Amp's Scooped Tones?

Bellycaster

As I've been looking for which beauty to add to my amp collection later this year, I keep reading about Fenders and Vox and a whole load of others as I'm undecided. I read a lot of people(not on here) describe Fender and Vox as having Scooped Tones.

I would never have said that, but maybe I don't understand properly, I always thought "Chimey" and "Sparkly" where the main adjectives used 

If I scoop the mids on my amps, they don't sound very Voxy or Fendery, so what's it all about with the Scooped tones?

Is it down to Output Valves? Fenders tend to use 6L6 and Vox tend to use EL 84.

Explain?

Cheers.

jellyroll

Scoop -> Ice Cream -> Ben & Jerry -> Tom & Jerry -> Tom Tom The Piper's Son -> Piper At the Gates of Dawn -> Pink Floyd -> Dave Gilmour -> Fenderrrrrrrrrr. Simples. 

Dave_Mc

I dunno if I'd call voxes scooped

and it tends to be blackface fenders which are scooped, I think

others will know more than me, though.

ICBM

Blackface/Silverface Fenders are fairly scooped. Tweed Fenders and Voxes definitely aren't.

bingefeller

I think the reason Fenders are Vox amps sound the way they do, and have a scooped EQ, is to do with the specific EQ frequencies that are scooped.  Your amp probably isn't scooping out the right EQ to make it sound Fender or Vox.

Bellycaster

bingefeller said:

I think the reason Fenders are Vox amps sound the way they do, and have a scooped EQ, is to do with the specific EQ frequencies that are scooped.  Your amp probably isn't scooping out the right EQ to make it sound Fender or Vox.

Probably a bad explanation by me in the O.P @bingefeller ;

I don't want to scoop my tone, I like Mids, I'm just confused at why some people state that Fender and Vox have "Scooped" tones. Maybe it's my lack of experience in how amps perform live with cutting through the mix.

The "If I scoop the mids my Amp" was just a statement of comparison.

I think I just twigged there, are these people on about how amps cut through live? My Amps don't let me down with mids live, I'm running a Mesa with 6L6's, it's great live, so is my Bogner running 6V6's.

I guess I'm just confused with the generalization.

ThePrettyDamned

I definitely don't find vox amps scooped - they're bright and have an upper midrangey sound, not huge on a whumpy bottom end. 

Fender blackface amps have a huge bass, bright treble and not much else. Lovely for bouncy cleans. 

Dave_Mc

ICBM said:

Blackface/Silverface Fenders are fairly scooped. Tweed Fenders and Voxes definitely aren't.

yeah that's what i thought

ICBM

To be super-accurate pedantic , no guitar amps are really that scooped - and especially not open-back combos. None of them have any real top-end response, and very few other than those with heavily-built closed cabs any true bass.

The differences are more that some are *all* midrange, and others have a sort of double-hump EQ curve with more lower and upper mids than mid-mids - the Fender Blackface EQ is a perfect example of the latter and was deliberately designed with a heavy mid cut to make the amps sound as 'flat response' as possible given the severe limitations of the speakers and combo cabinets.

Dave_Mc

haha yeah i guess that makes sense.