Jump to content

The Amp Thread!


Soni
 Share

Recommended Posts

So I've been looking into getting a decent-to-good amp at some point in the near future, and I think I've settled on one but would like other thoughts. Looking between $400 and $600. I don't play often enough (or well enough) to get a decent tube amp. I feel like the upkeep and care is more than I want given where I am in my playing (2 young kids make it hard to plug in much), although I was eyeing up the Peavey classic 50. I generally look for nice cleans and use pedals for effects and was looking into the Hughes & Kettner edition blue 60R. Then I stumbled across the H&K Zentera. Never thought of a modeling amp, but this one intrigues me. I've seen plenty of praise for this amp here, but has anyone played the combo? Seems like a good bedroom amp that could potentially gig down the road if I ever do that again. Any other suggestions? Looking to replace my mid 80's Fender Stage Lead, so I would guess most anything would be an improvement. I play blues, classic rock, and metal and use a Gibson Midtown with P90s and a BC Rich Warlock

 

Pound for pound, one of the best amps ever made

 

1980s Laney AOR Pro Tube Lead 30 watt combo ( all tube )

 

They pop up on eBay from time to time .. Realistically, they usually go for $300-$400 although some sellers start them higher

 

For hard rock, metal and blues, this amp cannot be beat

 

Yes those AORs were the best for metal in the late 80s. I had one and it did metal very well. not much else but fantastic for metal and pretty damn cheap.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

After having a Mesa Boogie Lonestar Classic amp for 12 years, I finally acquired it's little brother companion amp, the Mesa Boogie Lonestar Special. I've loved the Special for quite a while now, but never wanted to pull the trigger on getting one. Instead, I opted for a Mesa Boogie Mark V, and a Fender Deluxe Reverb (twice.) But a couple of weeks ago I was in my favorite guitar shop and saw a new Special displayed with the rest of the amps. A week and a half later, I was back in the shop hoping I could work out a trade with the owner. I was willing to give up the Mark V (it is a brilliant amp, but I found that for years I was only using it to get the sounds that I could already get from my Lonestar Classic.) I was also willing to give up my John Petrucci Music Man guitar that I've owned as long as I've owned my Lonestar Classic. It is a great guitar, but it is one of five that I own, and it was never getting played.

 

I paid $1300 for the Mark V new back in 2013 when Guitar Center was dumping all if their Mesa Boogie amps at half price because they had terminated their contract with them. The shop owner gave me $1200 for the amp. Not bad for years of ownership. I paid $1700 for the Music Man back in 2007, and the shop owner gave me $1200 for it, which was really a big shock considering I'd been trying to sell him that guitar for several years, and he wasn't even interested. The Special was $1999, so I got the amp and a check for $401. I still can't believe it. :LOL:

 

Here's the Lonestar Classic.

 

http://ampandguitar.com/shop/catalog/images/Mesa.JPG

 

 

And here's the Lonestar Special.

 

preview.jpg

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Mav, any difference in wattage?

 

The Lonestar Classic has four 6L6 tunes in the power section for 100 or 50 watts.

 

The Lonestar Special has four EL84 tubes in the power section for 30, 15, or 5 watts of power.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I haven't gigged for a couple years, but for several years I gigged regularly with a Fender Supersonic 22 and LOVED it! Great clean and crunch channels, pretty light, great projection and coverage for a 1X12, and very reliable. And my BOSS ME70 sounded fantastic through the effects loop. :7up:
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I haven't gigged for a couple years, but for several years I gigged regularly with a Fender Supersonic 22 and LOVED it! Great clean and crunch channels, pretty light, great projection and coverage for a 1X12, and very reliable. And my BOSS ME70 sounded fantastic through the effects loop. :7up:

 

Those are really pretty good amps. I have a Fender silver face Deluxe Reverb reissue that I really enjoy.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yup, I'm mostly a Strat guy and played Showmaster FMTs in my cover band. (Custom Shop flame maple top HSS Strats.) There's just something about a Fender amp with a Strat that you can't beat. A Strat with a Marshall can be cool as well, but is a whole different enchilada. :cool:
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yup, I'm mostly a Strat guy and played Showmaster FMTs in my cover band. (Custom Shop flame maple top HSS Strats.) There's just something about a Fender amp with a Strat that you can't beat. A Strat with a Marshall can be cool as well, but is a whole different enchilada. :cool:

 

You couldn't be more right about a Strat being played through a Fender amp. The amps are voiced perfectly for those single coil and the 2 and 4 positions on the 5-way switch. My Telecaster and Gretsch Electromatic sound awesome through my DR, as well. Makes sense though, that Fender would make their amps to sound great with their guitars and vice versa.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Check out this video about The Wizard, from HOOK amps (a Dutch one-man business). Crazy stuff but very, very cool!

