Steve Cropper and the Fender Harvard Amp ASK ZAC EP 19

well hi guys and welcome to another Ask
0:21
Zac so today I want to talk about Steve
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Cropper Steve Cropper is one of my
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favorite guitar players you know he got
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me when I was kid and kind of going
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along with that we're gonna talk about
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an amp that he's probably the most
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famous user of the Tweed Fender Harvard
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so as a kid I start playing guitar about
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twelve and I remember now I've kind of
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hinted at this in the in past episodes
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but my parents was kind of raised in a
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Pentecostal church and it wasn't really
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allowed to listen to quote secular music
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which mean I was I was only really
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allowed to listen to church music and
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there were some good church music and
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there was you know some bad Christian
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music also and the one loophole was I
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could listen to secular music that was
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instrumental so as a kid I was able to
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listen to the ventures and Chet Atkins
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and this band out of Memphis called
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Booker T and the MGS and those albums
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and those groups you know those artists
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they really made a huge impact on me and
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I remember buying you know with my
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allowance slash money from doing yard
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work buying Booker T Booker T and the
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MGS Greatest Hits
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on cassette remember buying that and
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listening to it and just loving it then
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I remember going to my grandmother's
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house and because my parents who
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wouldn't they didn't want to have cable
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because again they were trying to
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protect us from the
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bad influences which now is an adult
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with children I understand that now but
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I would go with my grandmother's house
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and I would watch cable and of course
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while watching cable the movie The Blues
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Brothers came on and boy how did it I
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love that movie
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she had a VCR so of course I found a
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tape put it in there and recorded the
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whole thing was being played on TBS I
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know because I it still has the the
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commercials and everything on there and
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I'll watch that thing over and over and
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over again watching you know Duck Dunn
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and Cropper and you know that guitar
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Murphy and whoa what a fun great movie I
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mean you know you don't need me to tell
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you that quick side note
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years ago I bought it on the Blues
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Brothers movie on DVD and I brought it
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home and I was so excited to play it you
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know for my kids guy thought they're
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gonna love this not realizing that I had
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been watching the edited for television
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version well guess what I start playing
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the movie and all of a sudden these
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words that I hadn't heard on the version
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I had been watching started coming out
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of the mouth and like my kids were like
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seven or eight years old and so I had to
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turn it off but yeah so yeah so they
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were having the Blues Brothers cuz I
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love the Blues Brothers then of course
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later when my parents kind of loosened
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things up when I was 16 and I could kind
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of buy whatever I wanted to
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of course I bought you know the Albert
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King that were Booker T and the MGS were
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backing him up at the born on her bad
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sign album love that album that's my
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favorite Albert King record you know the
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Wilson Pickett stuff too Otis Redding
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stuff oh my goodness you know that the
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guitar playing and you know the the
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double stops and the rhythm chinks and
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all the things that you know Cropper did
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here I'm just gonna play a little bit so
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I've got my 59 tweed Harvard I've got a
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67 telly on the neck pickup
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which is what Cropper tended to use now
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he would use the back pick up some too
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but he tended to play on the neck pick
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up a lot and I'm just not gonna play
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anything like note for a note from
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Cropper but this is just kind of maybe
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some Cropper isms or something
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[Music]
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so oh let's see
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here's more kind of Cropper isms you
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have the the kind of hammer on things
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where he played chords and arpeggiate
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them and hammer off the the the the
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third up to the the fourth any of them
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[Music]
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those kind of things you have of course
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the rhythm chinks now you have the
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hammer ons you have the chordal things
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li so it would've been easy for like
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sold you know those kind of things the
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six yeah
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Cropper you know had all sorts of you
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know great things in his in his back
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pocket he was and this is not to detract
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from Steve at all he was not the most
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sophisticated guitar player but he had
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such a great feel and you know and and
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he worked really well with al Jackson
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and Duck Dunn and Booker T yeah that was
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a great amazing rhythm section so I love
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love Steve Cropper loved the colonel so
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as part of that you know as a kid here
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listening to these things and you know
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of course trying to learn stuff off
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records and stuff like that and then you
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know they're this pre-internet you start
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finding you know there'd be an article
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on Cropper every once in a while and
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guitar magazines like you know bed every
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two or three years there'd be something
