Tweed or Black Face

[crisp flan]

I always thought the standard Fender sound was pretty much a 70's twin, until recently that is. I think difference between the 50's tweed amps and 60's black face amps is quite radical considering same valve types were used throughout models such as the Bassman. Your classic 59 Bassman is pretty much now used as a guitar amp, although some bassists love the sound, but the 70's black face Bassmans are pretty much used bass amps, just a wee example to kick off.
I'm undecided, Tweed or Blackface. What's you favorite of the two and why?

[Yellowclaws]

It's got to be the old Tweed Deluxe. Neil Young in a box. Lightweight but still loud enough for live rock ggs.
It's a Leo Fender classic that the crazy Brits have forgotten all about.

[BillPickle]

Fender Tweed Bassman for that ultimate clean fender tone 

[Tube Guy]

Has to be Blackface for the tighter bottom end and that spikey treble. Pure Keef!

[hef]

deffo blackface. tighter bite and brighter sparkle.

[anthonym]

I run various Strats through a tweed Bassman and love the tone. Looking forward to trying it out with a treble booster soon....

[ziess]

All depends. There's no standard tweed or blackface sound really. I mean, a blackface can sound spiky with a nice low end but the mids you can get of a cathode followed tonestack in an 'F'-series tweed sound great too and can get plenty of twang going with the use of the Presence knob. Even within the lower powered tweeds there's a ton of variation. Neil Young's guitar sound is completely unlike the tweed Champ on Johnny Cash's 'Walk the Line' but the amps are of the same era. Strangely, the 5E3 lacks negative feedback while the later model champs have it.
You say blackface sounds like Keith Richards? What era? He used a lot of frankly dodgy amps are various points (solid state Voxes anyone?) and still got good sounds. His current stage rig apparently consists of two high-power tweed Twin-Amps (which is almost a transitional amp, along with the '57-60 Bassman, between the tweed circuits and the blackfaces).
As far as the traditional "Fender Clean®" then any of the mid-'60s blackface reverbs will do (they're all the same basic circuit after all). If that's what you're looking for pay particular attention to the AB763 reverb models ('64-'66 ish depending on the model).

Clearly, five amps is the way forward!

Tommy.

[Tube Guy]

Hi Tommy,
Wow, top post! I'm a big Johnny Cash fan but didn't know that it was the good old tweed deluxe on the recordings. You're dead right about needing loads of amps. There is no single amp solution for all the great tones and most have some nagging drawback you wish they didn't have. I've never met a guitarist yet that wasn't blown away by a tweed deluxe but then they moan about the lack of headroom. You can't have it all!
I'm off to read up on 60's Fenders.

 

[ziess]

Hey, as far as I'm aware it's a Champ on the early stuff  (and most of the early stuff recorded at Sun). I didn't word that particularly well! You can get appreciably close with a Deluxe though. I mean, you can get appreciably close with a late tweed Bassman if you turn it up loud enough! Sadly not enough venues that let you do that around here...
I try to have an amp for all occasions though;
Going from quiet to loud, a 5E3 tweed Deluxe with Weber 12F150 speaker, blackface Deluxe Reverb with a 12A125, 5G9 tweed Tremolux, 5F6A tweed Bassman and the beast that is the 80-watt '62 6G8 blonde Twin-Amp (a real one dontchaknow, had it shipped from Florida).
I built them all except the Twin which is an original.

Speaker choice is everything when you're trying to dial in an amp if you ask me.
Don't know if you have a tweed Deluxe but I can only recommend an efficent ceramic speaker in it. Something of the Jensen C12N variety (stay away from the reissues though) like the Weber 12F150 or the Eminence Red Fang works just the treat. Raises the headroom to the just-right-for-a-small-gig point unless you've Keith Moon in your band.
On my Deluxe Reverb clone that I built I run a 12A125 speaker (clone of the P12Q). Makes the amp compress a lot quicker and with the negative feedback switch I put in the ground switch hole it sounds a lot like a big tweed Deluxe when cranked despite the fixed bias and plate-fed full tonestack. Turned down a bit (yeah, I've been known to do that too!) and with the -fb engaged it still does the blackface thing up to a reasonable volume.

In short, a great amp is a great amp and all great amps sound great doing different things, that's what's so good about them!

Hmm, went a bit off track there, never mind!

Best,
Tommy.