Blankenship VARIPLEX In Action....Clips!

[John Ziegler]

thought i'd share a really cool amp that i've had the chance of banging on and hearing live a few times recently!
this is from another board posted by a friend and fellow guitar player named dave phillips here in LA....

Originally Posted by RACKDOCTOR(Dave Phillips)

Well, here are the clips of the Blankenship Variplex I promised. First off, sorry for the sloppy playing. I was a little tense and playing a guitar that I wasn't use to. Anyway, here is the setup. I ran a reissue Les Paul with a Tom Holmes in the bridge into the Variplex dimed across the board dropped to 90 volts. The head went into a 70's Marshall cab with 25Watt Greenback reissues. It was then miked with a SM57. No EQ. Dry. Perfect mid-range. What you are hearing is all power tube distortion. No master volume. Hat's off to Roy Blankenship and Dave Friedman for designing an amazing amp.
David

http://www.davidphillipsmusic.com/variplexdry.mp3



and here's another clip that dave put online which has a little 'verb and panning added...

http://www.davidphillipsmusic.com/variplexrev.mp3

this amp is a really awesome machine.
hope you dig.

choice!

[gassyndrome]

Sounds awesome - (good) VH in a bottle! :AOK

[DestroyAllGuitars]

John, sounds like the best VH tone I've heard aside from the man himself.
This looks to be the amp that can finally delver on that claim.

[leftyaxeslinger]

NIce! Amp sounds incredible. What does dropping it to 90 volts actually do to the sound? I've read all the history on Eddie's sound but don't think I remember reading or hearing that explanation.

[gururyan]

wow, that really does nail the sound!

[michael.e]

Nice clips!

Any idea at what volume they were recorded at?

M.E.

[John Ziegler]

as far as the volume the clips were recorded at....
everything on the amp was all the way up("dimed").
it's a 50watt model going into one cab.

and the variac is what gives ya the "sag" and lowers the overall output volume....
it does some really cool things to the overall tone, eq, and feel of the amp too.
with tube amps you really can't go below 90v, because of tube/parts wear.
BUT, the Variplex can be turned all the way down to 10 volts....
without harm to the tube heaters.
the different tones sound really great all the way from 10 to 120 volts.
think of the most versatile killer sounding marshall you can imagine.....
and voila!

oh..and the 2nd channel is amazing too...
differently voiced(marshall super bass meets vox).
especially for the cleaner, bluesier stuff.

rock on!

[michael.e]

I guess that amp must be a custom order. I only see low power amps on his site. Although, I did read this........

"Power: 236 watts with 6L6 config. and 18 watts with 6v6 config."





M.E.

[Crunchyriff]

Originally Posted by leftyaxeslinger

NIce! Amp sounds incredible. What does dropping it to 90 volts actually do to the sound? I've read all the history on Eddie's sound but don't think I remember reading or hearing that explanation.

Yup, Ed used a variac. That was one of the main staples of his old rig. He used to drop it to around 90-95 vac and it would vary from venue to venue. Later, on the Fair Warning disc, he claimed he was running the variac at 140 vac, which of course killed tubes like crazy....

I'm hearing just a hair of 'fizz' on the notes, but aside from that, that is a legit tone. Very nice. COOL!

[John Ziegler]

since it's a brand new model, i'm sure it'll be on the blankenship site soon.
i do believe the Variplex amps are currently rumbling out the door...
with plenty of orders coming in from mostly LA guys that have heard the amp in action over the past couple of months.

good stuff!

[michael.e]

Didn't Ed also do something with criss/crossing wires inside the chassis to drop voltage as well?

So many myths, yet I doubt anybody else really knows. Except each of us, of course, because we believe the source of where we heard it.

Bottom line, there are many ways to cop that tone. It just happened to be recorded on that day with a result that will go down in history.

M.E.

[michael.e]

Originally Posted by John Ziegler

since it's a brand new model, i'm sure it'll be on the blankenship site soon.
i do believe the Variplex amps are currently rumbling out the door...
with plenty of orders coming in from mostly LA guys that have heard the amp in action over the past couple of months.

good stuff!

It is an incredible sounding amp no matter how you slice it! Eddie or no Eddie.

Radar tuned...........

M.E.

[electronpirate]

That does nail it.

[michael.e]

Can one safely use a variac [within reason] on any amp?

M.E.

[gomez1856]

Sounds great John!

I swear I'm gonna make it out the Baked Potato soon to see ya!

Hope everything's going well.....

BTW... I'm playing at The Barrel in Sherman Oaks Sat night if you wanna swing by!

Rick