I'm sure there is a spare tube around here somewhere or how do you like my tube....

 Rock musician Neil Young is said to own 489 1950s Fender Tweed Deluxe Amps. I'm not making this up. I read it somewhere. There is one particular Deluxe that he acquired sometime in the 1960s that has the voice of God. When Neil plays it the mountains crumble to dust, hippie chicks wearing long skirts, halter tops and ankle bells levitate, those with over active imaginations feel a tingle in their private parts and old Loup-Garou crosses the Sabine River into Texas looking for barbeque. 

Neil always plays that one Deluxe, reportedly no other has that sound he wants but he bought the other 488 just in case backup was required. These are all tube amps and with the war in Ukraine tube amp supplies are affected since most instrument amp tubes are made in Russia and under sanction, China where a factory burned, or Slovakia which as far as I know is still on our side. There are a few audio gear tubes still made in the USA but making tubes is a messy business environmentally and our laws are stricter than elsewhere. I'm sure Neil has a stock of tubes but I don't. 

I own three amps with tubes. Here you see the backside of a 1984 Champ II. It was a couple of years old when I bought it for $85 bucks and it's really not a typical Fender but more in the Marshall or Mesa camp. Clean ones go for $500. A few years ago a friend scavenged tubes from cheap ebay military gear and fixed me up with the 4 tubes this little hot head takes that are late 50s early 60s military spec vintage and tested brand new at the time. It's a little more raucous than I like but that's ok. I'll work with it.   

    

    

Here's a 1978 Fender Bassman 70. I scored it and the matching cabinet in a Nacogdoches pawn shop for $250-$300 (I forget) and excellent examples of this head now go for $700. It has 6 tubes and some years ago I installed a set of Groove Tubes. Fender owns GT and puts them in all amps these days but GT does not make tubes. Most tubes come from the Russian and Chinese plants and just have a famous name stamped on them.   

I had this amp out on the porch recently and stepped into the house for a moment leaving it and a four year old unsupervised. I returned to find it upended. No harm done but don't try this with your modeling amp with digital simulations. 

And here's the big boy. A 1968 Fender Bandmaster Reverb that I purchased in 1982 with original cab  for $400. Looks like these days the head only will set you back about $675 but prices are all over place on gear like this. It's old, it's big, it's heavy, you got to really want it. There are 8 tubes in this head. Looks like mostly RCAs and they might be pretty old. Seems I can recall an occasional but never a whole set.  

Since Covid I have not loaded a big tube amp and taken it anywhere. I load up the little old Texas Red Fender guitar amp and paired with a Sans Amp Bass Drive use it for acoustic bass accompanying acoustic guitars at church. Catch the sound of it on our livestream. I do own a Peavy bass amp that lives up at church for all to use and Morgan has my Fender solid state Ultra Chorus. That is an under sung amp that might become popular with a tube shortage.  

Chances are at this stage of the game I'll limp along with this old gear as long as I can. Western Electric, an American manufacturer of audio tubes is examining the guitar tube market due to current events and you can take a survey here so they have some feed back for business decisions. 

I might have a few odd tubes laying around. Like other things new ones are expensive and NOS still available is for the cork snifters. If I see Neil I'll ask for spares, made in USA please.