# Played a Traynor YGM-4 in Ottawa



## Greg Ellis (Oct 1, 2007)

My wife and I took at trip to Ottawa for the long weekend (just past), and I made it a point to seek out the old Songbird shop (now Spaceman Music).

They had a neat collection of older amps in there - everything from Roland Jazz Chorus (both the 120 and the 70 versions), several old Peaveys, multiple Traynor heads with cabs - alongside the usual Boogie, Line 6 and assorted modern stuff.

There was a "Studio Mate" in the store - the YGM-4, a 2 x EL84 combo amp with 4 x 8" speakers in a close-backed config. I didn't have a guitar with me so I grabbed something sort of close to my Tokai strat - an old Ibanez with humbuckers.

The amp is amazing - smooth, creamy bell tones. It plays itself. This must be power tube distortion - I can't think of any other explanation. Sounds ranging from Wind Cries Mary to Texas Flood and Shine On You Crazy Diamond just fell out of the amp. It didn't take more than a second or two to get close to those. Awesome.

As I went up higher on the volume, or if I hit the preamp too hard with the humbuckers, it got pretty harsh. Kind of raspy, not at all sweet. I imagine a pedal would be a better solution, if you needed an overdrive sound. The natural tone of the amp was enough for me - I couldn't imagine wanting to smudge out the sound by distorting it.

The amp is in good shape - one of the speakers had been replaced with something different, and I suppose some might want to undo that change. The price was a little higher than I wanted to pay - which was typical of the store in general; I think it's the extra cost of operating a brick and mortar store more than anything else. 

I'm looking around locally for a similar amp, though. I was very, very impressed with the amp.


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## traynor_garnet (Feb 22, 2006)

They are indeed beautiful sounding amps. Gorgeous cleans with all the attributes you describe. Not sure of what incarnation of the amp you played, but the later ones didn't break up as much when cranked. However they do sound nice turned up but a pedal is needed for heavy stuff. The "raspy" sound good be anything: dead tubes, tired speakers, or just the volume limits typical of most music stores (did you really crank it and dig in or did a few notes jump out and you quickly turned down?)

TG




Greg Ellis said:


> My wife and I took at trip to Ottawa for the long weekend (just past), and I made it a point to seek out the old Songbird shop (now Spaceman Music).
> 
> They had a neat collection of older amps in there - everything from Roland Jazz Chorus (both the 120 and the 70 versions), several old Peaveys, multiple Traynor heads with cabs - alongside the usual Boogie, Line 6 and assorted modern stuff.
> 
> ...


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## Greg Ellis (Oct 1, 2007)

traynor_garnet said:


> They are indeed beautiful sounding amps. Gorgeous cleans with all the attributes you describe. Not sure of what incarnation of the amp you played, but the later ones didn't break up as much when cranked. However they do sound nice turned up but a pedal is needed for heavy stuff. The "raspy" sound good be anything: dead tubes, tired speakers, or just the volume limits typical of most music stores (did you really crank it and dig in or did a few notes jump out and you quickly turned down?)
> 
> TG


It had High and Low inputs side-by-side, and a plastic standby switch on the front, beside a rectangular pilot light, if that helps to date it.

There's a pic of the amp on the Spaceman site;

http://www.spacemanmusic.com/Amps/Tube+Amps/Traynor+YGM-4+Studio+Mate+Combo


I really only tried a few notes at very high volume - I didn't want to piss off the staff and the other customers too much.  I'm sure I could dial in something at least a bit more pleasing to the ear, given some serious alone-time with the amp.

I did notice that the low input was much more to my liking than the high, and the amp sounded a lot better if I opened it up to about 2 o'clock on the vol and then dialed the guitar volume back about half-way or maybe even lower than that. 

I have no idea how hot the pickups were in the RG370 - they could have been anything, so that could clearly be a factor.

The bright switch on the amp (which engages a treble bypass cap on the volume control, according to the schematic) added far too much treble for my ears. And it made that scratchy, raspy noise a lot more pronounced. I spent most of my time playing into the Low input, with the bright switch off.

I did notice that the amp was wonderfully quiet - no noticeable hum at all, even when I turned it up.


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## traynor_garnet (Feb 22, 2006)

Greg Ellis said:


> There's a pic of the amp on the Spaceman site;


Yep, that's the last incarnation of that amp. I once rented one and it sounded amazing with my Strat; kind of like a Fender Blackface and it would be nice to hear it with some good speakers. Again, not tons of dirt when cranked but a great rock rhythm sound. Didn't get to try it with humbuckers.



> I really only tried a few notes at very high volume - I didn't want to piss off the staff and the other customers too much.  I'm sure I could dial in something at least a bit more pleasing to the ear


I hate playing in places where you feel "bad" or awkward for playing with any volume; makes it hard to really hear the amp.



> I did notice that the low input was much more to my liking than the high, and the amp sounded a lot better if I opened it up to about 2 o'clock on the vol and then dialed the guitar volume back about half-way or maybe even lower than that.
> The bright switch on the amp added far too much treble for my ears.


The high has a bit more "juice" so higher output pickups may be too much. The bright switch is useless. How could anyone have built that and though, "that sounds good" . . .


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