django49

Long since lost track. Pretty sure I have had over 90 Hamers pass through my hands, like this set of various Monacos and others, so details of each are long since forgotten.....Only a handful left now. I am guessing I sold that one over 10 years ago. The video looks to be 10 years old, so that is probably about right. Features look to be pretty much standard. So maybe an upgraded top, maybe different pickups. Just guessing....

I did not buy it new. COA was shipped with the guitar.

I owned that guitar and sold it to ZMB. He was buying specifically for using it as a platform for SD pickups. He did a good job on the guitar and the demo. I doubt anyone would be disappointed with it!

Greasy smell of fried chicken, Wafting out of the air... Up ahead in the distance, I saw a big neon light.... My eyes grew heavy and my stomach growled, I had to stop for a bite.... There she was in the distance....She was really big as Hell I wasn't sure if it was her or the chicken that I smelled Then she held out a menu and she showed me the way There were voices down the corridor.....Thought I heard them say.... Don't eat the chicken cacciatore Its got a lovely smell, but it'll burn like Hell If you eat the chicken cacciatore.....Any time of year (any time of year) Get your stomach pumped here.... It is a kick to see how long before the audience catches on.....

Make you rig even more compact......Mount your speakers right on your pedalboard! (Available only on April 1).

Interesting....After decades of NOT seemingly making any efforts at all. If anything, I sorta got the impression that they actually appreciated the universal nature of their design(s) and use by others. I wonder if German law translates in the states(?)

Feelin' good is good enough for you......Good enough for you and Mr. Magoo......

Best way to tell if there IS a difference.....Play them side by side. An advantage of rolling my own is the ability to make cabs that are essentially identical, one bare wood, another clad in vinyl or tweed. Your ears may differ and you may prefer the look of one over the other. ("Snakeskin" is always an attention getter!) If anyone is interested enough, and gets close enough to play thru them in person to decide for yourself, just let me know when. This particular pair are in the Forte 3D style, each a 1 x 12.

Okay, so I cobbled together the pieces to bring out to a gig yesterday. A few quick pictures from the site. The TKIP is the master, with the TKRP in the preamp loop. In front of the TKIP, in order, a Teletronix La-2A compressor, Brother AM (more or less a somewhat more obtainable King of Tone with built in Rangemaster---each side can be set as a boost, OD or distortion) and Love Pedal Super Six. TKIP out to a TC Chorus and delay/echo pedal that feeds into the small Carvin (cheap and affordable) stereo power amp, then into one of my small shop built stereo cabs. Power supply and power strip mounted underneath, so can run it all on one cord to be plugged into AC. Big sounds in a rather compact and light package. Tones? TKIP is pretty much a Fender Deluxe and a "Tweed".....The latter, with the boost in front, can get into that highly saturated Mesa or D tone realm. (Santana like?). Bypass the TKIP and the 2 TKRP channels are pretty much a JTM and Plexi. (Allman Bros, Gary Moore???) The TKIP as master allows the use of its built in Rev and Trem even when its preamp is bypassed. Meanwhile, if BOTH TKs are bypassed and the Super Six is selected (esp with some boost) we are into "Texas Blues" territory. (split the coils on the guitar and Pride and Joy, anyone?) I may yet swap out a piece or two. I like it. TWO fully tube preamps (with the PI) give a really nice set of tones on the fly, nevermind the digital power amp. Steve, a much better player than me, really loved the "blackface" tone, which is mostly what I used live yesterday. (I could say that the very versatile Huber Redwood {"Voice of the Angels"} with BRW neck was part of the equation). All of which comes at a cost. Add up the pieces and you are well past $2k for such a board. Could you program some sort of modeler to get something similar? Sure. Cheaper? Certainly could be. How much does it matter in a live setting? YMMV. Do you hate diving into menus to program and tweak? I do. FWIW, the two amps (Imperial and Royalist) in 1 x 12 combo amp form are around $2700 each. Seems to me this is not a bad way to get there, with stereo, esp if you can fab your own cabs. And these each have essentially the exact tube preamp of the combo amps. And that includes an attenuator on each channel to make it adaptable to the gig. I won't bore with details of the flexibility of each preamp...Plenty demos of that out there. Including ability to go direct and add IRs. Is it better than my "old" board that largely gets to the same place? Jury is out. But I think this one is a lot of fun. Thumbs up to what TK is doing, Will be interesting to see if and how much better it gets when the Wampler "Pedalhead" piece drops later this year, presumably replacing the Carvin for an even more "perfect tone" for live use. (If/when I settle on final configuration, I will lose the zip ties).

