Fender Concert (Concert II) - Modded for High Gain!

Fender Concert 1x12 Combo Amp - Modified for high gain on channel two!

Sometimes referred to as the Concert II, this is a early eighties Fender amp that was designed by Paul Rivera. These were the last of the eyelet board style amps to come out of fender. It has two switchable channels and reverb.

This particular example has had several great modifications. Some were done by a previous owner and most were done by me.

Mods done by previous owner (that I kept):

-The presence control was moved to the rear panel and a master volume was installed. I believe it was a Torres kit. It is essentially the same MV that was used on some Orange amps like the Orange Hustler. It's my favorite master volume design because it does not load down the preceding or following gain stages so I left it alone.

-A switch to disable the negative feedback was installed. When the switch is on the NFB circuit is stock. When it is off the NFB is bypassed and presence control is disabled. It makes things a little looser, more raw.

Work I have done (High quality components throughout):

-The stock Fender POS speaker was replaced with a Celestion Vintage 30. (If you want the original speaker I will include it.)

-All of the electrolytic capacitors were replaced. This is regular maintenance and not a mod per se but some were given upgraded values.

-New power tubes were installed.

-Bias circuit was upgraded with a variable bias pot (internal) and the failure prone 47 ohm resistor was replaced with larger wattage one.

-Channel one (clean) was changed to blackface pre-amp specs. Changed the bright cap configuration to be just like vintage fender. Also separated V1 so that one triode feeds channel one and the other feeds channel two. The result is the nice warm chimey clean that you'd expect from a classic Fender.

-Channel two is where it gets interesting. The arrangement and voicing of channel two's gainstages were altered substantially. The stock Concert II's unused triode was put into service as a cathode follower feeding a Marshall voiced tone stack. The voicing of the three remaining gainstages is controlled by two toggle switches on the rear control panel. In 'Vintage' mode the pre-amp topology is basically a modified JCM800 circuit. Great for throaty low gain and crunch. 'Modern' mode puts you in Soldano SLO territory. Killer high gain tones are available. The 'Lean / Mean' switch sends it all even more over the top.

This really is a Best of Both Worlds amplifier here. Beautiful Fender cleans with solid overdrive and distortion! An amazing tone monster.

(I'll try to get a demo up later this week.)