@stuartk: I too had a blackface Deluxe Reverb (1966), a favorite amp with me. That was Evan Johns’ choice as well, but when we recorded the Moontan album his was stranded somewhere in the country, so the studio in Atlanta, GA provided him with a blackface Super Reverb (same amp as the Twin Reverb, but with four 10" drivers). Evan played his Tele straight into the amp (he don’t need no stinkin’ pedals!), and cranked it wide open. When the engineer opened the door to the isolation closet the amp was sitting in, the sound coming out of the closet was about the loudest thing I’ve ever heard!
At the end of 2007 I did a three night gig (December 28th and 29th, a night off, then the New Years Eve show. The place was packed!) with Jonny Kaplan at The Iron Door Saloon in Groveland, CA (a little town up in the mountains, not far from Yosemite National Park), the longest continuously-open bar in California history (the original carved wooden bar and iron front door are still in place). It opened during the gold rush days, and has been opened ever since. One of Bill Graham’s top employees bought the saloon, and decorated it with original Fillmore Auditorium posters. The stairwell next door to the saloon leads to an old-style bunkhouse (like cowboys slept in on a ranch), which is where the band was provided beds to sleep in. Free meals and an open bar (the bartender made as good a Bloody Mary as I’ve ever had), plus gas money for the drive up from L.A. and an acceptable paycheck.
Non-musicians may find the following interesting: I had never before played with Jonny, and heard through the L.A. grapevine that he need a drummer for the gig (his regular drummer was back home in Italy for the holidays). I contacted him, told him whom I had worked with, and he asked me to send him some examples of my recorded work, which I did. He gave me the gig, and sent a list of songs he intended to play (his own and covers). My woman made me a CD with all the songs, which I played during the drive from L.A. to Groveland. The 28th and 29th shows were basically paid rehearsals for the New Years Eve show, and by the end of the 29th show we were pretty tight. He gave each musician (a trio to back him) instructions as to what he wanted different, me to play the backbeat a little further behind the deepest center of the pocket. That’s not uncommon with guys who grew up listening to Charlie Watts.
For a musician to replace a regular bandmember for just a show or two is called "subbing."
Anyway, Jonny played rhythm guitar using a Les Paul Jr. plugged into a modern Deluxe Reverb reissue, and it sounded great. Turned up just enough to give it a little "crunch". When I did a session with Dwight Twilley’s guitarist Bill Pitcock IV, he plugged his ES335 into a pair of old Deluxe Reverb’s, with an MXR digital delay in-line between the two (for that Sun Records slap-back echo sound---fantastic!).
I also had a 1967 black face single Showman amp (I had both JBL D-130 and D-140 drivers), which I used with my ’68 Fender P-Bass, a killer combo. I bought the bass in the late-90’s for $500, sold it in 2010 for $3500. The opposite trajectory of hi-fi components.
