The Epiphone Forum

My small stable includes vintage Gibson and Epiphones featuring full size and mini humbucking pickups. I noted in another post on this forum that the mini buckers are louder and punchier than the full sized pups. And of course have more treble response. This requires some tone and volume control tweaking when switching between guitars at gigs. My amps include (all 1964 Fenders):
Champ (Tweed style 5F1 circuit), Vibro Champ, Princeton (non-reverb), Deluxe (non-reverb) and Bassman (6GG-B "blonde" circuit with Presence control and blackface cosmetics). I had a custom made cabinet built with matching cosmetics and a single Altec 418B 15" speaker...

Nice!

I love small tube amp combos that have good amounts of gain. I guess I am a child of the '80s

Right now I play a little 5W Marshall SL5 combo. I love that amp.

My two Epis nowadays are the blonde '64 Sheraton and also a '62 Crestwood. Both sound fantastic through that little SL5. You would never know they weren't full-size humbuckers with the tone

I like BF/early SF Fenders. I have a Dual Showman Reverb that I run with a 2 x 12" cab with JBL K-120 speakers or a Bandmaster Reverb running a single EVM 12L. I'm saving up for a Glaswerks Zingano that should be a good match. I had a '66 Deluxe Reverb that I liked a lot, too.

The best tone I ever had with my Riviera was a '70 Twin Reverb with stock speakers and an extension cab with a JBL D-130 playing at an outdoor lunchtime gig at a college. I was playing in a duo with a pedal steel player and the stars and planets were all lined up that day.

I rarely use overdrive with the Epi, but one day I tried it with a Jordan BossTone I found in a pawn shop. I was immediately transported to the '60's. That was fun!

The only pedal I use with my rig is a Barber Direct Drive, a very early issue first edition model. I've tried all the other OD pedals including original KLON and keep coming back to Barber...