Fishman Loudbox Mini - great amp for both "bedroom" level and live gigs. Even for electric guitars!
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- čas přidán 27. 06. 2024
- Disclaimer: From Fishman's website: "Fishman doesn’t recommend using distortions or overdrives with our acoustic amplifiers. The speakers are designed for fidelity and are not built to tolerate the square waves that distortions and overdrives produce."
The Fishman Loudbox Mini is really a 60 Watts amp (solid state) aimed mainly at acoustic guitars.
It has two channels that can be used for Instrument and Microphone. On board effects are Digital Reverb & Chorus. By accident I found that it also works very well for electric guitars. If you want to do a combined acoustic/electric performance it can save you from dragging an additional tube amp - unless you really want to of course.
Gear used:
Fishman Loudbox Mini 60 W
Gibson J45 Standard w/ LR Baggs Anthem SL
Gibson ES-335 VOS 1963
Chapters
00:00 intro jam
00:33 Presentation of the amp and pedals
03:10 Gibson J 45 acoustic guitar
04:50 Record a loop to play over
05:29 Switch to the ES-335
06:30 Will it handle an overdrive pedal
07:01 Bedroom levels
08:57 jamming to the acoustic loop
10:15 The electric guitar with overdrive engaged
10:46 The electric guitar with no overdrive
11:27 Final thoughts
From the Fishman website: “Fishman doesn’t recommend using distortions or overdrives with our acoustic amplifiers. The speakers are designed for fidelity and are not built to tolerate the square waves that distortions and overdrives produce.” That said, I love my Loudbox Mini.
Hi, I just looked it up now and you are correct. I would think it is mentioned as a caution more around the tone quality, but better safe than sorry so it would probably be wise to go easy on overdrives/distortion pedals. I will pin your comment to the top here so people can be aware of Fishman's advice around this. Thanks for the heads up. Cheers 😊
@@GUITARSGIZMOS Out of an abundance of caution, I just bought a Fender Mustang LT50 for use on projects that require overdrive or distortion, and reserve the Loudbox Mini for things more tranquilo!
@@tommorrisey3999 Congrats on the new amp! From what I've seen online it seems to be a good one. Cheers!
This is good to know.
I certify it! I lost this amp for using distortion/overdrives. Protect your investment! Miss it a lot
Was starting to do some jamming and working on songs with a friend, in my little study / studio, and was just running my acoustic through the PA. I could stand the trebly "clack" I was getting, and so I pulled out my Loudbox Mini I'd hardly ever used - I was surprised how great it sounds, once I got it dialed in. The key is to get the right blend with the gain and tone controls, on both the amp and your acoustic. I can't wait to whip out my archtop next! Great video - thanks so much!
J. B. Was going to leave a comment, but after reading your opinion all I can say is ditto!!! This gentleman is gifted and knowledgeable - so thankful that he took the time to share.
Really helpful review. Just what I wanted to know. Sold!
Have a loudbox mini and haven’t tried with my electric guitars yet, but I’m excited to use it for some solo gigs. I must say…I’ve been playing guitar for a long time and your feel and understated playing is fantastic. You have skill my friend. A great review and skillful playing. Thank you!
Thanks a lot for bringing a smile to my face and for a good start of my day 😃 All the best, Thor
I was looking at Fishman Loudbox Mini but just seeing the Gibson Acoustic and Electric played so well I think your touch and sound was drawing me in. thank you so much showing us you skills and what the Loudbox can achieve.
Thank you 😊
This was an awesome review, and a pure joy listening to (you play)! You have that ever sought after, ever elusive intangible, which comes when you feel the music in your heart, and not in your head, and those are the notes you are laying down on your board, the board that acts as a runway, where you begin to soar, and take the listener on that ride with you!! Beautiful, brother! Thank you!
This must be the best comment ever! I love it 😊 You sure are a creative person to come up with this beautiful description of what you felt. Thank you so much for the nice words. Cheers, Thor
@@GUITARSGIZMOS Thank you, Thor, thank you for your kind words! Everything I experience, I filter through my heart, because I was taught as a boy, that a true man thinks with his heart, and not his head, for our mind can deceive, but our heart is true, when we learn to follow it. When I listened to you play, I was moved by it, and as such, I wrote what was in my heart at that moment, as the joy I felt in listening to what you played filled my spirit with something transcendent. In that quiet space between, the quiet space between the notes, there is something profound that lives and breathes, and it is transcendent, truly, a transcendent experience, that we are sometimes blessed to be able to open up enough to, to actually understand what true freedom feels like, in tune with the frequencies of the universe that are associated with the Light. That is what I felt as I listened to your music, the lightness of being, completely lost in the moment, and beyond time. Thank you for the brief moment of bliss, that was inspired by your music! Pretty cool. The notes you played, and the expansively bright space between. : )
I play my Fishman with my Tele.
