Fender Rivera-era Concert

[Chip McConnell]

Anyone have experience with this as a pedal steel amp? Seems like if it was set up properly you could have tube sound in a small package with more volume than a Deluxe Reverb could deliver (and a lot cheaper). A quick Forum search didn't yield much.

[Al Moss]

I've had a Concert for many years, bought it new back in the mid eighties. It's a really nice gtr amp. For steel it may need some serious tweaking in dealing with the range and strength of the steel gtr output. The steel will crunch the front end with a not out of the ordinary harder pick attack here and there..The voicing of the mids is nice for six string gtr but may need to be dipped quite a bit to work with the steel. -an outboard EQ mabe?.. I've not really been that impressed with the lows that it prodiuces for steel, again maybe an outboard EQ issue. Maybe some of those same reccs that have been made for the HR Deluxe and Deville would be ok for the Concert? The Concert is rated at 65 watts, 2 6L6's and several AX7's etc. It's point to point wired, baltic birch ply cabinet, nice verb and so forth. Weighs in in the 60lb range, well under a Twin but a good bit heavier than a Deluxe. My Concert has been a solid and dependable piece of gear for a long time. -one of the few amps that I have not sold or traded off over time but I've used mine exclusively for elctric gtr stuff. Of course, I'd love to hear of some tweaks that would make it the ideal steel amp.

[Donny Hinson]

As long as you're not looking for a lot of bass response, it will do fine. The early B/F versions (with 4 speakers) are my favorite, though their lack of a mid control puts them at a disadvantage for steel work. Later versions (II and Custom) have a single speaker, smaller cabinet, and a consequently "smaller" sound, but they did add mid-range controls, which makes them a little more versatile.

[Tony Prior]

I also had one of these in a 2x10 configuration for a very long time. For the Fender 6 strings and the Les Paul it was an OK bandstand amp with moderate volume, for the Steel I think it would be fine for a LOW VOLUME situation, kinda like the Hot Rod Deluxe.And yes, the mid range is gonna need some help.

I think this amp was leading edge for a Fender during that era and I liked mine ok. The Fender amp book has these at 60 watts, for my taste it was a weak 60 watts compared to the HR Deville's of today. I also found the channel switching to be really lacking which basically was what this amp was all about. I used outside intervention for overdrive..

I am now using the HR Deville 2x12 for guitar and Steel for moderate rooms and find this amp to be more out of the box Steel friendly. A tad bright but that can be corrected. I am always looking for one of these in a 4x10 config but not for $700 !

I sold the 2x10 Concert for about $350 at a show a few years back, it was a tuff sell with all of the newer Fender and Peavey tube amps on the market that offered more. It looks like a Black face and that helped.

Not sure what they are worth today...probably a bit more I suppose...but not because of performance.

tp

[Mike Phillips]

i have the single 12" speaker model of the Rivera Concert you're speaking about. bought it used during my college days in ithaca, ny for $325! had some work done to it once, but didn't have it tricked out for steel.

it's a great amp, has served me well, and now i find i am loving the sound of my emmons through it. to me, it does exactly what you're talking about: good old tube warmth sound in a package roughly the size of a deluxe reverb, only you get more volume and you can get these (point-to-point wired) for cheaper than a used "reissue" (PCBs).

i have a gig tonight and i am using whatever amp is there. if i had my choice, i'd show up and this amp would be sitting there.

mike

[Chip McConnell]

Thanks for the responses. Looks like it might be worth trying one with my steel (a ZB). If I do I'll post back with my thoughts.

[John Russell]

I bought one of these a couple years ago and it is a nice steel amp. I have had some issues with mine.

I was having problems with intermittent clipping, i.e. distortion at low volumes. Turned out to be some loose wires and need of a general "clean-up". Also the reverb isn't as dark, nor as intense as my Hot Rod Deluxe. But it has more head room than the Deluxe. (Both have the Eminence 12" speaker.)

The tone is, to me, great. Good ol' Fender tube tone that's hard to beat. It does get a little spongy in the low end if pushed hard, after all it's just 60 watts. I play a 12 string uni setup and I'm hitting the low E and B strings pretty often.

I've used it on big stages with a EV 15" speaker plugged into the aux. jack. Sounds fantastic. Noticeably better than the rack rig I use for hi-volume situations with the same EV speaker. With the second speaker it's sounds similar to the old SF Vibrosonic I used for years. The portability is nice, probably the same weight as a NV 400 peavey but jucier sounding.

John

[John Russell]

For a good description, click here

I've seen a few of these and they aren't all the same. The Concert II has the switches on the front and different font for the name. Similar to the Fender 75 which is similar but with 75 watts and heavier.

Mine has the classic pre-CBS blackface panel. Same type font. You'd swear it's from that era by the looks of it if you didn't know better. Also it has the switches on the back, same as the early Fenders.

[John Russell]

One more thing. I do use a Boss EQ 7 along with a digital reverb and analog delay pedals. As with most amps, I scoop the mids and boost the lows and highs. I've never used this amp without those FX so I tweak the EQ to compensate for whatever the amp may lack.

The reason I bought the amp was the idea of a big sound in a small package and it delivers that. It roars like a Twin.

