Got Mojo?

[Silvertone Jockey]

Anyone care to discuss mojo? Does t exist? can you disprove it? do you think you have some? any mojo stories to share? I'll start off. I think there is something to mojo. As I currently see things, I think that absolutely on a quantum level your thoughts about anything, especially something you are passionate about like the tools you use or create to make music, will change the outcome of the experiment

And yes I got mojo

Feel free to move this topic to a more appropriate forum if this isn't the place for it

[rjb]

IMO,
This topic belongs in the Lobby, the Parking Lot or one of its sub-levels- the Soap Box or the Storm Drain.

Does mojo exist?
Man, I don't be messin' with that hoodoo stuff.
No black cat bone, gris gris bag, or Johnny Concheroo for me.
No sir, not for me.
You won't catch me selling nothin' down at the crossroads neither.
I do keep a rattlesnake rattle in my fiddle. But that's just to keep the innards clean.

As far as musical instruments having mojo- that's just silly.
Some old instruments that have been played for a long time do retain memories- but that's a different story.
For instance, I once picked up an old banjo at an estate sale and found myself playing a haunting clawhammer version of Little Sadie- a tune that I'd never heard before.
I did find the experience a bit disconcerting- considering that I don't play banjo.

Mojo? Feh.
-rb

[bob p]

[Enzo]

can you disprove it?

Of course not, can;t prove a negative.

[J M Fahey]

Mojo does not exist at all in the Physical world but is very much alive in the Psychological one.
In this area alone, it´s a heavyweight game changer.

Lots of people find sound much improved after using stuff which has NO influence on it at all.

Double blind testing is Mojo killer by definition.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog...t-how-it-works

if you don´t want to read about the full experiment, this is its core:

The placebo effect is not deception, fluke, experimenter bias, or statistical anomaly. It is, instead, a product of expectation. The human brain anticipates outcomes, and anticipation produces those outcomes. The placebo effect is self-fulfilling prophecy, and it follows the patterns you'd predict if the brain were, indeed, producing its own desired outcomes.

[loudthud]

What exactly is Mojo? Is it something that doesn't make any sense, but to some people it's clear as day? Do tube guitar amps have mojo?

JM, on another forum you posted the following question:

I don´t get why a bedroom or at best garage sized player buys a 100W amp... or even 50W ... what for?

Post #29 Link: Still confused about speakers - diyAudio

Since you don't play guitar, you don't know what it feels like to play through a 100W amp. To you, it's just too damned loud, and in many ways you are right. But to a guitar player trying out several amps, the 100W tube amp just gives you more. It makes you sound and play better because it feels better. And to the player, you can never be too loud. It may be that players that are good enough to make a good living just playing guitar are beyond that. But to the hobby or semi-pro player, the 100Wer has mojo. Until someone tells you it's too loud, that's the way you go. Maybe by that time, the player may have learned how to sound as good on a 30W amp.

JM, Please don't take this as a criticism of you or your company's products. I'm sure there are players that think your amps have Mojo and are the best amps made anywhere.

[olddawg]

What exactly is Mojo? Is it something that doesn't make any sense, but to some people it's clear as day? Do tube guitar amps have mojo?

JM, on another forum you posted the following question:



Post #29 Link: Still confused about speakers - diyAudio

Since you don't play guitar, you don't know what it feels like to play through a 100W amp. To you, it's just too damned loud, and in many ways you are right. But to a guitar player trying out several amps, the 100W tube amp just gives you more. It makes you sound and play better because it feels better. And to the player, you can never be too loud. It may be that players that are good enough to make a good living just playing guitar are beyond that. But to the hobby or semi-pro player, the 100Wer has mojo. Until someone tells you it's too loud, that's the way you go. Maybe by that time, the player may have learned how to sound as good on a 30W amp.

JM, Please don't take this as a criticism of you or your company's products. I'm sure there are players that think your amps have Mojo and are the best amps made anywhere.

The mojo is just physics. A hundred watt amp (or several) through big cabs will give you more sustain even clean because of easy and prominent acoustic feedback and other nuances. But unless you are playing arenas, the days of monster amps are pretty much over. The days of the club owner standing by the front door with a db meter trying too keep his cabaret license are upon us. So.. The mojo comes from your talent and choice of gear now. The real people sounded like they sounded no matter what they played. Hendrix sounded like Hendrix on an acoustic 12 string or a Strat through a Marshall.... Same for SRV, Santana, whomever. Personally I love the sound of a 50 watt JTM Marshall dimed. I just can rarely use one anywhere anymore. There is an art to using small gear and pedals. IMHO you never quite get that monster amp tone. But with talent, technique, knowledge, and the right selection of gear you can get very close at a much lower stage volume. You can call that combination mojo as well.

