NAD that didn't happen

**nobozos** · 12.21.18, 10:18 AM

I came across a killer deal in my local guitar shop. It was a Fender Deluxe Reverb Reissue that had been gutted and redone by Torres engineering with the Hand Wired PTP setup. It had new Trannys and a Weber speaker. Basically, $1400 in mods done to a $1100 amp, being sold for $1200.

I had been wanting a Deluxe Reverb Reissue for a while, and this was too good not to consider. Being this close to Christmas though, I was going to have to Trade for it. What I worked out was, My 5150 LBXII head and 2x12 cab, plus my upgraded Mexi-Strat and $300. Considering what I was trading for, I felt like that was fair.

I'm lucky enough to have the kind of relationship with this Music Shop where they let me take the amp home to demo it for a night before I made my decision, which I did. Once at home, I plugged in my pedal board to it and set my tone. On my pedal board, I have a 5150 Overdrive and a Fly Rig 5. I use the Fly Rig 5 for the Plexi part of the pedal in front of the amp, and the 5150 Overdrive to give me a different gain structure than my 5150 LBXII Blue channel. In front of the DRRI, it sounded great, particularly through the "Normal" channel.

I unplugged the DRRI, and hooked up my LBXII again to A/B the sound, and I discovered something kind of cool. The tone I was getting from the Green channel on my LBXII, and the Normal channel on the DRRI were very, VERY similar. I mean, close enough to be not very significant at all. Aside from the reverb on the DRRI, the two are very close. I'm not sure if the Green channel was somewhat modeled after the DRRI, but there really wasn't much noticeable difference.

Anyway, this got me seriously thinking. Once I got over the excitement of the idea of having a legit hand wired PTP DRRI, I started thinking practically about what I was getting ready to do. I was about to give the music store money, a guitar and a 5150 amp, in order to get an amp that I was going to make sound like a 5150 for like 95% of what I play. Then, I add the wrinkle of the 5150 LBXII clean channel being so similar to the DRRI sound that it really didn't matter. I had that moment of clarity where I was like, "This just doesn't make any sense."

Needless to say, I took the DRRI back to the music shop and thanked them for letting me demo it at home, and told them that I would be hanging onto my current gear. They were totally cool with it, and understood what I was saying. I guess at the end of the day, although I would have liked to have owned the amp, I would rather see it go to someone who would be using that amp's tone for it's intended purpose and appreciate all the work that had been done to it.

**clawedmonet** · 12.21.18, 12:09 PM

Good for you: I like this story a lot. I got into surf rock a few years ago and did some similar stuff to get the classic Fender tone. Got the Mexi-Strat and tried a bunch of amps and pedals. All I kept was the Topanga reverb. Today, I just turn the volume down a little bit on my EVH guitars and still run everything through my LBX. Your comments about the LBX II make me think that should be next purchase!

I even put a mini humbucker SD '78 in the Mexi-Strat because I didn't like the tone. Overall, I'm always surprised by the versatility of the EVH gear.

**nobozos** · 12.22.18, 05:28 AM

Originally Posted by clawedmonet

Good for you: I like this story a lot. I got into surf rock a few years ago and did some similar stuff to get the classic Fender tone. Got the Mexi-Strat and tried a bunch of amps and pedals. All I kept was the Topanga reverb. Today, I just turn the volume down a little bit on my EVH guitars and still run everything through my LBX. Your comments about the LBX II make me think that should be next purchase!

I even put a mini humbucker SD '78 in the Mexi-Strat because I didn't like the tone. Overall, I'm always surprised by the versatility of the EVH gear.

You should try a Seymour Duncan Perpetual Burn.

**clawedmonet** · 12.23.18, 08:16 PM

I’ll check it out. Thanks!

**evhintexas** · 12.28.18, 06:23 PM

Originally Posted by clawedmonet

Good for you: I like this story a lot. I got into surf rock a few years ago and did some similar stuff to get the classic Fender tone. Got the Mexi-Strat and tried a bunch of amps and pedals. All I kept was the Topanga reverb. Today, I just turn the volume down a little bit on my EVH guitars and still run everything through my LBX. Your comments about the LBX II make me think that should be next purchase!

I even put a mini humbucker SD '78 in the Mexi-Strat because I didn't like the tone. Overall, I'm always surprised by the versatility of the EVH gear.

I have 2 MIM Strats---the pickups truly suck...No way in Hell I would use them for anything except complete overhall….

**ArtyBoy** · 12.28.18, 06:37 PM

Originally Posted by evhintexas

I have 2 MIM Strats---the pickups truly suck...No way in Hell I would use them for anything except complete overhall….

The old MIM Strats had ceramic pickups. The new Player series have alnicos (I think they're alnico 5?) just like the American ones. Same tremolos, too. It's going to be exciting when they start hitting the used market.

**PrideofPasadena** · 12.28.18, 11:05 PM

Love to have one as well but I don't think I coulda gave all that up either.
Not that it wasn't fair...just tough to do that.

**clawedmonet** · 12.29.18, 05:30 PM

Yeah, I didn’t like the distortion with the MIM pickups, even through the original LBX. They did the classic Dick Dale tone pretty well, but I got bored of it pretty quickly.

**nobozos** · 12.31.18, 08:56 AM

I outfitted my MIM Strat with Texas Specials in the Neck and Middle, and a Dimarzio Injector in the Bridge position. The Injector balances fairly well with the Texas Specials, but sounds great on 10 with distortion, and without the 60 cycle hum. Actually, I've loaned it to a buddy of mine who may be buying it. I replaced the old block bridge saddles with Fender bent steel saddles, and replaced the zinc trem block with a Dragonfire Steel block. It's a tone monster for a MIM.