So, if you do this on both pickups, does that equate to 8 x 8 or 64 total tone options? Or maybe more if you bypass for the straight humbucker too. I like options but that sounds like paralysis by analysis! (Sez the guy that likes to use a mini 3 way on each pickup so as to get single coil as well as series and parallel humbucking tones, so I am not much one to talk......)😁

Pretty sure that what he said was that he had an amp (that he particularly liked the sound of) from which the cab was stripped BEFORE he got it. And also compared some of the oldest Fender amps from before they started using tweed, then tolex. I am guessing that even someone with as deep pockets as he must have would be disinclined to mess around that much.....Certainly appears that, if he wants something bad enough, he will just have his minions go out and find it in the open markets. And he has the marketing backup to come up with yet another "reissue" of old classics if there is a market. (See the Clapton reissues and the more recent Fuchs ODS JB edition). As there must clearly be for those that think he has the magic touch (or ears)......Witness also the reverse engineered copies of the pickups of vintage guitars that he deems particularly wonderful. Not exactly the magic fairy dust I feel a need to chase, but Seymour is making a big deal of them.😉 But, FWIW, the recent Suhr guitars with the torched bodies, roasted maple necks and zero layers of finish do win acclaim for their "better" tone and resonance. Sorta like the improvement (IMO) when PRS stopped coating their guitars with deep layers of polyester and urethane. Def improvements since about 2008...... Is there a magic Bonamassa guitar pick out yet? Hey, for only $12.99 you too can be like Joe! 🫢

Yeah....Def do NOT mod a vintage amp! 😁 What is fun is to try out different variations of cabinets side by side to see how much of a difference THAT makes.

Some of you might find this interesting..... I thought it interesting that he says the amps (he was talking about older Champs in particular) sounded better with the tolex or tweed removed. FWIW, I have moved towards not using covering on my various shop built speaker cabinets.....I tend to make them from pine (lighter weight and more resonant) with hardwood edges for strength. As always, your tone preferences may be different.

So, evolving thoughts.....As much as I like the Thermion power amp, it is huge. I am going to try the Carvin(!) power amp. It is very small, pretty inexpensive and not as versatile, but does get the job done.....More than adequate power. It does have it's own brick power supply, but I can mount and hide that under the board. As to the power hungry TK pedals......Ordered a Voodoo 3+, which will also tuck underneath. With a pair of CURRENT doublers (each connected to a pair of 9V 500mA outlets) all the pedals can run without wall warts. The isolated outputs should keep noise from the other stomps under control vs having them daisy chained. I will still need two 120v outlets (one each for the Carvin and the Voodoo) but if the worst case is that I run both cords to a power strip that is NOT on the board, I can live with that. If I CAN hide it under the board too, so much the better. Yeah, this IS making the board even pricier.....But, with luck, all the pieces will be in place by the weekend.

PS.....Note that some folks have suggested using an A/B switcher so that the full functionality of each preamp is maintained, without some perceived compromise from having one run through the other with the bypass.....For examples, different IRs on each channel. I MAY try that. Which, of course, implies one more metal box on the input side. 🤔

I DID set it up as I expected. I do not have it fully tuned in yet. My tentative set up, a work in progress mind you, is a compressor and boost into the TKIP, TKRP in the bypass, so 4 presets, plus the boost option (and the internal preamp on the Zero). The TKIP into a Thermion Zero stereo power amp. In the LOOP of the Zero, a couple pedals, stereo back into the Zero and then out to a pair of speakers. Tentatively, using a TC Electronics Stereo Chorus and delay pedals in the loop, but that is subject to change. Rev and Trem on the TKIP, so those option are covered. Part of my hesitation is the powering, so I do not have it wired up yet. The TKs use a high power (12v, 750mA) power supply, so my older supply does not do that. Meaning, a need to plug in the 2 provided TK power supplies, one for the other pedals and one for the power amp......Just need to make that all fit without a pedalboard that gets too cumbersome, esp with the THREE large pedals. So it did NOT make it out to my jam yesterday. I DO need to find the right balance with all those presets (4 built in attenuators really help!), but I essentially have two F type tones, two levels of M type tones and one (drive channel of TKIP) with a saturated tone that falls somewhere between a Tweed, Mesa and D types. And a boost to up the ante a bit when needed. Pedalboard is bigger than I would like, but it would seem to make the load in pretty easy.....Pedalboard (with mounted power amp), small-ish shop built stereo cab and guitar and accessories in a gig bag. One trip from the car! So, I like it a lot but am not completely there yet. From all the hype, I guess it should be even better when the Pedalhead actually drops.....

NICE!

As the story goes, as I understood it, The Talladega Pro was Jol's attempt to go upscale into the arena of the Huber Dolphin. It was a great model, but the timing was not so good. The great recession was on, Hamer's time was running down and getting folks like us to look at a $6k Hamer (nigh onto 20 years ago) was more than a stretch. Does not mean it was not a great effort. Shame that not more were made. For me, it as instant bonding with the Dolphin, so my T-Pros all went away. If I was not so well served there, I would be having another conversation with Wes at Rebel Guitars. My experiences with him have been excellent. And I am guessing he's do a bit better on price if sold direct. BTW, the Tally referenced above was bought directly by me from Willcutts and it is every bit as good as you might imagine. You will have a hard time finding one cleaner.

Well, if a person can live with the name on the headstock🤔, this might be a good way to get into a T-Pro. I went thru 3 Tally Pros. I tended to think it might have been the best model Hamer ever made (for my tastes). Had I not fallen in love with a similar guitar, I reckon I'd have kept one..... https://rebel-guitars.com/preowned-jol-dantzig-guitars-tulsa-in-blood-red/