Recycling the amp from Jensen J120
Posted: Sat Sep 25, 2010 2:47 am
First, I must say that I'm not a jukebox collector, but I do value jukeboxes as a big part of history of music. I just wanted to share this funny "hunting" experience of "mystique" Jensen A-21 - amplifier.
I've played guitar for over 30 years and it happened that I bought old restored amp from local musician net community. It was restored nicely (there was few obvious modifications seen, but could not guess the origin of the amp then), it was covered with a good case and it really works well with my 2 x 12" cabinet with Celestions from '70. Of course, I was interested about amps history and started browse the web. The power amp seemed to be quite normal (good old 6L6-tubes), but the pre-amp seemed little bit odd to us (strange tubes etc.)
Everybody knows Jensen brand from speakers, but I found it very hard to find any information of amps manufactured under Jensen brand. Local guitar amp specialist thought: "Man, you've been palmed-off, there's no such thing as a Jensen amp, everybody do know their speakers, though".
We examined the amp with my friend and we thought, it is Jensen and its old - it must have been some experimental phase in Peter L. Jensen's career. Okay - it must be at least very rare, it's old (from 1955) and must be worth of thousands of euros! I paid 260 euros for it (actually we traded some guitar stuff, I only spent 100 euros in cash). "Best bargain ever", I thought.
And then - one hit from Yahoo (Google is not always the best!) by some random link led to German jukebox-site - and suddenly everything made sense to me. Peter L. Jensen moved to U.S. from Denmark in 1906 and his relatives (and he himself?) started this "Music system" production in Denmark in 1950 (it was from '50 to '57 - I think). With new search specs it took only few minutes to find pictures of this amp to verify that it's really from 1955 - but it's from jukebox, OMG!!
Ok - now I understand, why this low-gain pre-amp should be boosted quite a lot...
Well - the best part is that it works beautifully as a guitar amp. I boost it with MXR's 6-band EQ and overdrive pedal called Mad Professor's Little Green Wonder and I see jeaulous faces around me...
I'm hardly the only one using old jukebox amp in this way (well, maybe in Finland I am), but it would be nice to hear about any experiences of recycling these amps for musical instruments. Another thing I'd like to know - did I pay too much for it?
Anyway, for its sound - it's worth 260 euros for me anytime and because of this history lesson, I value it even more. Please don't kill me for this...
Regs,
Janne Nurmi, Muurame, Finland
Edit / Sep 27, 2010:
Jukebox historian Gert Almind in Denmark told me that these Jensens in jukebox manufacturing business were not really related to Peter L. Jensen. Amp was built wholly by factory in Denmark, like almost everything in these jukeboxes. However, Jensen Music Automates did use logo very similar to Jensen Speaker Systems and I got carried away mostly by this, Denmark and they having the same family name. Well - that does not really depreciate the value of the amp. Valuable work on jukebox history collected by Gert can be read on site: http://juke-box.dk/
I've played guitar for over 30 years and it happened that I bought old restored amp from local musician net community. It was restored nicely (there was few obvious modifications seen, but could not guess the origin of the amp then), it was covered with a good case and it really works well with my 2 x 12" cabinet with Celestions from '70. Of course, I was interested about amps history and started browse the web. The power amp seemed to be quite normal (good old 6L6-tubes), but the pre-amp seemed little bit odd to us (strange tubes etc.)
Everybody knows Jensen brand from speakers, but I found it very hard to find any information of amps manufactured under Jensen brand. Local guitar amp specialist thought: "Man, you've been palmed-off, there's no such thing as a Jensen amp, everybody do know their speakers, though".
We examined the amp with my friend and we thought, it is Jensen and its old - it must have been some experimental phase in Peter L. Jensen's career. Okay - it must be at least very rare, it's old (from 1955) and must be worth of thousands of euros! I paid 260 euros for it (actually we traded some guitar stuff, I only spent 100 euros in cash). "Best bargain ever", I thought.
And then - one hit from Yahoo (Google is not always the best!) by some random link led to German jukebox-site - and suddenly everything made sense to me. Peter L. Jensen moved to U.S. from Denmark in 1906 and his relatives (and he himself?) started this "Music system" production in Denmark in 1950 (it was from '50 to '57 - I think). With new search specs it took only few minutes to find pictures of this amp to verify that it's really from 1955 - but it's from jukebox, OMG!!
Ok - now I understand, why this low-gain pre-amp should be boosted quite a lot...Well - the best part is that it works beautifully as a guitar amp. I boost it with MXR's 6-band EQ and overdrive pedal called Mad Professor's Little Green Wonder and I see jeaulous faces around me...
I'm hardly the only one using old jukebox amp in this way (well, maybe in Finland I am), but it would be nice to hear about any experiences of recycling these amps for musical instruments. Another thing I'd like to know - did I pay too much for it?
Anyway, for its sound - it's worth 260 euros for me anytime and because of this history lesson, I value it even more. Please don't kill me for this...
Regs,
Janne Nurmi, Muurame, Finland
Edit / Sep 27, 2010:
Jukebox historian Gert Almind in Denmark told me that these Jensens in jukebox manufacturing business were not really related to Peter L. Jensen. Amp was built wholly by factory in Denmark, like almost everything in these jukeboxes. However, Jensen Music Automates did use logo very similar to Jensen Speaker Systems and I got carried away mostly by this, Denmark and they having the same family name. Well - that does not really depreciate the value of the amp. Valuable work on jukebox history collected by Gert can be read on site: http://juke-box.dk/