Seymour Duncan Convertible

matt1973

Off the back some small bargain-basement ad trawling I discovered these little beasts from the 1980s that typically seem to sell for £200-£300. As a long-standing Mesa Mark series fan, they have really peaked my interest; with that quirky modular design and nascent power scaling combined with reported reliability issues, they almost strike me as the Delorean of the amp world. Was curious to see if there’s any love, hate or indifference towards them on here.

https://youtu.be/vfVDLqVMec4

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Rowby1

I’ve never seen or played through one but I knew of them when they came out. I recall them being pretty expensive at the time. I think Frank Dunnery from It Bites used them for a while.

ICBM

A friend of mine had one in the early 90s. I’m surprised to hear they were from as early as 1980-81, I always thought they were much later in the 80s. As far as I know he had bought it new - although if I remember rightly, discounted because the shop couldn’t shift it at the original price, so it may have been quite old by then. It was OK - it sounded good, although not extremely like the amps it was supposed to emulate with the different preamp modules, and I wouldn’t say it really had a character of its own either - but it certainly wasn’t very reliable. In particular it was very hard on the rectifier valve, and kept going through them at quite a rate - if I remember rightly I eventually converted it to a solid-state one. The power control did work very well though, as he said it really did sound very consistent right down to the bottom of the dial.

Overall I would say it’s an interesting design but not really a lost gem or anything like that. Probably undervalued if they’re only going for a couple of hundred, but only from a technology/historical point of view - I can’t see them becoming more valuable, they’re just not distinctive-sounding enough.

JCA2550

Rowby1 said:

I’ve never seen or played through one but I knew of them when they came out. I recall them being pretty expensive at the time. I think Frank Dunnery from It Bites used them for a while.

Yes he did, sounded fabulous but kept breaking  down. I think I remember it packing up during a gig at the Town and Country Club?

welshboyo

JCA2550 said:

Rowby1 said:

I’ve never seen or played through one but I knew of them when they came out. I recall them being pretty expensive at the time. I think Frank Dunnery from It Bites used them for a while.

Yes he did, sounded fabulous but kept breaking  down. I think I remember it packing up during a gig at the Town and Country Club?

Yep, towards the end of the 1st song Kiss Like Judas!!! You can hear it giving up the ghost and the old footage shows him giving the roadie the WTF looks!! He went to the Pearce G2 then(I think that’s what it was - had one of them too very briefly coming to think of it - a complete weird amp!!!)

I had one of those convertibles for a while - funny old thing as I remember, didn’t make me sound like Frank so I sold it. Gigged it for a while, don’t remember it giving me any trouble though..

exocet

welshboyo said:

JCA2550 said:

Rowby1 said:

I’ve never seen or played through one but I knew of them when they came out. I recall them being pretty expensive at the time. I think Frank Dunnery from It Bites used them for a while.

Yes he did, sounded fabulous but kept breaking  down. I think I remember it packing up during a gig at the Town and Country Club?

Yep, towards the end of the 1st song Kiss Like Judas!!! You can hear it giving up the ghost and the old footage shows him giving the roadie the WTF looks!! He went to the Pearce G2 then(I think that’s what it was - had one of them too very briefly coming to think of it - a complete weird amp!!!)

I had one of those convertibles for a while - funny old thing as I remember, didn’t make me sound like Frank so I sold it. Gigged it for a while, don’t remember it giving me any trouble though..

I saw him playing it when it wasn't breaking down - Cardiff Uni SU in 1987 - sounded pretty good back then but the amps had a terrible reputation for reliability...all of those connectors on the plugin modules.

Ossyrocks

A mate of mine had one. I used to get the job of keeping it going, although back then, I didn’t know as much about amps as I do now, and it’s still not very much! He was a country player and it sounded ok for that, when it was working.

It caught fire in the end, smoke everywhere apparently.

welshboyo

exocet said:

welshboyo said:

JCA2550 said:

Rowby1 said:

I’ve never seen or played through one but I knew of them when they came out. I recall them being pretty expensive at the time. I think Frank Dunnery from It Bites used them for a while.

Yes he did, sounded fabulous but kept breaking  down. I think I remember it packing up during a gig at the Town and Country Club?

Yep, towards the end of the 1st song Kiss Like Judas!!! You can hear it giving up the ghost and the old footage shows him giving the roadie the WTF looks!! He went to the Pearce G2 then(I think that’s what it was - had one of them too very briefly coming to think of it - a complete weird amp!!!)

I had one of those convertibles for a while - funny old thing as I remember, didn’t make me sound like Frank so I sold it. Gigged it for a while, don’t remember it giving me any trouble though..

I saw him playing it when it wasn't breaking down - Cardiff Uni SU in 1987 - sounded pretty good back then but the amps had a terrible reputation for reliability...all of those connectors on the plugin modules.

Yep, saw him in Newport Leisure Centre around the same time (or could have been later?- definitely the EMISL tour and around the Town and Country era)

He was still on the SD's then and agree, they sounded fabulous - he's a pretty loud player actually - uses Laney's these days (or at least was last time I saw him)

grappagreen

Not wanting to hijack but good to see that there are some It Bites/Dunnery fans here..

I went to see 5 dates (I think) on the EMISL tour and had such a great time! Brill..

Gonna have a listen to Vampires on my way home tonight just to remind me of their brilliance and get me all revved up..

Si

Rowby1

Once again hijacking the SD Convertable thread. I saw them a fair number of times throughout their early career. I never saw Frank having trouble with his amp but I do recall Dick Nolan getting a nasty electric shock on stage and unceremoniously dumping his Wal on the stage half way through a song. Not sure what year but I think it was a Trent Poly SU.

relic245

I remember lusting after one of these at the time. 

I think the advertising was so on the money. 

Jeff Beck - someone who I considered to be cool as f**k, sitting on the wheel of a car that also looks cool as f**k, out in the sun and looking like he's having a great time. I just wanted to be him in the picture so obviously wanted the amp too, despite never having heard one and being a bedroom player at the time. 

Amazingly after reading this thread, I still want one even though I'm hearing they weren't that good and had reliabilty issues. The power of advertising!

richardhomer

I played a gig with Arlen Roth who used one at the time (1984). It was Boogie-like heavy and ‘very’ loud.

The tone he got (using as ESP T-style guitar) was thick and rich in an almost Soldano type way. I’ve no idea what modules he used - but I felt it was too driven, dark and compressed compared to his recorded tone. 

Not sure this helps particularly!

welshboyo

There’s one on eBay......

ToneControl

have you seen the Randall approach

ToneControl

I liked the H+K half rack ones
there were 4 models

ToneControl

PhilKing

I like the old H&K units

Redlester

I believe the famous Jerry Donahue Channel 4 ‘Equinox’ clip had him play through one of the combos. 

Ossyrocks

And.......there's a Seymour Duncan Convertible just appeared on ebay if anyone wants to give one a punt.

No affiliation.