Scott Henderson Discussion

[Rolly]

Scott,

Of all the tone stuff I’ve seen you discuss from your masterclass to every guitar wank, this site, etc...I don’t really recall you mentioning tubes. It usually focuses on speakers, mic placement, signal path, etc.

What are your thoughts on tubes and how they affect sound? Or do you even have any? Do you care? I know there are people who claim tubes have their own EQ and there are all sorts of claims of wizardry and whatnot.

Then I hear someone like Suhr say to just use the current production stuff (or X tube it shipped with) because the amp is tuned to it. My rudimentary understanding is that they just pass electrons so I have no idea how one could have midrange vs extended bottom end in another blah blah blah.

Anyways, are tubes something you give a shit about other than whether or not they work?

[Scott Henderson]

Tubes definitely make a difference in the tone - I was told that NOS tubes are really good but when I tried them in one of my Suhr amps, all it did was give it a lot more bass, and the JJ tubes which came with the amp sounded much better. Maybe NOS tubes are better for older vintage amps, I have no idea.

I've never spent much time comparing different tube brands, so that's why it's not mentioned here much - I'm not an expert. John says it's important to get a good matched set that's dependable - that seems to be more of an issue with him than comparing different brands, so I use JJ's and I've never had a problem with them.

I'm sure there are others on this forum who have more of an opinion about it than me, so maybe we'll both learn something!

[blackstratblues]

From what I recall, John’s most recent thoughts are that JJ EL34s are getting unreliable and that Electro Harmonix EL34s may be the way to go.

In most Marshall circuits, the first preamp tube (V1) makes the most pronounced difference, and I’ve had great luck with a NOS 12AX7 here.

[peter_heijnen]

I read -or was told- that if an amp designer uses new tubes during designing and fine tuning an amp, putting NOS in it makes little to no sense at all.