[rjb]

Anyone care to discuss mojo? do you think you have some? any mojo stories to share? ....on a quantum level your thoughts about anything...
And yes I got mojo

The mojo is just physics. A hundred watt amp (or several) through big cabs will give you more sustain even clean because of easy and prominent acoustic feedback and other nuances....

Are you guys on the "same wavelength"? What is your definition of mojo?
Is it some mystical supernatural brain-powered force, or just a powerful amplifier?
And who has a mojo story to share (whatever that means)?

[olddawg]

Are you guy on the "same wavelength"? What is your definition of mojo?
Is it some mystical supernatural brain-powered force, or just a powerful amplifier?
And who has a mojo story to share (whatever that means)?

Lots of technical people on this site. Many technicians, engineers, musicians... Sometimes all 3 in the same person. I don't deal to much in the metaphysical. I do own a Strat that has lost its "mojo" after a refret. I doubt the cause is supernatural. Some people attribute component value drift to "mojo" in certain vintage amplifiers.

[rjb]

I do own a Strat that has lost its "mojo" after a refret. I doubt the cause is supernatural.

Here we have it folks, our first "mojo story" - proof that mojo does exist!

Hey STJ, as OP and self-proclaimed mojo man, how about sharing a few of your own mojo stories?

-rb

[Justin Thomas]

I put a cathode bypass cap on the second stage of, and a new speaker in, an old Lectrolab R500B. That added plenty of Mojo right there...It went from being plinky to Crazy-Horsey. So just add bypass caps to all your cathode resistors = Instant No no. Even the reverb & cathode followers.

Justin

[Silvertone Jockey]

Interesting, I thought that this thread fell like stone with no replies, but anyway I have a mojo story to share. Mojo to me means something that is not physical. It's not in the stuff we make, that is to say the amp you just built doesn't have any mojo, BUT mojo may have been involved in it's creation which could make it special when compared to other amps.

I have a kind of mojo of sorts. scoff if you will but I can usually tell when I come across a broken piece of equipment if it will be an easy repair or not before I ever remove any covers and actually look inside. It's like a 6th sense and it almost never fails me. It works from thousands of miles away even if I'm checking out an item listed as 'parts or repair' on ebay. It doesn't work on anything I'm emotionally invested in however unfortunately, only on things that I could take or leave as far as caring about them is concerned.

Sometimes it fails me though, I recently acquired a Hamer Standard guitar that had a few issues and I just wasn't feeling it and was thinking that I would just finish fixing it and sell or trade it for something else. So I finally got around to finishing the project and that guitar makes noises (in a good way) that I can't reproduce on any of my other guitars. It would have been a huge mistake to sell it based upon what my mojo was telling me about it, probably being that I was already emotionally invested in it with out realizing it

[g1]

For your definition of mojo, I think it would be tough to keep your 'feeling' from becoming a self-fulfilling prophesy, at least for the stuff you have a negative opinion about. And in cases like ebay that you mentioned, you would pass on the particular item, so no way to find out for sure if it was good or bad.

[big_teee]

I Scoff!
I believe in science, & intellect!
Not Mojo, nor hocus pocus!

Mojo
The word originally means a charm or a spell.


Full Definition of mojo
plural mojoes or mojos

: a magic spell, hex, or charm; broadly : magical power <works his mojo on the tennis court>

[eschertron]

I Scoff!
I believe in science, & intellect!
Not Mojo, nor hocus pocus!

Mojo
The word originally means a charm or a spell.


Full Definition of mojo
plural mojoes or mojos

: a magic spell, hex, or charm; broadly : magical power <works his mojo on the tennis court>

I think in the vernacular, the definition of Mojo has been shaded by the likes of the Austin Powers movies, where Mojo is that 'Je Ne Sais Quoi' that combines sang froid, animal magnetism, and a sense of the exotic or rare.

When someone changes a component in their amp and it sounds different (in a good way) then the desire for novelty assigns a "mojo increment" to the change. Each time I change a capacitor, or tube, or guitar pick(!) the novelty compels me to like it better than the 'same old thing' I just had previously. Mojo is a very real and powerful force, because it gives a name and a justification to our hedonic impulse.