Vintage Intersound IVP Instrument Preamp

A Vintage Intersound IVP Instrument Preamp

There are giant fans of this and then those that just don’t get it. Steve Albini and The Grateful Dead are famous for having this as part of their rigs.

The rig is actually supposed to be a pretty transparent instrument preamp, but with a great range of EQ manipulation and some voice switching.
If you’re a fan of Albini and the tones he gets with his own music, then you’ve maybe been wondering how he gets the tone he does, or even looking for one of these. There are other factors of course in how he gets that tone, but I’ve seen this used as a distortion going into even the simplest of solid state amps and it getting something that sounds awesome.

This vintage piece probably falls into that bracket of "cool piece of gear at not much cost that can set your tone apart from the rest". We’re also sure that there are far more tonal shaping uses for it than just that.
Initially designed to help shape tone before amps had that level of control, it provides a four band EQ with a variable “center” and a peak LED, an effects loop and a unique “Tube” voicing that certainly gives you everything from velvety clipping all the way through some pretty hard compressed overdrive.

This one came out of a pretty busy home studio and at some point in the distant past it has had a solid, albeit DIY, transformer replacement. We’re not sure of the story behind this, other than it works great.
The unit is old and dirty, so don’t be expecting pristine. Some of the pots are a little scratchy, but really will only need a little cleaner sprayed into them.
We like to think that somewhere along the line a Big Black inspired teenage band used to rip it up in grotty punk clubs around the nation, with sweat corroding the rack mounts and the front panel, with beer soaked and bloody guitar mangled hands adjusting the controls…

…”Ewwww!”, you say, or “Mojo!”? - We say MOJO! …and in spades

Ask, if you have questions, but this is a difficult one and we might not have all the answers.