In my quest for the ultimate chunky tone for the guitar, I got greedy and over did it. I bought these power tubes that were rated for a lower volume so I could pump more signal into them, and in result, drive them guys into breakup. One day, while fearlessly turning that volume knob up and loving the grunt of it all, the amp dropped its volume for a second, then came back up. Now whenever I turn up the volume with the gain all the way down, it produces a terrible noise. I await a pair of power tubes that are rated for longevity and have good tone. I will be taking it into the pros for a repair.

I put my valve boost back on the bass and during my knob fiddling, I found a great sound. Just as an overdrive works, when I dig in, breakup happens. This being a bass, the breakup scared me. It sounded just like my speaker was blown out. So much so, I ran it through the trouble shooting paces. Nope, speaker is fine. This is the sound I want. It also supports my idea that bass should be played without compression. It’s not a tool anymore, it’s an instrument. However, I may put a transparent compressor with a very high threshold to keep them crazy woofs from dominating too much.