The amp is a little bit expensive (€2,850) but if I could afford it, there's no doubt that I would instantly get this thing.

Sounds really killer and has some fantastic, well-conceived features!

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDUi9vXqnEk

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That's impressive. Just seeing the knobs turn with each preset change was cool. The high gain tones were excellent. Tubes, baby!

Yeah, the turning knobs is a cool gimmick and very helpful since the master volume isn't affected when changing a preset. I love that solution. The amp is a beast!

The guy who made this video has also done some inspirational and impressive guitar videos.

I like this one here...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zoq_kNLpth8

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Haven't posted in a while... but I'm a Lifeson tone nut / chaser. I've been using a Splawn Supersport 50W EL34. But as of late, I'm running a Kingsley Maiden D (clean tube pre) and Kingsley Constable (plexi tube pre) into the FX return of the amp and use a swticher wtih pedals to get my Alex tone.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Haven't posted in a while... but I'm a Lifeson tone nut / chaser. I've been using a Splawn Supersport 50W EL34. But as of late, I'm running a Kingsley Maiden D (clean tube pre) and Kingsley Constable (plexi tube pre) into the FX return of the amp and use a swticher wtih pedals to get my Alex tone.

 

sounds cool

Link to comment
Share on other sites

After years (since 2007) of owning and hawking tube amplifiers over solid state, and later modeling amps, I took the next logical step, and purchased a Kemper Profiling Amp. :LOL:

 

What I actually bought was the Kemper Power Head and a 1x12 Kemper Kabinet so that I could get the "amp in the room" experience. I don't have any recording or p.a. equipment, so I don't have any FRFR speakers that I could hear the amp through. And I don't gig anywhere (currently) to go "direct out" to. So the head with a power amp built in, running a passive speaker in the Kabinet, is what made sense.

 

Once I got the amp and booted it up, I had to update the operating system, twice. The first update got me to the point where the amp could be run by the Rig Manager app on my desktop computer. The second update got me to the latest version of the OS. So from the Rig Manager, I can switch amp profiles being used with the click of my mouse. I can also swap built in effects in and out of the signal chain, as well as tinker with the individual effects, and finally, I can select from 19 speaker imprints (Celestion Vintage, Green, Blue, Cream, various Jensens, etc.) that drastically affect the configuration of the custom speaker to make them sound reasonably like the intended speaker.

 

But how does it sound, feel, play?

 

Overall, it's great!

 

The Kabinet is closed back, and I think that affects the sound and feel of some amp cabs that are naturally open back by design. Specifically certain Fender combo amps that have open back cabs. The sound isn't necessarily as broad or open, especially if you A/B it with the real thing. It's a small difference, but it is there. One of my early on favorite profiles is that of a Fender Vibro King. It's got a great clean blues sound that is I put a little reverb on, and use the on board Green Scream overdrive pedal, I get really close to my Deluxe Reverb or Lonestar Special.

 

Where things get really good are with the medium to high gain profiles, specifically for Marshall JTM 45, various Plexi, and 80's Marshalls, as well as higher gain Mesa Boogie sounds like from the Mark V and Dual Rectifiers. Here is where the closed back cabinet design really makes sense. It tightens up and focuses the tone and the bottom end.

 

One type of amp that I've not had any experience with is Vox. They are famous in rock, but I was never interested in getting one. But I love the AC10, 15, and 30 profiles that I've tried. Get a good profile, strum a few chords, and it's immediately like, "Yeah! that's that sound!"

 

The amp came with 277 profiles pre-loaded, and there are an additional 16,000+ free available on the Rig Manager. They're not all great, or even good, necessarily. But there are so many that are great. I'd have to own dozens of amps to have all the tonal options I get with the Profiler.

