Thunderfunk Trainwreck Connection

Thunderfunk and Trainwreck Connection

(Original unaltered post from my Music blog)

Trainwreck amps are like the #2 sought after amps in the millionaire's club of amp collectors, right behind Dumble.  Trainwreck is a more sad tale, as Ken Fischer designed and made these amps while in poor health.  This health limited his designs to around 100 made, and limited his life prematurely.

Ken's designs are exercises in simplicity.  When you look at modern Marshalls or newer Dumbles, you will see vast arrays of electronics, wired with many filters, creating these crazy complex marvels of modern technology.  Ken's designs were the opposite of that.  When you look at a Trainwreck on paper, you may go "that's it?".  Just like baking, sometimes its the care and thought that goes in to a work, instead of the amount of ingredients.  Ken's designs were unique, new, and while some say influenced by Vox, were his own.  The "purity" of the signal path leads to touch dynamics and a "quickness" to the amps that other designs lack.  I am generally a "new tech or you're a cave man" type of person, but there is this word called "elegance" and if you can put elegance in your simplistic designs, there's art there that I appreciate.

When I hear people compliment a Trainwreck on youtube or in a print review, I hear so many familiar things.  I hear about how fast the signal goes from playing on the guitar to hearing through the amp, and how it changes how you can play.  I have had the same thing happen with my Thunderfunk.  After playing it for months I got out the old Trace Elliot while I was demoing some compression pedals.  There was lag in the signal, the Trace Elliot, a tone machine of the rock gods, was "slow", and I never expected this to happen.  So when I read about the Trainwrecks, the lightbulb in my head went off.  Quite recently I was reading the forum on Freedom Stompboxes, and someone in another country wanted to make a Thunderfunk clone since they could not import one.  Several people said "wow, that looks really simple, should be no problem if you know what you're doing".  Again, the same thing said about Ken's Trainwrecks.

So how does this tie together?  Well it turns out Dave Funk was one of two people approved by Ken to work on Trainwrecks under warranty.  In fact, when Ken was in the worst of health, he hired Dave to create two Trainwreck amps that were sold as 100% Trainwreck.  Due to the low numbers, these amps are well documented and well appreciated.  So it seems like Dave did not just take inspiration from the A.M.P. series, but also threw in a little of Ken's own philosophy about keeping the tone circuits simple and strait forward.  Looking at the front of a Thunderunk belies this detail as it looks complex as hell, but in reality its a masterpiece of both complex and simple.

Thanks to Dave's own website, http://www.thunderfunk.com/, the Trainwreck Wikipedia page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trainwreck_Circuits, and Talkbass.com for all the info.  (I do not write this kind of post to brag, I am genuinely a lover of great stories, and the amp tech stories around the Acoustic360 Legacy envelops everything from SWR, to Eden, to Train Wreck and is worth the research to read)

April 23rd, 2014

Hmm.  A few quick things, I'll keep it short since the post above seems long.

Suikoden II has been rated for North American release.  This is one of the most expensive, low number produced GOOD games to have come out of the PS1 era of RPG's.  It is probably the holy grail of the JRPG's of that era.  One of the reasons is because we never got another version of it in English.  Japan has had a few reissues on the PSP and other places, but not the western world.  I can't bare to part with my copy even though I could get a few hundred bucks in its semi-bad, but well loved condition.  It is miles ahead of the first one, and is on the emotional and complexity scale of Matsuno's Tactics series, even though its turn based combat like classic Final Fantasy games.  Of note, aside from the story, is a great Sim City like village creation sub-game, and an Iron Chef contest where you must know the likes and dislikes of even minor characters to know what to cook them, its very fun and very worth the money.  Soon that money cost will be down to $10 or so.

I will not be placing a review of my 2nd beer from Tuesday that I drank because I do not feel like I gave it the attention it would deserve.  The Arrogant Bastard probably blocked some taste buds with its high hop content, so I will be getting another Sam Smith Nut Brown for another review day.  It was good, though seemed a bit underflavored, which is not what I read about, so I either got a slightly old one, or the Bastard broke my taste buds for a few hours.

I think I may have switched what guitar amp I want to go for.  It will probably change again as time goes by, that's just how I am, up to the point of money changing hands, I'm always looking for a better deal.  I want the one amp that will make me not want other amps.  I went through a few bass amps before I got the T'Funk, but I've not wanted anything else since.  I want that with my guitar.  I will not go into it here, but its German.  Germany has been good to me on the tech end of things.  The engine block in my Ford was made in Germany, and has held up perfect for almost 25 years(the American made susepension, and Taiwanese electronics? not so much).  This German amp has auto-biasing on it, much like the Mark Bass Tube heads, and the sound is somewhere between a JCM800 and more modern Marshalls with a huge mid response(like I like it).