I use an irig to plug my tele into my ipad. I use the tonebridge or garage band app to select any sound. Ramones. Johnny cash. Slayer. 😂
What an amazing Age for creativity.
These are phenomenal amps.I run a Taylor 414e with an Expression 2 mic system. It produces a wonderful sound and has inspired me to make new music, more than before. You'll be surprised how much volume and audio quality you get in such a small form factor.
Thank you so much for this demo!
I've been wanting to go busking with the electric guitar. I was going to get the cube street 2, but I think I'll try out the Fishman loudbox mini first :)
Hi, thanks! I haven't tried the Cube Street 2, but I would believe that a battery powered version of the Fishman Loudbox Mini would do a great job. As you say, try it in the store and see if it is for you. Cheers, Thor
Thanks for a really good demo video 😊 Ive tried a Loudbox mini in a music store with my Taylor accoustic and it was excellent; beautiful tone, mellow, rich and full ( much better than say a Fender accoustic amp). I wondered about using my ES335 with it and you answered that question perfectly. The Loudbox is in a class by itself, in accoustic amp, and versatile as well. Looking forward to getting one.
PS. loved your playing too .
I've used my wife's Mini Charge in the last few shows we've played with my Turbocaster Electric Guitars TJM Deluxe Hollow and my Jazzmaster. It actually does great with the electrics!!! (and I'm a Fender Deluxe Reverb guy thru and thru). I'm just getting ready to buy one for myself!
The mic side also sounds great as well. Having two of these will enable us to travel without having to carry our Bose L1 and my Deluxe Reverb!! (Note: I don't use pedals, and rely on Fender tube amp style tones, which I actually get lots of compliments on).
Compré este amplificador hace poco y estoy muy contento con él. Potente, sencillo, robusto y ligero. Y suena muy bien. De verdad, muy recomendable.
I recently started using my Godin A6 Ultra with my Fishman Artist. It's a hybrid with electric and acoustic tones in one guitar. I run the two cables into individual channels with appropriate pedals going into effects loops in the back, including the Ditto Looper for the acoustic side and a Fender Smolder overdrive and delay pedals for the electric side. Going for that One Man Band sound...
Great video. Thank you. Really awesome that you showed it at different volumes, and with electric + acoustic in a loop. Very cool. Did you plug in everything via the looper and then input into the amp from the looper? Sounds very clear.
Thank you 😊 Yes, the signal chain is how I show it around 2:40 in the video, so the looper is last in the chain and from there goes directly to the amp. Cheers, Thor
This sounds Amazing, Thor! 👏👏👏
This is a marriage of a high quality, versatile amp, with what IMHO is the best sounding, most versatile type of electric guitar type: the semi-hollow with humbuckers. And yours is a Gibson ES-335, the gold standard! I envy you, mine is an Ibanez 73 (inexpensive, but I love how it plays and sounds, from Jazz to Rock - everything but high gain chug). As much as I like controlled feedback, which you can get with a semi-hollow, it is probably convenient to use the Fishman with the anti-feedback circuit, if you play at high volumes. Definitely safer (out of control feedback can be a nightmare). 😁
Another PRO over carrying a tube amp to play live is that tubes can fail at any time. Not super likely but certainly possible. Solid state is, well, pretty solid 😅. You could also bring both a tube amp and this baby, and run an A/B box so you can blend them. I do that at home but my solid state is not great. It still sounds great. I run the solid state dry (I split before the pedalboard) and the effects on the other.
Cheers, and keep up the good stuff! (I am subscribing)
Leo
Thanks for keeping me company here at my channel Very much appreciated Leo 🙂You make som good points here about the Semi-hollow guitars. I love Ibanez guitars. My oldest and dearest acoustic is one and I will never part with it. Regarding tube amps and that tubes may be fragile... Yes indeed, but I have played in bands for more than 45 years (I'm 59 now) and dragged my tube amps on and off band busses and on to different venues. Fact is I have never had a tube fail on me to this day 😅 Knock on wood it won't happen any day soon either. I think your tip on using both a tube amp in combination with a solid state is interesting. That might be something to test out. Cheers, Thor
I have both the the mini and performer by Fishman. I do the same thing. I mostly play Brazilian and soft rock stuff on nylon string Flamenco guitars (Cordoba). Both amps sound great for that. But I also do some harder and classic rock. I didn't want to lug around two amps. So one day I plugged the electric (a Fender Lead III) in and was surprised at how good it sounded. I like to run the amp's reverb and chorus on both.
