Hendrix' Marshall

[talbany]

Lefty
Very COOL!! Thanks for posting..Of coarse a huge Hendrix fan and my fave tones were from the Monterrey pop recordings...The high voltage Marshall along with the Showman gave him the slightly cleaner rhythm tone than the straight up Marshalls, although the Band of Gypsy's tone was pure Marshall tone being played by the MASTER.. From what I know about the man and gear was he normally traveled with 3 things...Since Marshalls were the standard back line used in those days he sometimes used the rentals to do the 1 off gigs not associated with a normal tour schedule (so this amp might have been a festival rental)..He would still always carry with him his fave Fuzz Face at the time and his Wha and several of those cheap coiled telephone looking cords..Since the added capacitance helped to smooth out the sound of those Fuzz Faces when he opened up his vol on the guitar..AFAIK he usually just left the FF on all the time and used his FF and volume controls to generate the gain he needed at the time..Although the GEC KT66 were well built and could handle those high voltages for a while and depending on how you ran them..I imagine Jimi would have to have them re-tubed after a dozen or so shows (the way he ran them) since that's about all he would get out of them before they would start to go south..The 6550's provided the added power and headroom but 575 on the screens of a 6550 is really pushing it as these were prone to screen blowouts output Xfromer failures and internal arching...Because of this the Marshall Major was born and designed to run either KT88 or 6550's but the screens had to be run in ultralinear mode to help with reliability..These were also used later on by Jimmy Page and Richie Blackmore and generated some classic rock tones!!

Tony

[Roe]

I have often wondered about the BOG show. His tone is darker.

Wasnt he using a silicon fuzz by then also?

he used a red fuzz face with that Roger Mayer claims is an axis fuzz circuit.

[Roe]

Lefty
Very COOL!! Thanks for posting..Of coarse a huge Hendrix fan and my fave tones were from the Monterrey pop recordings...The high voltage Marshall along with the Showman gave him the slightly cleaner rhythm tone than the straight up Marshalls, although the Band of Gypsy's tone was pure Marshall tone being played by the MASTER.. From what I know about the man and gear was he normally traveled with 3 things...Since Marshalls were the standard back line used in those days he sometimes used the rentals to do the 1 off gigs not associated with a normal tour schedule..He would still always carry with him his fave Fuzz Face at the time and his Wha and several of those cheap coiled telephone looking cords..Since the added capacitance helped to smooth out the sound of those Fuzz Faces when he opened up his vol on the guitar..AFAIK he usually just left the FF on all the time and used his FF and volume controls to generate the gain he needed at the time..Although the GEC KT66 were well built and could handle those high voltages for a while and depending on how you ran them..I imagine Jimi would have to have them re-tubed after a dozen or so shows (the way he ran them) since that's about all he would get out of them before they would start to go south..The 6550's provided the added power and headroom but 575 on the screens of a 6550 is really pushing it as these were prone to screen blowouts output Xfromer failures and internal arching...Because of this the Marshall Major was born and designed to run either KT88 or 6550's but the screens had to be run in ultralinear mode to help with reliability..These were also used later on by JH, Jimmy Page and Richie Blackmore and generated some classic rock tones!!

Tony

the majors were designed for kt88s, not 6550s. the majors have more than 600v on the screens, while the 6550 datasheets typically state that 440v is max screens voltage.

the amp supposedly running 575v plate voltage was a kt66 amp

[talbany]

the majors were designed for kt88s, not 6550s. the majors have more than 600v on the screens, while the 6550 datasheets typically state that 440v is max screens voltage.

the amp supposedly running 575v plate voltage was a kt66 amp
_________________

Actually here is a quote from the man himself..

http://www.vintageguitar.com/2827/jim-marshall-3/

The Marshall Major was a 200-watt head made for Ritchie Blackmore, and he’s still got the same one. The amp, being 200 watts, overheated a lot because in those days the tubes didn’t last very long. The original Majors used EL34s. Then we changed the tubes in Ritchie’s amp to KT66s. Customers had a choice to order the amp with either EL34s or KT66s. We made very few of them.

So it looks like some artists had there techs install either KT88's or 6550's. (I had a friend who had a later 69-70) that had 6550's in it.. Jimmy Page had one of his Marshalls (supposedly owned by Jimi H at one time) upgraded Marshall 100's which are customized by Tony Franks in New York (he customized Hendrix's amps too actually) AFAIK. Page's Majors had UL tap output transformer upgrades when they installed the 88's..There is also a rumor the SRV ran 6550's in his major but this is unconfirmed..As long as the amp is running UL you could probably run either 6550 and KT-88 safely

AFAIK.. Dagnall transformer used in the original Majors had a tendency to melt down, and were replaced with a US made transformer with better interleaving to eliminate the excessive screen voltages, which was the cause of the melt-downs...Several assumptions made by some colleagues was that the Dagnall's were adequate for non-ultra-linear designs, but they didn't know how to integrate screen grid taps properly (the UL tap should be about 40%, not 70% like the Dagnall and Dyna OPT's), which was key source of reliability issues for some
stock Marshall Majors.

while the 6550 datasheets typically state that 440v is max screens voltage

.

