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Charlie,
My 2 cents worth is...I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss attenuators (not that you are). I use two 50 watt Weber MASSes at home for practicing and for low volume gigs when you want to maintain as much of your tone as possible. Yes, when you turn the MASS volume as low as maybe 4 (the speaker volume on the MASS) or less, it starts to mess with your tone...usually the top end. But at volumes about 6 or higher on the attenuator they sound pretty darn good. And your volume is attenuated very noticeably at that level. I have a guitar (Epiphone '56 Les Paul Goldtop with Lollar p-90s) that actually sounds better when playing it through my 40 watt Allen Encore with 4x10s with the MASS. It sounds so good through the MASS I don't play the guitar without it. It just does something really sweet to the top end. It sounds very smooth. And it (the MASS) never sounds bad with any of my amps. I would estimate it is about 85%-90% transparent, which isn't bad. Is it perfect? No. But I've found it to be a very useful tool when you need to preserve your tone at lower volumes. It works better than pedals for that purpose, for me.
Tom
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