artists » Jeff Tweedy of Wilco

“…I’ve never not had an AC30 on stage…”

“The first time I could afford a really good guitar amp for myself I was predominately the bass player in Uncle Tupelo. When Uncle Tupelo broke up and Wilco started I bought an old AC30. I spent the most money I ever spent on any piece of gear to get a AC30 from England shipped to me and I still have that one. Once I had the AC30 for a little while I found another one and bought it as a backup- I’ve never really been comfortable with anything else since. I’ve tried a lot of other amps along with the AC30 but I’ve never not had a AC30 on stage. For the longest time I was trying to find the right smaller amp to give the front of house guy something that’s a little bit more broken up to use as a color. I have a ton of different amps that I use in the studio but once the AC15CC1X came out I was just like ‘well that’s kind of like what I’ve been trying to do- have the AC30 and the AC15!’ Now I’m comfortable with both amps. I was never really comfortable with the other amps before the AC15.”

“For a long time, up until just recently, I was using the hand wired head (AC30HWH) that came out a few years ago. The master volume was really good for Wilco because we have a lot of dynamics. Our song selection has some really quiet acoustic stuff and loud electric stuff so, in general, it’s better for us to keep a very low stage volume. It makes it easier to transition between loud and soft. Now that we’ve graduated to some better P.A.’s and bring our own monitors and our own production the stage volume is a little bit louder and the new Heritage Collection (AC30H2, AC30H2L and AC15H1TV) amps that I just got are fitting in really nicely. I’m really just thrilled to have a nice friendly relationship with VOX. It been really great for me to be able to use these Heritage Collection amps.”

For more information on Jeff Tweedy and Wilco visit them on the web at www.wilcoworld.net/.

Wilco’s latest release Sky Blue Sky is available in stores now

Photo Credit: Zoran Orlic