The electric sounds awesome for chunk-type funk. It sounds great for mellow stuff. But... it also sounds surprisingly good when I run my Keeley fuzz and overdrive pedals. At this point, I don't really see any need to lug along a heavy tube amp when the Fishman will do it all and sounds fine for all I throw at it, from mellow nylon string to harder classic rock type stuff. Of course, I'm not running it at ear splitting levels (then I'd go with the bigger tube amps), but for small gigs, it works great for everything and cuts down on the gear I need to haul and set up. I even occasionally use it for a bass amp at lower volume level gigs, and surprisingly, it sounds better than my big bass amp!
This is very interesting to hear. I am a bit too fond of my tube amps to stop using them for my electrics, but yeah, The LoudBox Mini is surprisingly good in handling all kinds of gear you throw at it. And as you say, even a bass guitar. I also had the bigger Fishman amps at one time (Performer and Artist) but I thought they were too different in character of tone to the LoudBox, so I sold them 😀 Cheers, Thor
I tried a Strat Type guitar directly, however did not sound good. Is there a cheaper eguitar preamp that could be useful here?
Would a bass guitar not damage the speakers over time?
@@uwetittmann1423 Sorry, but your questions for some reason got under the radar for me. I'm not quite sure, it also depends on the kind of pickups and style of playing. As I haven't tried any eguitar preamps myself, I'd suggest an overdrive pedal set with little gain to tame the highs and compress the tones a bit more to your taste. An EQ pedal might also do the trick.
@@uwetittmann1423 If you don't push it too hard I think it will cope. But of course it's not meant to be a bass guitar amp, so it would be a calculated risk to take.
I really enjoyed this presentation. One of the best about this amp. I am thinking of buying this amp to use with my Taylor T5z. Great playing with and without your loops. Interesting how the acoustic needed more EQ but the electric needed less. I wrote down your pedal arrangement too. Lots of really good information. One thing isn't it true that the gain if using electric shouldn't be turned up too high on an acoustic amp?
Thank you so much 😊 I think the reason an acoustic guitar will need more tweaking of the EQ is the fact that it will relate more to the quality of the acoustics in the room you're in. In most cases you will need to take out some of the lower frequencies and maybe tweak the mids a bit. The electric guitar will be less sensitive to the acoustic environment. Cool that you also think my pedal arrangement is worth noting down. I particularly love tremolo, reverb and delays. The reverb in this amp is so much to my taste that I choose to use that and feel no need to add a reverb pedal to my board. On your question about the gain if using electric guitars, I'm not really sure. I just pinned a comment to the top of this page about Fishman's advice around not using overdrive/distortion pedals with this amp. I'm willing to take the chance with mine, but I use it on very low gain and in small doses 😉 All the best and I hope you will be successful in your search for an acoustic guitar amp.
@@GUITARSGIZMOS Thanks for your reply. I think you are fine with low gain. Right now this is probably the amp I will buy.
Just ordered mine with a Shure PGA58 microphone. Do you recommend the equalizer as well or do you think for mostly backyards and small gigs it isn’t necessary? Would you get anything else personally? Great review thanks I can’t wait to get mine in a few days!
Congratulations on some nice new gear 🙂I think you'll be fine with no additional effects. Try it for a while to see if you think you need any otherl pedals to help tweak the tones. An EQ can of course come in handy if the venue's acoustic is tricky. As I don't really play that many different venues it has been on very rare occasions I found the need to use one myself. What I sometimes do like to add is a tremolo and sometimes a bit of delay. But that is extra spice and can come after a while when you have experienced the gear you have now. Cheers, Thor
@@GUITARSGIZMOS cheers brother thank you 🙏
Thanks so much for this. I've got a question for and something else. Here's a valuable, inexpensive experiment for you... Get a Joyo American Sound pedal and run that before your Mini. They are super cheap on Amazon and easy to return if it doesn't work out. Set up: Guitar, drive pedals, Joyo, reverb/delay, Loudbox. I don't know if its just my ears or what, but for home levels this thing sounds great. Tell me I'm not crazy? I've had and run some really nice tube amps and also have a Boss Artist Katana. All were great, especially at high volumes. But for ease of use in the home, and for that crisp high fidelity sound you can't get from a guitar amp at low volumes, the Loudbox has worked out great. With a my pedalboard and my vocal mic run right into the Mini I get a great sound. I've also run my pedal board with the Joyo direct into my full on PA and it sounds great there too but more volume than I need for at home.
Maybe you could try that Joyo in your chain. As a plug for that Joyo American Sound pedal (AMS) it works great to get both the Blackface and the Tweed sound or something in between, with the turn of a dial. For the money Joyo (Harley Benton sells the same thing.) They really did something great with that. For the purist I'm sure they'd pick the sound apart but for a performer in front of a drunken crowd singing along (screaming the wrong words really) I doubt any one would notice the loss of "tube tone".
