"Don't attenuate - buy an amp of appropriate size"

Wazmeister

Dominic said:

Depends on the amp
.........some respond really well to a good attenuator and others don't 
ALSO some 15w Amps EG ; Matchless Lightning or a 30w Vox AC 30 are as loud as some 100w amps
My Lightning 15w would drown my Brunetti 50w Plexi 
Not all small amps are quiet

Bang on mate...

The attenuation on the Lazy J is great, and my Carr Mercury V is a simply wonderful versatile amp.

Teetonetal

Dominic said:

Depends on the amp
.........some respond really well to a good attenuator and others don't 
ALSO some 15w Amps EG ; Matchless Lightning or a 30w Vox AC 30 are as loud as some 100w amps
My Lightning 15w would drown my Brunetti 50w Plexi 
Not all small amps are quiet

What speakers are you using with the plexi? Mine is damn loud.

Speaker sensitivity has a pronounced affect on amps. My Laney Cub 12 is easily loud enough to gig with when used with a Celestion V, but not the stock speaker.

randella

The built-in 'attenuation' in my Mini Rectifier I suspect is actually power reduction.  The consequence of this is that dropping from 25W to 10W makes little difference for home use due to the logarithmic nature of volume perception, and at gig level it becomes too saggy in the band mix at 10W.

It cuts better when loud on the full-power setting, and sounds just fine at home at the sort of levels that aren't too antisocial for my wife trying to watch the telly.

I've always used MV amps, so have never felt any need for an attenuator - if I had something like a Deluxe Reverb I'd be interested just for fun so I'm not dismissing them out of hand.

TimmyO

randella said:

I've always used MV amps, so have never felt any need for an attenuator - if I had something like a Deluxe Reverb I'd be interested just for fun so I'm not dismissing them out of hand.

don't dismiss trying a good attenuator with your MV amp - an MV control is one of many ways of controlling overall volume

hotpickups

I hardly use drive pedals anymore. Just use the amps dirt (2 channel amp). Sounds great so I must have the right wattage amps now

sweepy

I don’t know how they mic up the the Andertons Demos but the Aynsley Lister sounds miles better than the demo, even through studio monitors

zepp76

I attenuate my JTM45 even though it has a PPIMV fitted, it works really well as the amp is bloomin loud for 30 watts!

Cirrus

I strongly agree that you should not attenuate, and that it's better to use an amp that's appropriately sized for the venue.

That's why every gig I ever did, I carried at least 10 amps - ranging from 1 watt up to 300 - and switched them out during soundcheck in an iterative process of closing in on the perfectly powered amp for the situation. Since some big gigs needed very low stage volume, and some small venues needed a surprising amount of firepower on stage, I could never pre-suppose the gigs requirements and take less than 10 amps. Eventually I had to stop gigging because the cost of having half a dozen Sherpas employed to lug the amps about on gig night were becoming excessive. There was also one incident where my 20 watt Fender was too quiet, but my 30 watt Vox was too loud. I had another fender that I'd measured at being 23 watts max clean output, but it blew a valve 30 seconds after I turned it on. I therefore threw it in the bin and had to drive home with the other 14 useless amps I'd brought to that particular show rattling around in the back of the lorry I was using at the time.

ICBM

I actually do know someone who had a collection of pretty much every model of Fender Blackface/Silverface amp from a Champ up to a Showman. He plays harmonica as well as guitar, so being able to control feedback well as getting the overdrive sound at the right volume is important. He would just choose the right one for every different gig, from experience.

The funny thing is that he sold almost all of them - I think he still has a Princeton - and now he uses a Peavey Backstage mostly .