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on him and that's when I started hearing
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about this amp called a Fender Harvard
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it's like you could have said the Fender
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Gersh Putin the boots I mean I wouldn't
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you know it's like what is that now of
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course you know I had seen all sorts of
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fender amps you know growing up in South
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Texas I'd seen twins and Pro reverbs and
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Deluxe's and Princeton's and showman's
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and band masters and baseman's and all
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sorts of stuff but I'd never seen
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Harvard before I never heard of one so
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it was like what is that
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so what until many years later that you
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know on the on the internet was probably
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the first time I heard or one of the
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Fender amp books that that came out in
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the
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the 90s I finally saw what one looked
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like I was like okay it's kind of a
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little you know practicing kind of thing
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so the way I actually got to play
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through one and how I ended up acquiring
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this one was there's a great young
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player named Daniel Donato if you're not
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familiar with him he was the after JD
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Simon left the Don Kelly band Daniel
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Donato was the next player in that band
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and and Daniel is an amazing guitar
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player and he was at the true tone
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offices one day and we were just you
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know yammering on of course you start
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talking about gear and at the time you
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know he was very much into Pro reverb
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amps and he he said also have a 59
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Harvard and I said you have a 59 Harvard
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he said yeah I I got it from you know
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one of the guys at Grune and I've got it
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he said that's a fun amp but I don't
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really use it very much I'm thinking
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about selling it I said bull let me
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check it out
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so you let me borrow it and there was I
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I wanted to buy it but you know when you
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and you have that thing where it's like
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I shouldn't buy it so I returned it to
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him and then of course I couldn't stop
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thinking about the ceiling up and I had
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the money to buy it but I was like now I
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don't need it
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but then it was like I just I couldn't
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so then I reached back out to Daniel and
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I said hey you still have that amp and
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he said yeah but I don't know if I want
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to sell it now and actually someone else
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wants to buy it and they're offering me
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more money
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oh my goodness see it's like missed
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opportunity so I had to offer offer more
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money but I got it and I'm glad in yeah
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and but that it has a you know kind of a
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fun lineage coming from and who knows
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who else has owned the amp the amp has
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also been used by a JD Simo on some
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recordings and yeah so I got this
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59 Harvard amp it was all original
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except the year the handle had been
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replaced and you know of course these
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most of these rotten
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their handle right so it's it's you know
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it's incredibly unusual to have the
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original handle the other thing was the
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original p10 our speaker was gone and
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but even though I just had a reissue
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Italian seat in our ceramic Jensen
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speaker in there the amps still sounded
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ridiculously good so I picked it up so
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and then I decided to define an original
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p10 are from 59 boy howdy that was
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expensive so it ended up costing me a
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couple hundred bucks to find an original
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1959 date-stamp p10 are with the
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California fire marshal orange sticker
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on the back you know because of course
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it's like you know if I'm gonna do it
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let's go all the way so and the speaker
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came out of a 59 bassman that had had
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been so heavily damaged that they were
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kind of you know parting it out so a
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fellow collector was kind enough to sell
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me the speaker and the one that had the
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the sticker on it so thank you so uh
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yeah just a little bit more about the
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Harvard the Harvard was part of the
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fender lineup from 1955 until 1960 it
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never changed you know it was only in
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this narrow panel version it was never
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wide panel or TV panel and never went to
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brown tolex or anything else this is the
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only version of the amp you know it has
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two 6v sixes
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it has a 686 in v1 v2 is a 12 X 7 and
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then it has the 2 6v sixes in a 5 y 3
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rectifier and it's volume tone 3 inputs
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the number one input is you know kind of
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full strength and then the other two are
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attenuated so if you had something with
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like really high output or a microphone
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you might want to you could plug those
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into one of the attenuated inputs of
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course again the p10 our speaker pine
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cabinet really light really easy to
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carry around great sounding
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and it's kind of the Steve Cropper ramp
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so that's what he used on you know
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everything that he did green onions all
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the way up until he recorded soul man
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with Sam and Dave and at that point he
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switched to a black face super reverb
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and but he returned to the Harvard when
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they recorded dock of the bay for the
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overdub for the for the tracking session
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he played acoustic which you can hear
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the acoustic you know very beginning of
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the song and then he overdubbed and I
