That Sound!

[William2]

I know virtually nothing about amplification. I do love the sound of, and archtop amplified but played basically without any of the sound effects possible with electric guitars. Does one have to spend a fortune to get a sound like this? I'm attaching a short video of the type of sound I like. The player in the video is using a relatively inexpensive Godin instrument. He doesn't say what he is playing through, however. Is the sound quality basically an amplification thing?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VV9-exn71A

[Queequeg]

You can get a good clean, "dry" sound, (no effects) from many amps.
Most of the sound(s) we associate with electric guitars are sweetened or filtered with effects which are too numerous to list here but you'll recognize them as fuzz, delay, wah, chorus, flanger, phaser, vibrato, tremolo, countless more...

There's a number of acoustic guitar amps on the market designed to deliver a clean sound to approximate that of an acoustic instrument.
Fishman makes a number of them which get good reviews- Loud Box (in at least 3 sizes) and the Fishman 'SA330x Performance Audio System' which is kind of a tower with multiple inputs, and achieves a pretty good acoustic unfiltered signal.
Fender makes the Acoustasonic (not my favorite). The sky's the limit price-wise. Hughs & Kettner for around $1000. Lots of boutique hand made amps.
A lot of guys like to use a keyboard amp or a bass amp because they are generally really clean/absent the overdrive filters you get with electric guitar amps.

[William2]

Thank you for this information.

[Queequeg]

I just listened to that Godin played by Mason Razavi DARN THAT DREAM you linked.
I believe he's got a bit of reverb going on there.
Not too much. Just right, IMO.

[William2]

I just listened to that Godin played by Mason Razavi DARN THAT DREAM you linked.
I believe he's got a bit of reverb going on there.
Not too much. Just right, IMO.

Thank you. I will check this out again. Is there a different type of amp required for an acoustic guitar verses an archtop instrument? These kind of tunes and arrangements constitute a large part of my playlist. I'm not a jazz player but when I can get an arrangement like this, I add it to my repertoire. I'm thinking about this Godin instrument. It isn't very expensive, I like its looks, and if an amp to make this sound isn't too expensive, I might do this. Godin does make this as a lefty instrument.

[Queequeg]

I've seen archtop jazz players use a wide variety of amplifiers, including those designed for electric guitars such as small Fenders. Low wattage is best. You're not playing a colosseum.
I just did a search on jazz amps and I ran across this bit of advice I believe to be true:

How to get jazz tone on your amp?

Turn off your effects, set all your EQ knobs to the middle, and set your amp to a clean channel (if you have one). Jazz guitar tone is usually very simple and clean...

Here's a video you might find useful, William.
His Gibson L5 is one of the top shelf guitars favored by decades of jazz guitarists. He's playing through a Quilter Labs Aviator.
(Note that he has his reverb dialed in at about 10 o'clock)

And here's the Quilter amplifier page & prices

[teh]

Three years ago, I bought a used Fishman Loudbox Mini in good condition, at a local brick and mortar store. During their three day sale and using an additional discount coupon I bought the amp for $169 plus tax. I can run a guitar and a vocal microphone at the same time. I can also run my i-pad or I-phone through the amp and play music. Lots of flexibility.

A new Fishman Loudbox will cost more but there are used ones out there.

I had a factory installed Anthem dual source no cut pickup in one of my Larrivees and an L.R. Baggs I-beam pickup in another. I also have a Fishman Humbucking soundhole pickup to use in my other acoustics. I've also purchased a delay pedal and a looping pedal that I'm still figuring out how to use. I can also use my Apple laptop and speakers along with a set of headphones that I can run through my computer.

I do like the look of the new Taylor acoustic amplifier that was recently introduced it at $1,200 it's bit pricey for me.

[B0WIE]

 Amps all sweeten and color the sound in their own way. They do not have flat frequency responses even when they are "clean" amps, so you have to find the style that works for you. If you want something small, I am very partial to the classic Fender Princeton sound. It's responsive, chimey in the top, growly in the bass, and has just enough smoothing to not sound harsh.

 Plugged-in acoustic and jazz guitars are very different things in terms of tone. The acoustic tone needs to have the high frequency extension to sound like an acoustic. Chimey and bright. With jazz, you typically want the highs dampened a bit for a smoother, more buttery tone.