True but although the KT-88 were rated much higher 8w (700v) if you run the load line on those the 88's these too were also in danger of over dissipating the screens at 500+

Load line provided by Martin Manning

Tony

[statorvane]

This place aint the same without reel

What happened to Reel? I haven't read a post from him in a good while. I got such a kick out of his comments. I made sure I wasn't drinking any coffee when I read them in the morning. Too many close calls spewing coffee over the keyboard.

[Roe]

the majors were designed for kt88s, not 6550s. the majors have more than 600v on the screens, while the 6550 datasheets typically state that 440v is max screens voltage.

the amp supposedly running 575v plate voltage was a kt66 amp
_________________

Actually here is a quote from the man himself..

http://www.vintageguitar.com/2827/jim-marshall-3/

The Marshall Major was a 200-watt head made for Ritchie Blackmore, and he’s still got the same one. The amp, being 200 watts, overheated a lot because in those days the tubes didn’t last very long. The original Majors used EL34s. Then we changed the tubes in Ritchie’s amp to KT66s. Customers had a choice to order the amp with either EL34s or KT66s. We made very few of them.

That is a very strange qoute indeed (cf. Doyle's The history of Marshall: The first 50 years, Chapter 10). The first marshall 200w amps, the Pigs, used kt88s, as did the later Majors. Marshall also made Majors long before Blackmore started using one

[statorvane]

Just ask Dawk: http://dawkmods.proboards.com/board/2/ask-dawk

[5dollazz]

Hi guys, forgive me for the tardiness but I thought I'd share some interesting info regarding Monterey and Hendrix's tone. I work for a co that releases classic movies and when we did Jimi's set at Monterey Pop we had to have Eddie Kramer oversee the new 5.1 and 2.0 mixes for the discs (all things Hendrix had to pass through his hands at that time). Anyway, our engineer working with Kramer commented on the beauty of the stacks on stage and Kramer remarked that they were really just for show. He said behind them there was a mic'd Twin Reverb that was responsible for the house mix. He said this was the norm for Hendrix at the time. Crazy I know. I don't want to believe it, but it's a fun story at least.

The other crazy thing was that the original tapes lacked a lot of the tone that we think of a Hendrix. Then Kramer got them and all of a sudden it was the tone we all know and love. I was really surprised how much influence his mixing had on that iconic sound.

[LeftyStrat]

Eddy's memory is a little off. There was a dual showman that can be seen in the full performance. Hendrix did indeed own a Twin Reverb. I've heard many bootleg recordings of some of his late night jams in NYC clubs. Apparently that was the amp he would bring with him, though I still can't imagine jumping in a cab with a TR.

I'm sure the master could coax nirvana out of a solid state brick. To me he was one of the first to treat everything in his chain as part of the instrument.

Thought I would add this photo:

[cbass]

Eddy's memory is a little off. There was a dual showman that can be seen in the full performance. Hendrix did indeed own a Twin Reverb. I've heard many bootleg recordings of some of his late night jams in NYC clubs. Apparently that was the amp he would bring with him, though I still can't imagine jumping in a cab with a TR.

Well he was a tall strong lanky young man when I was 25 I could carry a twin under one arm and a half stack under the other and through a football a 1/4 mile

[Matec]

EDIT

[86'd]

And like Jana said, the Univibe had an effect. Those weren't true bypass, so it would have affected his signal even if it wasn't on.

Likewise the Crybaby, and not forgetting the strings were in reverse order over the pick up pole magnets.

But to paraphase Mr. E Clapton, "it's all in the fingering".

[gui_tarzan]

I wish people wouldn't get so hung up on having the same tone as someone else. Yeah it's cool to know how they did it but there's no way any other individual can sound just like one of the greats (or in my case anyone even slightly talented on guitar). It's one thing to want your amp to have a similar tone but there are so many factors that go into it it's nearly impossible to re-create.

[The Ballzz]

I wish people wouldn't get so hung up on having the same tone as someone else. Yeah it's cool to know how they did it but there's no way any other individual can sound just like one of the greats (or in my case anyone even slightly talented on guitar). It's one thing to want your amp to have a similar tone but there are so many factors that go into it it's nearly impossible to re-create.

Truer words are rarely spoken! ""I Ain't The Arrows, It's The Indian" is a phrase that comes to mind! No offense intended to my Native American friends.
Gene

[LeftyStrat]

I wish people wouldn't get so hung up on having the same tone as someone else. Yeah it's cool to know how they did it but there's no way any other individual can sound just like one of the greats (or in my case anyone even slightly talented on guitar). It's one thing to want your amp to have a similar tone but there are so many factors that go into it it's nearly impossible to re-create.

I don't think my documenting the first Marshall that Hendrix owned is in any way indicative of me trying to 'sound' like Hendrix. There is a certain historical and technological aspect to documenting what contributed to the sound of certain moments in history, namely Hendrix' performance at the Monterey Pop Festival. This Marshall is very special, in that it was an early KT66 model. Hendrix' later concerts were a combo of this KT66 Marshall and a couple of EL34 models.

I would be equally fascinated with the amp that Pete Townsend used on Live at Leeds. Or David Gilmore's modded Alembic FB2 into his Hiwatt's modded line in to the power amp.

Does this mean I want to sound like them? No. Does this mean I never spent time learning to play some of their music? No.

This is a forum of amp builders. We desire to build those amps that are an instrument in their own right, and would sound different with every talented guitarist.

A great amp is an instrument to be learned as much as a great guitar.