JTV kills in club again!

[JTSC777]

Just to balance out some of the negative posts re: our beloved JTV.

Played a 250 seat nice club ladt night and used it all night.Unusual for me as I typically start with one guitar then finish with another.Besides being a great gigging instrument its stability tuning and otherwise make it a killer guitar synth controller.Mine had a GK3 pickup installed when I bought it.

 

Straight ahead jazz standards

Country

Funk

Blues

Alt/ Metal

Beatles

etc...

through a Vox Night Train head and 1x12 cab with a Boss ME70 front end.I also use a Palmer cab sim instead of using a mic on the cab.

 

Cheers to Line 6 for giving us a real working mans tool just as Leo Fender did in the 50s!

 

well done!

[specracer986]

I agree. I never expected my JTV69 to become my #1 guitar. I bought it out of curiosity after seeing a pro player use one at a gig. I wondered what it might add to my Helix experience. It's opened up all kinds of doors for me. I'm looking forward to the next generation of Variax that I hope L6 is working on. I consider them quirky, but I've embraced that. When I play gigs, I see other guitarist looking at me, wondering what the heck I'm playing. I had one ask me why I never change the selector knob. When I told him that was all programmed into my Helix patches, he had a blank stare. The one thing I don't like about it, is it killed most of my gas for other guitars.

[Utah_Cowboy]

I regularly gig with mine, I used to go to gigs with four guitars.  Now, I only take my JTV 89F.  I totally love it, and it has so far been rock solid.  I am glad, because I don't carry a backup.  It has replaced my American Strat as my #1.  I go through a HD 500X and into a Fender Hot Rod DeVille.  Sounds great and allows me to sound more like the original.  We play Country, classic rock, blues and southern rock and I love how I can make my guitar sound more like the original recording.

[amsdenj]

Same experience here. I use a JVT-69S almost exclusively for gigging and my 90's Strat Deluxe is my backup guitar. My '67 Less Paul stays home.

 

I don't love the modeled tones, but they're ok and functional for club gigging. However the magnetic pickups are just fine and is mine is a very playable guitar. Its also quite a bit lighter than my Strat, and that helps an old guy like me.

 

I'm sure its not the greatest tone, but I have to wear ear plugs anyway, so I'm not going to hear that tone one way or another. And the audience probably wouldn't know the difference.

[ADBrown]

 The one thing I don't like about it, is it killed most of my gas for other guitars.

 

A curse and a blessing! 

[JTSC777]

Played a packed out 150 seat venue last night and used my JTV69 with my HD500 and ADA cab simulator into one Alto 10 in powered speaker.When you eliminate the poor cab sims in the HD500 it kills.What a combination.I had a lot of pressure to be sharp right out of the gate and both my Line 6 tools delivered in spades! Loving It! The JTV is an absolute marvel and the tremolo unit is killer.Stays in tune almost perfectly.

[davidgitar]

I bought a JTV-69 earlier in the year hoping to replace 3 or 4 axes I gig with on the occasions I play out. While I do like the feel of the instrument and the sound of the magnetic pups, the models leave somewhat to be desired, at least if you compare them to their real world counterparts. I find that many of the models just do not have natural sustain as one would expect, Maybe I am expecting too much or too much of a noob yet to have unlocked the hidden key to get the sustain out of the models. So at this point, I am a bit disillusioned with it but not to the point I am ready to put it up for sale... yet. Our sound guy says it is not as hot at the output as my partscaster or my les paul special. It is supposedly incompatible tonally through the mains in a live situation with my other guitars. So until I can come up with a substantive way to meaningfully address these differences, it's going to have to remain at home. :(

 

Any suggestions to deal with this situation would be appreciated.

[Rewolf48]

I have not had any problems with sustain on my JTV-69, but that doesn't mean that there isn't something wrong in the set-up of your guitar that isn't killing sustain.

Have you tried using Workbench HD to tweak the JTV? If you are expecting it to be as loud as a Les Paul and quick swap without changing any Amp settings then it needs a boost in output level - you can change the volume of each model and even string using Workbench HD.

[Triryche]

Have you tweaked any of the models in Workbench HD?

 

If not I would recommend reading the manual.

[brue58ski]

You can boost the models in the Variax by 6dB in Workbench if you want to. Globally or individually.

[davidb7170]

I've been gigging with my 59 since 2011 and my 69S since late 2012. Both are beauties. Being a longtime Fender and Strat player, I gravitate to my 69S more, but take both to gigs for broken string contingencies. Use the Helix into an ALTO TS210 (recent purchase) very happy with it all. I changed my 69S pups to DiMarzio Noiseless, as I had been spoiled by HB's on my Epi LP and the Variax 300, then JTV-59.... I use the pups 80 - 90% of the time, but do get good results with the models.

 

One thing I recently bumped into was the less sustain of the models versus mags, and plinkyness of some models' upper strings - usually the bridge pup models were the worst offenders. I was adjusting string volumes and such with HD WB to fight this - helped but didn't cure it. Anyway in balancing out the string volumes and trying to make mags and model volumes more equivalent, I lowered my magnetic pups to lessen the volume on them - usually you try to get the MOST volume out of mags.

