Busking harp amps ?
Thu, 01/11/2018 - 14:19
Hi Skip
I hope you are well
I wan to street busk on harp but i tried a Roland cube..
i found acoustic wise soudn is good but feedsback if i stand too close.
I can work with that but .... is there a battery powered amp for busking that you woudl recommend for harp?
to get a slightly more distorted sound?
(the reason why I ask is because i got loads of feedback and "squeel" when using the built in "sounds" of the rolan cube - unless i was using only the clean channel (it's for guitar so im guessing they aren't relevant to harmonica ?)
Do you have any advice maybe?
thanks in advance
regards
Julien
UK
Hello Julian- Thanks for writing. You have a tough problem there. That groovy old "dirty" harp sound is easy to get with an old tube amp, but it is going to be a lot harder with a solid state battery-powered amp!
The most popular busking amps are probably the the Roland, the Mouse and Moose amps, and the Pignose. They aren't ideal for harp but offer the best solution. You could experiment with distortion pedals but remember that my man Rick Estrin and other harp-gods can get a cool dirty sound with no amp at all! Keep working on it!
One more good guy to ask would be Adam Gussow at Modern Blues Harmonica. He has spent a lot of time playing on the street.