All this got me thinking. I'd have a need for the larger Fishman Performer for some gigs instead of the full PA when I go solo. But since the Mini sounds so good with the pedals I'm wondering if when in full band mode with electric guitar could I use the Performer as my electric guitar amp and serve as a monitor vocals? Not sure how much feedback I'm likely to get in that case between both loud guitar and vocals?
Anyway, thanks for the great video.
Hi, thanks for the tip on that Joyo pedal. I had to check it out and it looks quite interesting. Will investigate further, thanks! I have had both the Loudbox Performer and the Artist. I returned both because I felt they sounded nothing like the Mini. They have a different speaker configuration and I just had a hard time getting a good tone with them. I would recommend to try them out if you get the chance before you make up your mind on one of those. For a band, and if you're playing loud, a decent tube amp would be my choice and have the vocals monitored from a PA system. Just my two cents🙂 Cheers, Thor
Great video and demonstration 😄 did the overdrive have any effect on the speaker? Fishman does not recommend it, but it works fine. I use this Amp for acoustic, electric and bass guitar.
Hi, thanks! I can't hear that the OD had any negative effect on the speaker. But maybe it can do some harm over time if there is a recommendation not to do so from Fishman?
@@GUITARSGIZMOS I asked Trey Hensley and he also didn't hear any longterm effect on the speaker 👍
I read that you once tried the artist and performer model but sold them because you liked the mini better. I've been thinking on buying the artist because I have an outside gig upcoming where I will be playing mostly acoustic and one song electric and will be running trough a PA system. At first I wanted to do it with the mini and use it as a monitor on stage and play trough the PA via the DI output. But then I started reading that the artist has a special DI output that doesn't change the sound you give the audio guy. It would be nice if I could do the concert with the mini, but maybe that's being unrealistic.
@@Gilbertgetar Yes you are correct, I found that the speaker config in the two bigger brothers were different than the Mini's and that they had a quite different character of tone. Maybe you have an opportunity to test one of the bigger amps before you decide to buy? Regarding the DI from the Mini, I mean to have read that it is pre FX, meaning that it goes unaltered to the house PA.
What cables do you recommend for my acoustic guitar to the FM mini? And what vocal mic cable to the FM mini? Thank you...
Hi there, I'm probably not the best guy to answer this question as cables has not gotten my attention the way they deserve. I plan to do some research on the topic to see if I need to up my game a bit. I guess you'd be better off by doing a search for "best instrument cables" than what I'd be able to provide. That said, if you ask me I would probably go for a well known brand like D'addario, Fender or Boss. I'm not sure I would pick up the difference in tone quality from these to a top notch Mogami that would cost more than double of the price. If you're in a recording studio and depend on the best equipment and tone possible, than I can understand the need to look to the best of the test, but for live gigs or just jamming at home I would think money spent on a more budget friendly brand would be a good choice. Hope that helps. Cheers, Thor
@@GUITARSGIZMOS Thanks man...much appreciated...
For a regular Fender Strat eg. would it not be better to use a eguitar preamp with this Fishman amp?
Hi, I think you would be able to tweak the tones to be even better with your suggestion, but haven't tried it myself. My point with this video was merely to show how flexible this little gem of an amp is. Cheers, Thor 😃
@@GUITARSGIZMOS I got the Loudbox Artist, great for both Microphone and Acoustic guitar. Completely sufficient for the stage.
It does get a fairly clean sound...but to me I don't 'feel' the music around in the room, the music is just straight from the box. Also, the reverb and chorus are very weak. I have a Gibson GA-15 tube amp...well, the Fishman doesn't even come close. I wanted to like it, but sent it back. Just didn't compete.
Great amps, but do not run distortion, it will ruin the speakers
I've heard about this, has it been confirmed? I'm planning on doing a live concert outside for about 1000 people and I want to use this Amp for my Eastman acoustic and stratocaster in combination with a nobels overdrive pedal. It will run trough a PA system.
@@Gilbertgetar Fishman told me this directly.
@@jackloganbill605 Yes I've read it on their website as well. But in a rig rundown video with Trey Hensley I saw him use an overdrive pedal with an acoustic guitar true this Amp, the artist version. Maybe I'll have to replace the speaker faster, but they are not that expensive. And a stratocaster sounds surprisingly good true this Amp with an overdrive pedal.
How are the vocals when playing electric guitar at same time?
Geez, that dB meter is annoying to watch. I play a Fishman Loudbox Mini Charge, so I love the amp. I know the point of having the dB meter to show that the amp puts out decent sound - but, . . . it’s still awful distracting (and not really all that useful to see).