The Steel Guitar Forum

I acquired a Fender Dual Pro and been using an old, small Fender amp and will be looking for another amp. Will be using it to play country/western swing at small venues, jams. I like that 1940's, 1950's era country sound. Looking at Nashville 112, Sessions 400, Sessions 500 or a Fender Blue Jr amps. Any idea, suggestions on best amp would be appreciated.

Rob

The new all digital Fender Deluxe and Twin "Tone Master" Reverbs are getting rave reviews.

How bout a genuine tube Twin Reverb, amps don't get much better.

The Peavey amps you have listed will have tons of headroom and will sound great but won't have the tube quality that you're in search of with 40's and 50's tone in mind.

You mentioned the Fender Blues Junior. I have and use one but am never really happy with it for Western Swing and Country. It's fine at home but there isn't enough headroom for traditional steel gigs. It can get really loud but it gets dirty. I think EL84 power tubes are better suited for rock, which is what the amp is made for. I mostly play through it with a telecaster lap steel for my r'n'r needs.

If you want mostly clean sounds look for something with 6L6 power tubes. If you want the real grindy 40's tone look for one with octal preamp tubes. If you want both sounds get a clean amp and use an overdrive pedal.

I like to use a Bassman 4x10 combo, and turn on a Nocturne Jr. Barnyard pedal for my 40's octal dirty tones.

I really want to try one of those Tone Master Deluxes though. I'll bet it's much better than the Blues Jr. for country steel but could easily handle my rock needs as well, plus be nice and light.

Best of luck in your search!

A Tweed Deluxe, or a clone of one, will do a great job. I use one with Wampler faux spring reverb and faux tape delay. In a living room setting I use the bright channel and for louder stuff the normal channel, with a Weber 12A150-50w speaker. You really want the tube sound, especially a smaller watt type amp. Clean is cool, but a pushed Tweed is the sound. Maybe one of the modelling amps can do that for less cash. I don't know much about them.

I agree 6L6 amps are better for headroom. A Tweed Pro, cathode biased gives you 25-30 watts. My buddy has a Victoria Pro...it's really great!

I have the Tonemaster Deluxe, and while it's great for 6 string and very clean steel sounds it will not get a convincing 40s-50s sound. For that, I use a Victoria Regal II. Pricey but I can get a wonderful tone at all sorts of different gig volumes with the right amount of grind.

A 5E3 clone seems like a good compromise unless you have to be painfully loud.

Vintage47 makes decent quality 40s inspired amps if you want the octal preamp sound. Don't expect high volume though.

Reading comments, lots of people want them to digitally clone a tweed twin or Bassman. With the success of these I won't be surprised to see Fender expand the line.