Vox Amplifier

[Erock]

Anyone know how they amplified the Vox typically back n the day? I am thinking of House of the Rising Sun by The Animals. Did it go to a Leslie with Over Drive?

[clem]

To my ears, for just the dry, cheesy sound, Vox organs sounded best through the bigger Fender amps...Super Reverbs on up. I had a Jaguar, then a Continental but all I could afford for an amp was a Vox Essex. Sounded ok and Vox was the look everyone was after around here.
As for House of the Rising Sun, I've read lots of stories. One even said it was a L100 through a Bandmaster....but it sounds like a Vox to me.

[jdoc]

usually a Vox amp as well or equivalent, combo preamp came later???? Vibrato or tremolo rather than Leslie......our survey says? I used a Traynor mark II head and 4x10 cabinet for my Vox Jaguar and Farfisa Professional, Leslies were big bucks. I do remember preamps in the late 60's early 70's, saw an Ace Tone played through one. (Not Blue Rodeo lol, Creed, a local band ....not that Creed)
Not sure the original House of the Rising Sun Studio Recording was on a combo organ either, worth a search???? On some videos they show one but not usually plugged into anything.......

[clem]

Leslies really woke them up. They could get pretty dirty and Hammondish. We played a battle of the bands once and another band's keyboard wouldn't fire up. I loaned him my Continental and he let me play our set through his 147 and combo preamp. I was hooked.

[~dave~~wave~]

Vox organs sounded best through the bigger Fender amps....

When I saw Augie Meyer play his vintage Continental with the Sir Douglas Quintet back in the 90s, he used a Fender tube amp, probably a Twin or Super.

I heard him interviewed about how the Beatles flew him to London for a consultation.
They couldn't duplicate the sound he got on the Sir Douglas records.

He suggested they turn on the amp's reverb. :embarrassed:

- - - Updated - - -

Not sure the original House of the Rising Sun Studio Recording was on a combo organ...

To my ears, the Continental vibrato is unmistakable on that record.

[jdoc]

when did the Type I/II and II combo preamps come out, I know Three Dog Night had 900 Leslies (or 910)on the Live at the Forum Album from the album cover

[clem]

Summer of 68 was when the incident I mentioned took place in Glasgow, Mo. I don't know how long the combo preamps had been out but it was the first one I'd seen. Before that it seemed the rich kids with Leslies all had them rigged to a guitar amp.

as for House of the Rising Sun, I agree...the vibrato sounds very Vox-ish.

[andyg]

House must surely have been on a Connie.

I can't say I've heard a Connie through a leslie, at least not to notice. Farfisas, sure, or through their own rotary speaker, and they had this reedy edge to the tone that was transformed into the wonderfully fizzy sound. Not for nothing did they sometimes get the nickname 'Farfizzer'.

[clem]

Our rhythm player had a Vox Royal Guardsman and I can't say as the Continental sounded any better through it than it did the Essex. I sat a Hohner Pianet N on top of the organ and it definitely sounded better through the Essex....for some reason. The Connie was great in the HOTRS, 96 Tears, Light My Fire, Inna-gadda-da-vida days but by late 68 we were wanting to play more Steppenwolf, Rascals and Vanilla Fudge stuff and it sounded pretty weak. Playing it through the 147 opened my eyes and ears. In Jan of 69 I managed to score a 145/preamp pedal from a regional cast of Up With People that I had played with some. They were disbanding and didn't want to move it. I played this rig on up through the 2 years of college that I attended. In a live setting, it covered the Hammond parts pretty well....except for Whiter Shade of Pale. I remember never being satisfied with how it sounded.

[Erock]

Thanks for the replies. Very interesting! Someone should write a book on vintage equipment from that era. It could be like some history and document who used what. I truly believe that early Rock is going to be appreciated a hundred years or more from now and people might want to know.

[David Anderson]

There is a good bit of information on the web regarding musicians and the gear they used, especially if it was a signature sound of some sort.

One complicating factor is that what you see musicians playing on stage was not necessarily what they recorded with in the studio. You might see someone using a larger amp on stage for adequate stage volume, but the guitar solo on the recording may have been recorded using a smaller amp. There are many examples of this. I know several studios with amp collections.

I believe Ray Manzarek used an Acoustic Solid-State amp and speaker cabinet with his Continental.

My own experience with a Continental suggests that they like an amp with a higher input impedance, like a guitar amp input. The ~10k impedance of some modern mixing boards and line inputs thins out the sound a bit. Many of these organs probably could have used an impedance buffer at the output stage, but that would have added to the cost.

Edit: And when you get into Vox amps, it gets complicated since some Vox amps were made by JMI in England, while a different line of amps, also with the Vox name, was built by Thomas Organ. Some built by Thomas were tube amps, and some were solid-state.

[clem]

I loved the old combo organ days. I started on guitar in 64 but the hot local garage band had an organ in it and I got hooked real quick. The first one I owned was called simply "Porto Organ". It sounded so bad that it almost drove me back to guitar. Just in time I was able to buy a Vox Jaguar from a guy leaving for the service. I was in heaven. I traded the Porto Organ for an 8 track tape player to put in my 59 Ford and to this day I think I got the best end of the deal. Once organs got popular in these parts it was pretty much 50/50 Vox/Farfisa.
I still have a Super Continental and my favorite amp to play it through is my Motion Sound KBR3D. You can play it straight up or with rotary. I use it once a year at a class reunion that's my favorite gig of the year.