Amp quest: Teach me the ways of the Princeton Reverb

Make it loud here.
User avatar
kingmedicine
PAT. # 2.972.923
PAT. # 2.972.923
Posts: 178
Joined: Wed Jul 14, 2010 9:45 am
Location: Detroit, MI

Re: Amp quest: Teach me the ways of the Princeton Reverb

Post by kingmedicine » Sun Jun 24, 2018 8:42 am

Have you looked into the '68 Princeton Custom reissues at all? I really liked mine for home use and recording (I've got an AC15HW which is a little too loud a point of comparison). The '68 PR reissues are supposedly based off the bassman topology if you're used to that.

User avatar
mezcalhead
Admin
Admin
Posts: 11566
Joined: Tue Sep 12, 2006 4:18 am
Location: Swampland

Re: Amp quest: Teach me the ways of the Princeton Reverb

Post by mezcalhead » Sun Jun 24, 2018 9:08 am

It's a slightly different amp, but roughly same wattage: I have a brownface Princeton, which I have used to gig at smaller venues. It struggled a bit in any place bigger than a small pub and wouldn't really deliver a clean sound. I also gigged with a reissue Vox AC15 which was capable of handling any size place, up until they would be routinely miking amps anyway.

If you're going to be buying an amp you might as well get something that doesn't need attenuation to get it to the volume you want. I've never felt the need to attenuate either the Princeton at home. I also have a tweed Champ, which is also appropriately house-trained - it actually sounds louder than the Princeton on occasion, which I think is down to its more aggressive sound rather than actual dBs.
Distance-crunching honcho with echo unit.

User avatar
green_mario
PAT. # 2.972.923
PAT. # 2.972.923
Posts: 61
Joined: Wed Jul 27, 2016 7:48 am

Re: Amp quest: Teach me the ways of the Princeton Reverb

Post by green_mario » Sun Jun 24, 2018 9:25 am

Thanks everyone for the responses. This is all really good information, and useful for my current (and future) quests.

I ended up getting a decent deal on an old Silverface Champ on Ebay. So far I'm loving it. I can get tremolo and reverb from my Eventide H9, which sounds good enough for me right now. Having an 8-inch speaker is a little different then what I'm used to, but sounds better then I expected. The original speaker sounded a lot better then I expected too given what you read online. I replaced the original speaker with Jupiter 8SC Ceramic just to see the difference, but I haven't decided which I like better yet.

If I start to fall out of love with the champ, the princeton is next on my list!
Very glued and greasy reverb sound

User avatar
wproffitt
PAT. # 2.972.923
PAT. # 2.972.923
Posts: 1263
Joined: Wed Feb 24, 2010 8:48 pm
Location: Ellicott City, MD, USA

Re: Amp quest: Teach me the ways of the Princeton Reverb

Post by wproffitt » Sun Jun 24, 2018 10:43 am

Congrats on the Champ! Those are fun little amps. They also get a different sound from a PR whe on cranked. I think you’ll enjoy it.

User avatar
Embenny
PAT. # 2.972.923
PAT. # 2.972.923
Posts: 10363
Joined: Tue May 24, 2016 5:07 am

Re: Amp quest: Teach me the ways of the Princeton Reverb

Post by Embenny » Sun Jun 24, 2018 5:23 pm

wproffitt wrote:
Sun Jun 24, 2018 10:43 am
Congrats on the Champ! Those are fun little amps. They also get a different sound from a PR whe on cranked. I think you’ll enjoy it.
Yeah, and champs sound way bigger on tape than they do in a room. A lot of surprisingly big recorded tones were achieved with champs. The small speaker acts as a natural high-pass filter, which pretty much all recorded guitar tones get run through anyway.
The artist formerly known as mbene085.

Post Reply