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think it was because he was over dubbing
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that he used the harvard's to the super
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reverb
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and yeah and as far as we know we didn't
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really use the amp much you know past
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that so and now the amp Croppers Harvard
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is at the Smithsonian now in Washington
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DC so so what happened to the Harvard
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well they've got it kind of got squashed
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out of the lineup so originally the
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bottom you know of the line was the
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champ and then of course was a class a
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single-ended meaning a single output
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tube you know had just had a sit 166 you
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know like five watts or so and then they
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had the Princeton was a step up above
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that and it was still a single-ended amp
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at that point and it still had a six or
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single 6v6
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still like six or eight watts well the
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Harvard was the step above the Princeton
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and it had to 6v6 tubes and it had a
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10-inch speaker instead of like an eight
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and so that's what you know because it
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was kind of like they had the two Ivy
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League amps they had the Princeton and
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Harvard and the Harvard was the step up
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well when Leo went to the brown amps in
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like 61 he he decided to eliminate the
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Harvard and it seems like the Harvard
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was not a popular amp because they're
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rare they're incredibly rare I mean I
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see TremmoLuxe's and vibroLuxe's and
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baseman's you know tweed ones you know
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fairly often but a Harvard is kind of
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hard to come by and yeah I got
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eliminated so the brown Princeton meant
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the death of the Harvard so now people
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talk about some Harvard's going
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the factory that only had a single
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output tube and an 8 inch speaker and
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that sounds like they were using kind of
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leftover Harvard badges with you know
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some tweed Princeton parts when the the
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Brown Princeton was already out too but
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they're very few of those so yeah that's
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the amp I love it and the reason I love
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it is it's completely different than my
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deluxe reverb and the deluxe reverb is
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my favorite amp and I have two of them I
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have a 65 in a 67 blackface and and then
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this is my other amp so I only own three
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guitar amps. Two Deluxe's and this Harvard
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and I love the Harvard because it has
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completely its own sound you know it
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doesn't you know doesn't sound anything
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like a blackface deluxe and in fact the
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reason why I don't like the Princeton
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Reverb is not because it didn't sound
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great it's because it's like every time
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I play through a Princeton it sounds
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like a deluxe but without the bigger
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cabinet and the bigger speaker and I
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always miss the deluxe so if I'm gonna
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do like a grab-and-go amp and just you
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know going over to a friend's house or
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something this is what I'm gonna take it
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records great has a tight you know great
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sound you can play a kind of more
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Western Swing II type of stuff on it
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[Music]
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it's very obviously it's very dry you
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know it doesn't have any type of exit
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I'm not using any effects with it today
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you know it's just guitar into the amp
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yeah it's a it's a great fun amp and so
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being able to get this amp kind of
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connected my love of you know vintage
16:45
fender and my love of Steve Cropper and
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all those great
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Arlie records and so to me it's kind of
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like you know with I kind of have the
16:55
Reggie younger and James Burton kind of
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thing with the deluxe and this is kind
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of the the Cropper thing and those kind
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of covers some of my favorite Telecaster
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sounds I think I'll uh I'm gonna put
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together a Spotify playlist of Cropper
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stuff that that would that features the
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Harvard and so you can hear a lot of
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that stuff and I think it's yeah it has
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such a great sound yeah bootleg and
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green onions and all those things so
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yeah so the Fender Harvard Steve Cropper
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I still listen to Cropper all the time
17:34
with Booker T and the MGS I recently
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read Booker T Jones is a time is tight
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book which was great I highly recommend
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that I'll also put some links to some
17:44
different books on Stax and it may be
17:49
even like an instructional book or
17:51
something like that in in the
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description for you know things if you
17:54
want to really dig deep if you want to
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dig even deeper on the Harvard my fellow
18:00
writer at vintage guitar magazine Dave
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hunter who's an amazing writer he's
18:06
written a bunch of you know guitar books
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he did a full article on the Harvard for
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vintage guitar magazine and I will put
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the link to that if you really want to
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get in you know deep on to you know the
18:18
the tubes and and
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more into the nitty-gritty on that so
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that's it I hope you've enjoyed it
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yeah I just I love this I love having it
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you know it's kind of like being one of
18:31
those things that I wanted as a kid and
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I was able to find and wasn't like crazy
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expensive and yeah so I hope you all are
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having a great week I know this is you
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know crazy times right now but I hope
18:44
you'll keep watching the show and this
18:46
can be a fun distraction I know it is
18:48
for me I'm so appreciative of everyone
18:50
that has subscribed and everyone that's
18:53
commented and everyone that said nice
18:54
things and even people have said not
18:56
some nice things like saying I look like
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Fred Flintstone or saying I picked my
19:01
nose or anything like that those are
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just those are hilarious so anyway I
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hope you'll have a great week and I'll
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see you next time bye bye