IK Multimedia has just expanded its Tonex One amp modelling lineup with a mini pedal that puts 20 models from two classic Dumble tube amps right at your feet – and, for that matter, serves up tones from six Overdrive Specials in the software pack that comes bundles with it.
Limited to 1000 units worldwide, with a warm brown enclosure, the Double Special is the Tonex One for the blues guitar tone connoisseur, the player who enjoys the finer things in life, and, perhaps, like the best of us, the one whose guitar amp budget doesn’t quite stretch to six figures.
The price of Dumble tube amps is beyond the average player – beyond most players – and also could you really justify it even if you had the bread? They need to run loud, free, big lungs. They are the kind of backline option best left to the pros; Joe Bonamassa, Robben Ford, Carlos Santana, John Mayer…
But for €249, a pedalboard-friendly option that gives you instant access to the tones from a 1978 Overdrive Special Export Combo (Serial #0038) and a 1980 Overdrive Special Combo (Serial #0080) nicknamed “The Don” is a very attractive proposition – and it gives you access to a further 40 tones from the pair, plus all the sounds featured from the the four Overdrive Specials in IK Multimedia’s Tonex ODS Legends bundle.
Alternatively, you could just buy the software… The choice is yours. IK Multimedia captured these sounds using a variety of dynamic, ribbon and condenser recording microphones, which were then rendered by its proprietary AI-driven Tonex V2 modelling tech.
Amps were captured with and without the speaker engaged, and in the company of some boutique overdrive pedals, including the similarly grail-worthy Klon Centaur, the JHS Pedals’ modern classic transparent drive pedal, the Morning Glory, and the ubiquitous TS10 Tube Screamer.
And these are two very special Dumble amps. Yes, all were special, but as a pairing, “The Don” and the Export-era ODS present two distinct flavours of what an amplifier built by Howard “Alexander” Dumble could do. They were both 50-watters, 6L6s in the power section. They both have their charms.
As IK Multimedia notes, the Export-era amps were “more immediate and organic, with an open top end, blooming midrange, and a raw, touch-sensitive response that feels highly connected to the player” while “The Don” was more “focused and refined, with tighter low end, quicker transient response, and better note separation at higher gain”.
As avowed Dumble enthusiast Kenny Wayne Shepherd told MusicRadar in 2024, the late Howard “Alexander” Dumble was a “bona-fide” genius. “There is so much about building those amplifiers that was all in his head,” said Shepherd. ““I have watched him take a bag of these little capacitors and measure each one of them and see what the value of it was. I don’t even know how many of them he would toss aside because they didn’t have the right value. Like, he knew.”
Shepherd says amp builders could build boutique clones but they didn’t really capture the essence of what made the amps so special.
Perhaps, then, if you find yourself without an Overdrive Special to hand, digital modelling technology is the best way to savour that Dumble tone. If so, with the Tonex One Double Special Signature Collection out now, IK Multimedia has us covered.