[William2]

Thanks for all the information, everybody. I was thinking of getting this guitar as an inexpensive archtop. However, after watching this review on You Tube where a dealer really trashed the instrument, I got so turned off I've decided to just stick to acoustic instruments. I'll keep what I've learned here in case I decide to try this again in the future.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fAs_kIFvMk

[jpmist]

Thanks for all the information, everybody. I was thinking of getting this guitar as an inexpensive archtop. However, after watching this review on You Tube where a dealer really trashed the instrument, I got so turned off I've decided to just stick to acoustic instruments. I'll keep what I've learned here in case I decide to try this again in the future.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fAs_kIFvMk

Baffling video! Sure, lets review a guitar on a video site by not offering a sample of how it sounds? Yikes!

[William2]

Baffling video! Sure, lets review a guitar on a video site by not offering a sample of how it sounds? Yikes!

LOL!!!!

[Queequeg]

Baffling video! Sure, lets review a guitar on a video site by not offering a sample of how it sounds? Yikes!

Equally as baffling to me: after throwing shade at this guitar for 6+ minutes he says it's up for sale and "any interest, feel free to message me." 
Just to add that I ordered one of these 5th Aveue archtops when they first came on the market, strictly acoustic- no p/u's and no Bigsby of course. It's the only guitar I ever shipped back; returned within a week. It was just completely devoid of any top resonance with zero sustain. And I like Godin. In fact I have a nylon string Godin Multiac Mundial which I like very much indeed and play it most every day.
I figured I just got the rare dud 5th Avenue and that any other one they had shipped would have been OK.

[jpmist]

Just to add that I ordered one of these 5th Aveue archtops when they first came on the market, strictly acoustic- no p/u's and no Bigsby of course. It's the only guitar I ever shipped back; returned within a week. It was just completely devoid of any top resonance with zero sustain.

I scratch my head about archtops. My one and only experience was with an ancient Gibson 300ES I grew up with that had a 1/4" thick plywood top, back and sides plus a floating saddle that pressed down only slightly with the string ball ends offering sound vibration through the trapeze tailpiece to the thickest and least receptive tail block part of the guitar. I honestly don't get why they're still in play over bridge pin saddled acoustics. I suppose these were literally designed for the 40"s big band era to be rhythm guitars that wouldn't come close to drowning out the horns.

For such a huge heavy guitar it was quieter than my OOs, considerably brighter and had no resonance I could discern. Apologies to all the archtop fans out there, but my take is that current ones require pickups to make up for the lack of string vibration they offer. My take is that anyone used to more modern acoustics with pin bridges has to considerably lower their expectations on archtop tone. It's a whole different thing. . .

All IMHO of course! It certainly could be that my one experience with them was a poor example of what archtops can offer. Your mileage may vary 

[William2]

Equally as baffling to me: after throwing shade at this guitar for 6+ minutes he says it's up for sale and "any interest, feel free to message me." 
Just to add that I ordered one of these 5th Aveue archtops when they first came on the market, strictly acoustic- no p/u's and no Bigsby of course. It's the only guitar I ever shipped back; returned within a week. It was just completely devoid of any top resonance with zero sustain. And I like Godin. In fact I have a nylon string Godin Multiac Mundial which I like very much indeed and play it most every day.
I figured I just got the rare dud 5th Avenue and that any other one they had shipped would have been OK.

WOW! A couple months ago I was considering a nylon string lefty. AGF had nothing bad to say about Godin classicals. It was between the Godin and the Cordoba C-10.  Godin only offers lefties in Cedar and mahogany. The C-10 had cedar and rosewood. I couldn't decide and decides to stick with acoustics. Too bad about the Godin archtop.

[Queequeg]

WOW! A couple months ago I was considering a nylon string lefty. AGF had nothing bad to say about Godin classicals. It was between the Godin and the Cordoba C-10.  Godin only offers lefties in Cedar and mahogany. The C-10 had cedar and rosewood. I couldn't decide and decides to stick with acoustics. Too bad about the Godin archtop.

Well, the Godin Multiac Mundial hardly qualifies as a classical guitar. It's all solid cedar but it looks like a telecaster. I bought it for playing out.
I'm very pleased with it.

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/MultiMunAB--godin-multiac-mundial-nylon-acoustic-electric-guitar-arctik-blue

[Silence Dogood]

I recently got a Guild hollowbody electric and a small Vox Pathfinder amp. No effects.  Something like $119 and an absolutely killer clean tone.  I don't play out anywhere and dont need a large amp. I do also have a nice reverb pedal I run with it.  It nails a 50s jazzy/bluesy tone that I really like.  There is also a gain knob and overdrive button.  I like to dial in the gain on the clean setting to fatten things up.  Works great for me. YMMV.