroverb 16
This is the most unique amp
of the bunch. After I’ve tracked
a heap of different guitar
parts for a song, it sometimes
becomes difficult to get a new
guitar part to poke out and
speak through the existing
parts. When this happens, I
plug into my Astroverb 16 and
my problem evaporates. This
amp truly has it’s own original
character, making it hard to
lump it into the typical Fender
or Marshall comparisons that
are often used when discussing
amplifiers. The Astroverb 16 is
a great amp for power-chord-
driven rock and for solos. And
the amp’s reverb is excellent for
Santana-like leads when paired
with a gain-saturated setting.
PAUL “TFO” ALLEN
is a multi-instrumentalist
who has worked with Big
& Rich, Adele, Sebastian
Bach, 112, Jake Owen,
Larry The Cable Guy,
and many others. He
also has his own project called Ten Finger
Orchestra. Reach him at tenfingerorches-
tra@yahoo.com.
