1967 VOX AC100 (DI)

This is a late JMI-era VOX AC100 mk.II. If you know your Vox amplifiers' history then you know these amps are what the big guys all played in the 60s. The AC50 was developed in collaboration with the Beatles to get above the sound of screaming fans. The AC100 was Vox's final answer which aided the likes of The Kinks, Rolling Stones, Yardbirds, Peter Green and of course, The Beatles. The Mk. I originally shipped with a quartet of cathode-biased EL34s which actually only generated 80W as opposed to the 100W the fixed-bias Mk.IIs achieve. It features two ECC82s,(12AU7s) known for their much cleaner response than the ECC83s (12AX7s) as the aim of this amp was purely to get the loudest clean signal possible. The result is that the amplifier largely sounds the same right until the final third of the volume control. At which point the bass and treble controls can take the amp anywhere from a pokey early Marshall sound all the way to power amp fuzz and vintage edge of breakup (included here). This particular example is from right before the original owners of Vox, Jenning's Musical Industries (JMI) went bust in 1968. These heads were originally paired with Vox stacks featuring two Midax horns, though we didn't have a matching cabinet around so instead we thought it best to capture this head just as a DI in order to let it be experimented with different cabinets. I was using my favourite Marshall 4x12 Impulse Response, which will be included in an upcoming IR package... This exact amplifier was provided and can be purchased from the Vintage Amporium in Southampton, UK. If you're interested then get in touch via their link! captured at Blue Bell Hill Studios, Kent by Clay Bennett. Send Level is 18dBu - most interfaces will require nam modeller to turn down by ~6dB on the input.