>‘Well there weren’t amps.’” Albeit a simplification, Setzer’s quip is pretty accurate.
Seems like Setzer can quip pretty accurately from time to time. Not too many like him.
For almost 20 years starting in the early 1960's, guitar amplifiers got more capable every year in ways that professionals could appreciate.
Santana was a good example, before Woodstock he was already developing his maxed single-note lead guitar tone & style. He's always been the bandleader and never intended to do vocals so his flambuoyant instrumental style makes for a good frontman, his vocalists over the years have been professional sidemen. Every year he would come back with better amps than the year before, same with lots of classic rockers, like Steppenwolf or the Beach Boys. You could see the smile on their faces as they played last year's hits with their new-found stonk. Better equpment each year than had ever existed before.
Before that it was not too easy to make single-string guitar notes loud enough to stand out from the mix and substitute for the original rock & roll melody instrument, the saxophone.
Players needed to bang on all six strings at a time just to be heard, keeping them in the rhythm section. Plus it took a while for solid-body guitars to proliferate, which could actually be cranked without feedback.
Vocalists had to fight feedback too and were mostly the only electified member of a big band or jazz group.
Nobody really had enough satisfying power for any of this until the 1960's.
The 1950's Fender Bassman preferred by Setzer for his lead guitar playing is only a 50-watt amplifier, not really voiced differently than other amps sold for 6-string guitarists. There was just no reverb or tremolo on a Bassman since bass players really did not need effects. It had strong enough speakers to be run at full volume where the tubes were easily overdriven to some tasty distortion for guitarists but bass players growing up all said WTF. It wasn't good enough for rock bass with only 50W when you really need about 300W for clean bass to be as loud as an acoustic drum kit. But cranked all the way up a 50W amp is barely loud enough for lead guitar though.
When you think about it, when the Bassman was designed it was intended to make Fender's new solid-body basses as loud as an acoustic string bass. Otherwise you wouldn't hear anything. That's really about all it will do for a bass, man.
Ampeg was a bit ahead of Fender at the time, their amps were designed to make an acoustic string bass louder to begin with so they could be heard along with all the horns.