Srv/SSS story by Egnater

[frankdrebin]

This surfaced here sometime ago...

http://www.ampbuildingclass.com/my-srv-story.html

Inviato dal mio m3 note utilizzando Tapatalk

[Bombacaototal]

Fantastic! Adding to the forum in case link is ever down

My SRV_Story 1986
Roughly 30 years ago, I received a service call from a local venue in Royal Oak, Michigan for Stevie Ray Vaughan. I had heard his music but knew little about his gear. The tech told me he had a pile of Fender amps and this Dumble amp, called a Steel String Singer in need of repair. I had worked on a few Dumble Overdrive amps but had never seen a SSS amp. I had Mr. Dumble’s phone number so I called him, and he answered. I explained what I was going to repair and who it belonged to. He detailed in “tech” terms what the circuit was so I would know what to bring with me. His explanation clearly described an SVT so I took the parts and gear needed to repair an Ampeg SVT as well as the Fenders. Upon arrival I was greeted by his very friendly tech whose name I cannot recall. He showed me the setup and began to explain what they wanted done to the Fender amps and the SSS. I told him I had just spoken to Howard Dumble on the phone. He stopped me, obviously perplexed, and asked how I spoke to Howard Dumble? I said “I dialed his phone number and he answered”. He ran off ranting that Mr. Dumble would take a call from me (who he didn’t know) but not from Stevie Ray Vaughn! Apparently he owed them a couple of amps and was not delivering or accepting their calls. While he was gone taking care of that, I began work on the SSS that, and I quote, “just doesn’t sound right”. The worst complaint you want to hear when trying to repair gear in the field. As I begin inspecting this beast, it became clear that this was an SVT power amp chassis with the Dumble preamp. Not like an SVT, but an actual SVT chassis from an Ampeg amp. The repair was straight forward with the usual SVT problems. As I completed that repair, the tech returned and was no longer angry. He said “it has been handled”, whatever that meant.

Now it was onto the rest of the amps. Allow me to explain what I believed was the magic of Stevie Ray Vaughan. In front of me is literally a pile of Fender amps just stacked up in a totally haphazard way. I don’t recall all the different models but they were all Blackface combos. Probably half a dozen random amps. Also, teetering on the end of the pile was a Fender Vibratone Leslie type cabinet and the SSS on the other end. So, here is this wall of amps and hanging in front of them is a little sheet metal box with a bunch of ¼” jacks on it. Each jack is, in turn, plugged into one of the amps using those gray, plastic Radio Shack cords. On the floor is a wah pedal and a Green overdrive pedal. That was the entire setup. No fancy buffers or splitters. Just six amps all parallel together through this little jack box. The tech says “let’s start here”. In the random pile is a Fender Vibrosonic. Basically a Super with a 15” speaker. Apparently, they had just purchased it on the road and stuck it into the pile. He goes on to show me what Stevie says is wrong. He plugs in the Strat set to the neck pickup and runs his hand across all the amp’s knobs so everything is now full up, as were all the other amps! His left hand is not on the neck and he strums the open guitar hard. Need I say what that sounded like? He tells me Stevie says it has too much bass and asks what can I do about it. I reach over and turn the bass knob down. He strums the guitar again and proclaims “that’s it!” I think we are done at this point. He then says “that is OK but Stevie wants it to sound like this (bass knob on 3) but wants to see everything full up”. You guessed it, I suggest rotating the knob so it looks full up. That was not acceptable because Stevie would find out and would be pissed. He had me go inside and modify the amp so when the knob was full up, it was really only on 3. The rest of the tasks were routine repair stuff.

Sadly, this did somewhat burst my SRV bubble. I assumed much of the incredible tone was from some finely tweaked amps but alas, I realized his tone was truly in his hands. Not only did he have an incredible attack and feel but he also knew how to control a pile of amps all on ten, all the time.

And that’s my SRV story.

[pompeiisneaks]

Oh man, that's so cool! Love it!

Bruce is a nice guy on the facebook groups all the time, too bad his amps don't sell more, seems like he gets it It seems he's focused more on the amp building classes, so I hope those are a big success.

~Phil

[M Fowler]

Oh man, that's so cool! Love it!

Bruce is a nice guy on the facebook groups all the time, too bad his amps don't sell more, seems like he gets it It seems he's focused more on the amp building classes, so I hope those are a big success.

~Phil

I think Egnator is selling amps just fine. I have fixed some and see them around.

[pompeiisneaks]

Well that's good to hear then I've not worked on one yet, but I've not worked on a ton of amps yet, I mostly build. (that and I've only been doing this a little over a year).

~Phil

[Bombacaototal]

For the curious members like me, I exchanged a couple messages with Bruce. This is what he had to say:

Thanks for contacting me. Please understand I am neither a Dumble nor SRV fanatic. When I worked on his gear 30 years ago, he was not famous. I had no idea the Dumble amp was something special and Stevie Ray was not huge yet either. It was just a service call to repair some amps. I don't really remember much about the SSS other than it did have the poweramp from an Ampeg SVT. As I said, the poweramp chassis was not "similar" to an SVT but an actual chassis removed from an SVT and put into the SSS. I don't remember much more about it. No photos. No serial number. No schematics. It was just a weird amp that I fixed for a not yet famous player. Sorry I don't have more information. Does seem to have stirred some conversations amongst the Dumble and SRV aficionados.
Thanks
Bruce

[M Fowler]

I like Bruce's stories good reading.

I first heard about SRV from returning Army veterans in college talking about SRV since they had seen him in concert in Germany but in the USA we were not talking about him nationally, probably only in Texas.

I went out and bought his Album and recorded onto cassette tape. I said to a drummer friend of mine at work, hey take a listen to this guy. He was floored and said who the hell is this guy? Long story short he and his family moved to Austin, Tx to be closer to the blues scene and now they play with a lot of greats. In fact his son fronted/toured with Double Trouble after John Mayer left. He is now playing guitar with The Fabulous Thunderbirds. Probably would have got there without my SRV tape but I still feel responsible for turning on the Keller family to SRV.

Mark

[beasleybodyshop]

SRV went to High School with my old man here in Dallas. He was pretty well known in Dallas well before he blew up. I can remember being a little kid and when I'd go visit my dad Jimmy Vaughan would be there, they would always be bullshitting about hot rods and stuff (my old man had a body shop, and was always working on hod rods, etc) I had no idea who Jimmy was at the time because I never really put 2 and 2 together.

I remember asking my dad about him a few years ago, he said they had a falling out a long time ago and haven't really spoken much since.

That's about as close as I can get. lol. Stevie was a big influence on pretty much any kid who wasn't playing heavy metal here in DFW/Texas at that time I think.