JR

[Joe A. Camacho]

Bought mine in 1990 for 200 bucks, I recently had the local Fender guy go through it and warm up the clean side a little. Steel sounds great through it, I'm thinking of having Rick Johnson built me a head and speaker cab for it, cause it's so damn heavy.

[Al Moss]

John, after reading your post I hooked up the Concert through a GE-7 and it sounds pretty nice. I'm thinking that it can be a good small venue amp. There's a stock Fender 12 in the cab right now but I may even dig out the original Fender EVM 12 that's stashed somewhere here in the house and put that back in there to see how it sounds. Thanks. I feel like I got a new amp.

[John Russell]

Al, if you really want to wake it up, try a second speaker in the aux. jack. I use an EV 15 in a closed cabinet which is smooth as glass, but one of these newer cabs with another 12" would probably sound great. You might experiment with some of the other 12" speakers in the amp, EVs are great as are JBLs but you're adding weight. Some of these new neodymium speakers might sound good. An amp tech I know recommends the blue label Fender speakers as used in the Evil Twin amp. Same weight but he likes the output better.

JR

[Jim Sliff]

Donny, these are nothing like the 4x10 concerts. These were Rivera's attempt at creating "modern" sounding amps for Fender.

Not the most revered of the amps in Fender's history. Lots of gain, nice for buzzy Santana-inspired leads. Subject to odd oscillations, especially at low-to-mid volume. 6-stringers around the Tele and Fender forums pretty much put them in the boat-anchor category with red-knob Twins. Some people like them - I've had a few, and dozens of BF and SF Fenders - the Rivera-designed models sound nothing like any other Fender IMO - he just tried to add too much stuff and lost the basic Fender sound in the process.

Just my opinion - but you couldn't talk me into playing through one if I had almost any other reasonable alternative.

[Al Moss]

John, Thanks again for the suggestion of adding a speaker from the aux speaker output on the Concert. I placed an EVM 12, front ported monitor cabinet, (little high end tweeter dialed off) into the equation and it really behaves nicely. The two cabs together smooth out the highs and give a bit of bottom oomph. It's completely un-carriable for a live gig, I sure don't want to bother schlepping it out of the house. But--It makes you think a bit about using a second cab that's a sealed back instead of an open back in order to smoosh the tonal properties of different cabinets together.

[Dave Mudgett]

I'm joining late - but I had one of the Rivera-era Concert 112 amps with 60 watts and a single, stock Fender EV SRO speaker in it. That thing honked as a clean jazz, blues, or country guitar amp and had plenty of bottom-end from the SRO, so I think it would make a good low-medium volume steel amp. An outboard graphic EQ could probably fix any small issues.

Yes - I would avoid all the Rivera add-ons like the plague. The distortion knobs and that kind of junk sound buzzy and horrible, to my tastes at least. I would just play it clean. These amps have doubled in price in the last 10 years - I sold several in my guitar store back then, and typicall went for $300-350 for them then. The VG Price Guide now lists them in the $550-700 range.

The surprising amp from that period is the Super Champ, which now books from $700-1000. I think the Concert 112 is a much better and more useful amp.

BTW, Jim - they made the '82-'85 Rivera-era Concerts in at least 1x12", 2x10", and 4x10" configurations, so Donny's may well be one of the Rivera-era amps. You're right about this being very different from the early 60's white-tolex and black-tolex Concert amps with no reverb, but great guitar tone.

Donny - maybe outboard EQ would add some bass, but I just haven't had much luck playing PSG through 10" speakers. Lord knows I've tried, since my Teles and Strats seem to prefer them. Perhaps 4 very robust 10" speakers would work.

I think what would make the Concert work for steel for me is that nice big phat 12" EV SRO speaker. It sure gave a great big phat jazz guitar tone in my old Concert 112 - wish I had it back.

[Jim Sliff]

Dave - Yeap, I know about the other speaker config's....but Donny said [/quote]The early B/F versions

, which would be the '64 BF...not the Riveras.

I guess you had better luck than I did - even clean I could not get anything remotely "Fender" out of them. Even when you don't run all the gadgetry, that stuffs sucks tone from the circuit, and the clean tones ranged from dead to harsh with the ones I worked on.

[Dave Mudgett]

Jim - Donny actually wrote this:

The early B/F versions (with 4 speakers) are my favorite, though their lack of a mid control puts them at a disadvantage for steel work.

He didn't specifically mention '64. Rereading it, I guess he meant a '64, but I thought it was ambiguous, since there were Rivera-era blackface 4x10" concerts. It sounded like he was basing his conclusion on the fact that it was a blackface 4x10". But I guess the lack of midrange control may well pinpoint it to a '60s version. But seriously, I've had people drag in '80s Concert 4x10"s and insist they were '64s, so I'm always wary of assuming anything.

On guitar, for anything but very clean sounds like for jazz, country, or some blues, I much prefer the earlier amps too. I especially think the earlier brown-tolex concert (I think I said white earlier, that's wrong) is one of the best-sounding amps Fender ever made. Just drop a Reverb unit on top, and that is a ride with a Tele or a Strat. Of course, I'd be afraid to take a nice one much of anywhere anymore. Pretty sad state of affairs.

But for PSG at a medium volume, I think the later Concert 112 would probably be a better choice.