What kind of killer content do would guys want?

[Bearded]

Being the amp-whore that I am, I'm trying to put together a website especially for like-minded individuals. I want to keep the focus on boutique/hand-wired small-production amps.

What kind of content would keep you guys interested?

I'm currently trying to line up phone-interviews with amp builders in the community that I could post on the site or maybe do a podcast.

But what else? Sound clips? Sound clip hosting? Amp reviews (or "tone reports" :AOK)? Videos/pics of amp innards?

Let me know if you guys have any ideas.

Thanks!

[Jahn]

a sidebar for current auctions for the item spotlighted on the page. a mini-forum or at least comment trail so folks can give feedback or discuss a particular spotlighted amp. audio clips, of course.

[Jet Age Eric]

Sound clips? Sound clip hosting? Amp reviews (or "tone reports" :AOK)?

All great ideas! -E

[Franklin]

How about a comment section for each amp's page so people can leave tips on settings, mods, etc.?

[Bearded]

a sidebar for current auctions for the item spotlighted on the page. a mini-forum or at least comment trail so folks can give feedback or discuss a particular spotlighted amp. audio clips, of course.

Definitely planned.

How about a comment section for each amp's page so people can leave tips on settings, mods, etc.?

Oh! A "recommended settings" section is a great idea. Maybe even an amp-settings wiki.

[Frankee]

I like the gutshots idea.

[funkycam]

interviews would be great.
HIGH QUALITY sound clips (well recorded, well played) & a friendly interface would be top for me.

[Ricman]

Listings of places you can actually go see and try some of these amps that are out there.

[epluribus]

How many guys do you know, rookie and otherwise, that get totally lost with modellers and amps and pedals and the daunting array of tone that's available today? They get the gear and twiddle the knobs shopping tones, hoping to blindly stumble upon the acorn they hear in their heads, never to find it. (Worse, they get online and flame their Deluxe cuz it does stinky drop-tuned hi-gain.) And so all that gear sits and collects dust, mired in confusion. I see it all the time, online and off. It's like an old Crayola 128--most of the crayons are old, big, and dried out, and about twelve colors are worn down to little nibs.

In these times when even the po' guys have access to the big Crayola set the question is...what are all those colors for? What will those colors say to my audience? Tone is a language, IMHO.

So I'd really love to see a tone dictionary aimed at the notion that tone has become a language. Your audience probably doesn't know Tweed Fender from The Tweed Ring, but if you plug in a 5150 and an MXR Phaser to do Chet, you won't sound much like old-school Nashville, and the audience won't be riveted to a time and place in your music. It's not a vivid dramatic experience and the audience just won't get it.

Sooo...a tone dictionary...what would that look like? It would tell you which crayon is typically used for what. F'rinstance, my personal tone library is organized by gear instead of by band or song. In other words, what are the classic sounds that each type of amp is known for? Which tones are household words for my listeners? My music needs to speak a language my audience knows.

So when you dig through my Favorites and hit Deluxe, you get a bunch of links to vids and mp3s that have the songs that typify the Deluxe sound. You start understanding what sort of pictures you can draw with the Crayon marked Deluxe.

You learn to paint this way, btw--you have to see and understand the color in your subject before you can mix the paint to portray it. Helps if you know that Lemon Yellow is a cold yellow and will drive you nuts if you try to mix up warm sunset-orange colors with it. (Cold yellows will make your skies muddy, cold, and green looking.) Knowing which gear to pick to get sounds the audience understands is likewise crucial to setting the tonal stage for a song. But even more crucial is knowing which tone they'll understand in the first place.

So I'd like to see a tone dictionary of the classic sounds of various pieces of gear, and a little gear-ography noting the band, the song, and the album. Links to vids and mp3s would be very useful. I find such a thing helps me make sense of the bewildering variety of crayons in my coloring box these days. But more important, I begin to know the language my audience knows.

--Ray

[Bearded]

That's a totally different site from what I'm building, but it's a GREAT idea.

That may be next. :D

[Tone_Terrific]

Being the amp-whore that I am, I'm trying to put together a website especially for like-minded individuals. I want to keep the focus on boutique/hand-wired small-production amps.


Interviews with the builders outlining their design objectives and how they chose the components and arranged the circuitry to achieve said objectives.

You might start with that Dumble dude and get him to post his schematics and tell how he varies his designs to suit individual players.

I'm sure all the other builders would be equally enthused to enter such a discussion!:D:Devil

[epluribus]

That's a totally different site from what I'm building, but it's a GREAT idea.

That may be next. :D

Kinda had a hunch that was true, but I thought it was worth mentioning. AAMOF I figured it was sufficiently OT as to open the notion in its own thread here (http://www.thegearpage.net/board/showthread.php?t=457779).

As for Tone Terrific's suggestion, above, I agree bigtime. As I learn more and more about amp circuit design, the art of shaping tone as seen by pro designers would be a wonderful subject to include.

Cool project you got here B., I'll be tuned in...

--Ray

[epluribus]

ps...for the solder-heads among us, how about schematics? Even cooler, screen grabs from 'scopes.

...In My Dreams Dept...SPICE models?

--Ray

I use Tone Stack Calculator constantly when evaluating schematics, btw, and the screenshots are worth a zillion words. I also learned to plot tube behavior on Tube Data Sheets (TDSL.com) to discover how they saturate, etc.