How about them old H|H amps?

[Pacafeliz]

Yeah i know about the (amazing) Marc Bolan connection... but what about the amps themselves?

I know they are early solid-state, which mustn't be a bad things considering the fans of old Roland and Sunn amps.
They seem to pop up over here quite often, but i've never seen one onstage so far.

Good? Bad?

[stevejamsecono]

There's some wonderful old threads about them from a few years ago. Unfortunately "HH" is hard to search with the current engine on the forum. They're out there, though!

[Pacafeliz]

...Spacemen 3

[zhivago]

Excellent amps...when I was in my old band, I gigged an MA100 head pretty hard for three years.

[Axeman52]

I have a few HH amps:

two VS Musicians (one combo, one head), an IC100 head and an IC100S head.

Great amps for a particular type of sound, but each have a few foibles and/or design flaws that need to be worked around. I could provide more information but I don't even know where to begin.

What do you want to know?

[eggwheat]

Bauhaus - Daniel Ash, a supremely underrated guitarist, used HH amps almost exclusively for the whole of his career.

Also classic era Buzzcocks.

[Pacafeliz]

I have a few HH amps:

two VS Musicians (one combo, one head), an IC100 head and an IC100S head.

Great amps for a particular type of sound, but each have a few foibles and/or design flaws that need to be worked around. I could provide more information but I don't even know where to begin.

What do you want to know?

thanks!

i'm looking at a VS Musician, pretty damn mint from the original owner.

[Axeman52]

thanks!

i'm looking at a VS Musician, pretty damn mint from the original owner.

Ok.

The VS Musician is not the classic "Bolan" amp and sounds nothing like the earlier models that Bolan used - but it is a really good amp.

The cleans are comparable with JC120 cleans in terms of the immaculate definition and transparency, but with a bit more of a conventional electric guitar voicing, a bit less cold and sterile. The overdrive is very usable too - it's an epoxy covered circuit called "Valve Sound" which I believe is just a MOSFET overdrive. At lower gain levels it is surprisingly smooth and transparent and really does a great "on the edge of breakup" type tone that you don't normally expect to hear from a solid state amp. The characteristic of the distortion is very tube-like, but the response isn't. IMO the amp is better at running on low gain settings with only a small amount of breakup dialed in, but when set like this the dynamic response is identical to the clean sound as the "valve sound" circuit doesn't introduce any sort of compression or limiting that starts to enhance the sustain until it's turned up to the point where it kinda becomes too heavily distorted and the definition is pretty much lost. (think of the usable range as being somewhat similar to that of a cranked blackface fender).

Also, it has a very spacious sounding spring reverb with a very long decay.. switchable voicings, but only the middle setting is really useful - the "light" mode hollows out the midrange too much, the "heavy" mode fills out the midrange too much. The un-labeled setting in the middle is quite a neutral voicing kinda like a Vox AC30 normal channel only with more flexibility thanks to the active EQ.

If you want an amp that's going to give you a thick wall of singing sustain the VS Musician isn't really the right choice - because it wasn't really designed to do that type of distortion. It's a really great amp to use with a slightly overdriven base tone for running pedals into, though, as the "valve sound" stacks nicely with overdrive pedals - just take care not to push the front end of the amp too hard as this can lead to some really muddy distortion. I think my combo actually has some components out of spec as the input is especially fussy about being driven too hard - the head version that I have isn't quite so sensitive, but there's a user on youtube called Jamie Clague who has a demo of his VS Musician combo and said he modified the amp to have a less sensitive input.

The 2nd channel is a more basic channel with just volume, treble and bass. I use this channel on my combo as my main keyboard amp now, it's great for synthesizers.

Hope that helps and isn't information overload

[mynameisjonas]

I used to have a VS Musician, and I really liked it. I used it for both synth and guitar in one of the bands I was in at the time, and it was perfect for that job. Axeman52's description is spot on, the overdrive sounds a lot like a tube amp, but doesn't quite feel like it. I didn't have any problems with hitting the front end of mine, I used to slam it with an MXR Micro Amp, and it sounded fine.

[Pacafeliz]

wow thanks for the extensive info guys!

i mean, i don't need another 2x12, really... but hauling around my 110v (plus step-down converter box) '68 twin reverb isn't a real joy of an idea, either.

and the VS is really clean, used to be a hotel lobby amp. priced at slightly less than 200 i guess i'll have to... right?!

[caliban]

A friend of mine used to have a HH bass amp some years ago, a combo, is what I remember. Sounded good, and he bought it quite cheap.

[Pacafeliz]

here's a pic. the owner says they used to play Fenders, so the HH looked bad in the mix, so he had a silver grille put on it.
looks sharp, doesn't it?

[Axeman52]

That doesn't look like the original cab that a VS Musician combo would be housed in - looks like an early IC100/IC100S cab.

[s_mcsleazy]

HH is a big part of my bass sound. i use 2 old hh cabs with my fender bassman. they have aluminium centre caps and they sound so big. i've repaired a few old hh guitar amps and i'm always impressed by them. my usuall guitar shop has one for sale i'm kinda tempted by when really i need another old ss amp like a hole in the head. however, i say if you can, go for it.

btw, pat. i might have a few questions for ya regarding moving from one country to another. i'll pm you sometime.

[Pacafeliz]

btw, pat. i might have a few questions for ya regarding moving from one country to another. i'll pm you sometime.

i'll help however i can!