 

I'd had the 59 & 69S set up by a Very good guitar tech - intonation, neck relief, etc. Think he probably set up the mags like he would a normal guitar. ANYWay when I recently  lowered the pups on both my 59 & 69S, the plinkyness lessened markedly AND the sustain of the models improved. I believe the models are very sensitive to the magnetic pull of the pickups on the strings...

 

Just an observation. Since I made that adjustment, I've been much more happy with the models in general.

 

My 2 cent's worth...

Dave

[davidgitar]

Thanks everybody for your input.

 

I am admittedly a noob when it comes to the JTV-69S and to be perfectly honest, haven't had a lot of time to learn Workbench HD much less study the manual. I did give it a look when I received the guitar just to learn how to operate it but that was pretty much the extent of it. I plan to read the manual and take the suggestions offered here and try to balance everything out to where it sounds more musical and compatible with my partscaster and the LPS.

 

I like the feel of the guitar better than I thought I would and the sound of the magnetic pups is palatable. I just need to equalize those with the models and with the traditional axes. I think the suggestions given offer a good chance of making the tones much more pleasing to the ear.

[eenymason]

I bought a JTV-69 earlier in the year hoping to replace 3 or 4 axes I gig with on the occasions I play out. While I do like the feel of the instrument and the sound of the magnetic pups, the models leave somewhat to be desired, at least if you compare them to their real world counterparts. I find that many of the models just do not have natural sustain as one would expect, Maybe I am expecting too much or too much of a noob yet to have unlocked the hidden key to get the sustain out of the models. So at this point, I am a bit disillusioned with it but not to the point I am ready to put it up for sale... yet. Our sound guy says it is not as hot at the output as my partscaster or my les paul special. It is supposedly incompatible tonally through the mains in a live situation with my other guitars. So until I can come up with a substantive way to meaningfully address these differences, it's going to have to remain at home. :(

 

Any suggestions to deal with this situation would be appreciated.

I find the "not as hot as the output as ....." comment by your sound guy to be unbelievable, unless you bought your 69 2nd hand, and the previous owner had lowered the overall string volume VERY significantly. I have Kinman Woodstock Plus pickups in my Strat, and when I bought my first variax, I noticed straight away how the Variax output was significantly hotter than the Strat, and the Woodstock Kinmans are pretty hot for Strat pickups. Note also that I reduced string output on the Variax to 70% when I changed from the stock Piezos to Graphtech Ghosts, which are hotter than Baggs.

Also, I have just joined a covers band doing the classic rock schtick, and the singer/guitarist sometimes puts down his Les Paul, and uses my spare variax at rehearsal for drop tuning etc, and same thing - the variax is a lot hotter than his LP.

I'd definitely pursue that possibility if I were you, as well as checking specs for optimal mag p/up height in the 69.

[weshunter]

I've been gigging with my 59 since 2011 and my 69S since late 2012. Both are beauties. Being a longtime Fender and Strat player, I gravitate to my 69S more, but take both to gigs for broken string contingencies. Use the Helix into an ALTO TS210 (recent purchase) very happy with it all. I changed my 69S pups to DiMarzio Noiseless, as I had been spoiled by HB's on my Epi LP and the Variax 300, then JTV-59.... I use the pups 80 - 90% of the time, but do get good results with the models.

 

One thing I recently bumped into was the less sustain of the models versus mags, and plinkyness of some models' upper strings - usually the bridge pup models were the worst offenders. I was adjusting string volumes and such with HD WB to fight this - helped but didn't cure it. Anyway in balancing out the string volumes and trying to make mags and model volumes more equivalent, I lowered my magnetic pups to lessen the volume on them - usually you try to get the MOST volume out of mags.

 

I'd had the 59 & 69S set up by a Very good guitar tech - intonation, neck relief, etc. Think he probably set up the mags like he would a normal guitar. ANYWay when I recently  lowered the pups on both my 59 & 69S, the plinkyness lessened markedly AND the sustain of the models improved. I believe the models are very sensitive to the magnetic pull of the pickups on the strings...

 

Just an observation. Since I made that adjustment, I've been much more happy with the models in general.

 

My 2 cent's worth...

Dave

This is the first I've heard of this. I'm definitely going to try it. Thanks!

[amsdenj]

I've recently been trying to reproduce Matt Schofield's tone with my Helix and JTV-69S. See The Pedal Show interview with Matt Schofield for great information on how Matt approaches amp and pedal tones.

 

I got close with the JTV-69S mag pickups, but not really there. When I switched to the Spank model it was actually closer. That was unexpected. Guess the modeled Strat is just a bit closer to his Strat.

 

This is another example of the value of a JTV. Anything close to Matt Schofield's tone is good tone.

[specracer986]

Here's a quick solo using my JTV69 through my Roland Blues Cube. This was at a local jam night, not my band, just other jammers. Not great tone, but it worked. I was using a Lester setting.