Fender 1963 Vibroverb Brown Face

    Right now Im at home, I checked my logbook. and can indeed clarify
    the V&R is a 63 Brownface, as where I was getting confused with the BF twin Verb I did recently, no idea why, as its a totalllllllly different amp!... (one of those days so dont ask, lol hey I have so many amps here that it gets confusing fast)
    The RI VirbroKing is in Pack 2 - there All cleared up :)
    wow!. I profiled it like 4 months ago, have I really forgotten since then!. im getting old fast

    And thats great, so I have played a Brownie! lol

    Quote from Fender

    There is a very good article from Udo Pipper about the holy grail 1963 fender vibroverb and reissue 2 in den german journal Gitarre&Bass (edition february and march 2013 ).
    According to this there are over 500 exemplars of the brownface vibroverb all over the world.
    Mark Knopfler is playing a brown face vibroverb.

    Pipper oh well, don't get me started about that guy ;)

    Knopfler uses a brownface Vibroverb in recent times. But the legendary brownface Fender he did the first Dire Straits albums with, was actually a Vibrolux. It was cosmetically changed (they added the Fender logo on the front, as a Vibroverb would have but not the smaller Vibrolux or Deluxe). And it is believed to already have non-original speakers of unknown orignin when he got it in 1978. Other than that it is prolly much the same amp And44 profiled in the latest pack. Try that with a strat and you should be hard pressed NOT to sound like Sultans of Swing ;)

    Going by the pictures from Andy's facebook page, that '63 Vibrolux is really a brownface. Knob style, tolex and grill cloth match. The color of the faceplate is odd though. Could also be a blackface chassis transplanted in an earlier cab and the knobs changed to match the style.

    The only way to be sure is to look inside the amp and look for the circuit designation. Usually it's on the so called tube chart in the cabinet but if the housing is not original to the amp that wouldn't mean anything as it's the chart from a different amp then. So only a picture of the actual circuit would really help to decide it it's a brownface or not.

    going OT slightly, but a question about Dire Straits, he was known for swapping chassis for his fenders, and a lot of the time was to keep endorsments happy on stage (least thats how I gather it) - But the "brothers in arms" Ive been told he used a Virbolux, and also a Mesa Boogie Mark 2B - I didnt even give this a thought, untill I heard it in a conversation from another studio producer, so made me think.. was this the case? and did he use the Boogie?

    Back on topic again now.
    I didnt open the amp to see if it is or not, I cant do that for lots of reasons. - I just get told what they are, and pay for them. I try to find history on the amp itself, (the particular one) - and on many of these Vintage amps, from the V&R pack, And the latest pack 4, very famous folk have used them, or owned them, but I cant speak too much about that as its not documented anywhere for proof, so I never mention it.. untill now.. daaaa daaa! - err, not that t makes any difference, sadly its the player playing it not the one who used it last that matters!

    Quote from and44

    going OT slightly, but a question about Dire Straits, he was known for swapping chassis for his fenders, and a lot of the time was to keep endorsments happy on stage (least thats how I gather it) - But the "brothers in arms" Ive been told he used a Virbolux, and also a Mesa Boogie Mark 2B - I didnt even give this a thought, untill I heard it in a conversation from another studio producer, so made me think.. was this the case? and did he use the Boogie?

    I know he used the Vibrolux intensively on the first two Dire Straits albums. The amp is said to be all original except for the Speakers. They are Sound City labeled and could be Fanes.

    Don't know about the Vibrolux on "Borthers in arms", but I am very positive about the Boogie. He has gotten one shortly before the recordings and I remember he even was listed as an endorser back then. When we were kids and that record came out we all thought it was Boogie all over. Ironically the most iconic songs of that record - "brothers in arms" and "money for nothing" - were tadaaa: A '66 Marshall JTM 45 and a matching cab from the same period although it is not known which speakers it has. Guy Fletcher believes they are EV12Ls other people think it still has the original G12M25 greenies. Mark still has that amp and cab and uses it until today. Here is a picture of that very amp during the sessions for the "Get Lucky" album:

    [Blocked Image: http://www.mk-guitar.com/wp-content/upl…shall-jtm45.jpg]

    If you look closely you can see his settings (for the song "before gas and TV" or maybe for "So far from the clyde"). See how far he turned down the bass? And he jumped channels in good british tradition. If you dial in a JTM 45 with that settings you end up with the brothers in arms sound no matter what ;) I've done that many times with JTMs and this settings even work with the tiny Marshall Class 5 combo ;)

    Here's the absolute best source of everything Mark Knopfler related:

    http://www.mk-guitar.com

    The site is maintained by Ingo Raven. I know Ingo for a very long time and he is probably the #1 Knopfler affinicado worldwide. He has researched pretty much anything, knows all available interviews and articles with the man himself, engineers of records, guitar techs or the guys from Chandler in London who painted Marks famous strat red... Ingo knows them all!

    Quote


    Back on topic again now.
    I didnt open the amp to see if it is or not, I cant do that for lots of reasons. - I just get told what they are, and pay for them. I try to find history on the amp itself, (the particular one) - and on many of these Vintage amps, from the V&R pack, And the latest pack 4, very famous folk have used them, or owned them, but I cant speak too much about that as its not documented anywhere for proof, so I never mention it.. untill now.. daaaa daaa! - err, not that t makes any difference, sadly its the player playing it not the one who used it last that matters!

    It would be very intersting to know some of the names though ;) But I do understand that you can't disclose them in public. Too much possible hassle. I mean we at least know we have Gilmours personal Hiwatt and playing a solo from "The Wall" on that profile makes my pants wet. I really wondered how you get your hands on Davids Hiwatt? I guess he ownes it still, no? Does he know it's been profiled?

    I mean isn't that unbelievable? We talk about the circuits and details of decades old amps because we are able to capture every nuance of it with the KPA. Fantastic times for guitarists!

    One final note regarding the Vibrolux in the R&V pack:

    It must be a brownface as the blackface version had two bright switches and the faceplate looks much different accordingly.

    Other pictures of that amp I found on the net show the same very dark color of the frontplate and the knobs. They are much darker than I remember the color of my brown Deluxe but that dark color seems consistent for a Vibrolux for whatever reason.

    wow thanks for that post! salute your knowledge, and that site ive bookmarked for a later read, as Im digging knofflers stuff right now for some reason or another.
    And yes the bass is always rolled off on those amps, as all the JTM's and even some JMP's always are bass heavy, and ten times worse when you really crank them through a loud 4x12.

    And so the rumers were true about his boogie days then, thats great to know.

    regarding The amps I get, well Ive told you before than Im fortunately a well connected guy, so this means a big chain of well know branded amps sitting in studios and on tour vans across the UK :)

    Gilmours amp was the one he used on the wall & Darkside albums, that was recorded at (insert studio name) - then the studio auctioned off all its amps. gilmour always kept this amp and documented the serial number, and made it his own for 5 years, but live meant new endorsements from hiwatt and along came new amps a custom to his needs at that time. - since that day, the gilmour hiwatt has not been touched just been left as it was, as if it was yesterday he used it. - needles to say, I profiled it and now its ours for keeps. - (never been able to say that about an amp before). its traditional gilmour setup on the amp irtsef if you look at the pics of it. such a classic.

    Speaking of Knopfler and his Vibrolux:

    Here he is at home playing a '54 Strat over that old Vibrolux (you can see the non-original Fender logo identifying the amp):

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=990GRjtnkDc

    I took my maple neck strat and loaded your "AFV-63 Vibrolux Crank" Rig.

    I will be damned if that doesn't sound spot on. Works best with vintage 50s style pickups.

    That Vibrolux profile is out of this world.

    As a side note: The KPA is the only device that captures that very special glassy but still warm top end of vintage Fenders. Heck, even the modern reissues can't do that (I believe it's a matter of the speakers and the tubes - you just can't get new tubes that work really good in some Fender circuits). I had the original tubes in my Deluxe and when I sold it the buyer did retube the amp. He says the amp has lost it's magic on that day.

    Getting that sound back alone was worth the price of the KPA for me.