 

The Kabinet is relatively new in the Kemper world (it came out earlier this year.) In the future, I know they are going to release power Kabinets that will work with their standard Profilers without the power amp section built in. Maybe they will eventually release 1x12, 2x12 open back cabs, or 4x12 closed back cabs. One thing you can do is buy the speaker (Kemper Kone) separately, and install it (or them) in your own cab. I may even be tempted to try my hand at cabinet building to experiment with these possibilities.

 

Overall, I'm very satisfied with this purchase. I broke down the shipping boxes and packing material a couple of days ago to go out with the trash, because it's not going back. I've had a blast playing it, especially the high gain stuff. I'm not much of a metal player, but my Les Paul going through the Dual Rectifier profile is amazing to thrash around on, and puts a huge smile of fun on my face.

Edited by Maverick
  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Kemper update 5 weeks later.

 

I've had a little more than a month with the Kemper since I posted above, and it keeps getting better and more fun. A couple of weeks ago I purchased the remote foot controller, which opens up a whole new world for using the amp.

 

With the Kemper, an amp instance is called a profile. A profile with effects attached to it (or not, but usually you'll put something, even if it is just a noise gate, EQ, or reverb,) is called a rig. You can make a collection of up to five rigs and that is called a performance. The foot controller gives you the ability to scroll through performances with dedicated up and down scrolling switches, and then there are five switches giving you access to all five rigs in the performance. Plus there are four switches to turn off and on multiple effects on each rig. There's also a switch to activate the internal tuner, and a switch for tap tempo. The five rig switches can also function as a looper.

 

The Kemper can store up to 1,000 rigs and 125 performances. If you are in a band with a 30 song set list, you can build a performance for each song and have everything easily at your feet. If you're going to a blues jam, you can make a single performance that will cover pretty much everything you'll need. It's just amazing how these pieces are all integrated with each other.

 

Kemper released a new software version a couple of weeks ago that had two new overdrive effects added. The first is called the Full OC Drive which is an emulation of a Fulltone OCD. It's controls include Volume, Gain, Tone, and a button to select High Peak or Low Peak, just like the pedal. The other drive is called the Kemper Drive. It models a TS 808, a Klon, a Blues Breaker, a King of Tone, a Timmy, and a Horizon Precision Drive. The Kemper already had a good Tube Screamer they called the Green Scream, and but it's great t have another option that is even more tweakable.

 

I've looked into a different speaker cab possibility, and I found that Mojotone makes a 2x12 open back empty cab. That would be a great solution to get that and two Kones.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Kemper update 5 weeks later.

 

I've had a little more than a month with the Kemper since I posted above, and it keeps getting better and more fun. A couple of weeks ago I purchased the remote foot controller, which opens up a whole new world for using the amp.

 

With the Kemper, an amp instance is called a profile. A profile with effects attached to it (or not, but usually you'll put something, even if it is just a noise gate, EQ, or reverb,) is called a rig. You can make a collection of up to five rigs and that is called a performance. The foot controller gives you the ability to scroll through performances with dedicated up and down scrolling switches, and then there are five switches giving you access to all five rigs in the performance. Plus there are four switches to turn off and on multiple effects on each rig. There's also a switch to activate the internal tuner, and a switch for tap tempo. The five rig switches can also function as a looper.

 

The Kemper can store up to 1,000 rigs and 125 performances. If you are in a band with a 30 song set list, you can build a performance for each song and have everything easily at your feet. If you're going to a blues jam, you can make a single performance that will cover pretty much everything you'll need. It's just amazing how these pieces are all integrated with each other.

 

Kemper released a new software version a couple of weeks ago that had two new overdrive effects added. The first is called the Full OC Drive which is an emulation of a Fulltone OCD. It's controls include Volume, Gain, Tone, and a button to select High Peak or Low Peak, just like the pedal. The other drive is called the Kemper Drive. It models a TS 808, a Klon, a Blues Breaker, a King of Tone, a Timmy, and a Horizon Precision Drive. The Kemper already had a good Tube Screamer they called the Green Scream, and but it's great t have another option that is even more tweakable.

 

I've looked into a different speaker cab possibility, and I found that Mojotone makes a 2x12 open back empty cab. That would be a great solution to get that and two Kones.

 

Mojotone makes good stuff. Just for comparison check out Avatar speakers. I've had one of their oversize 2x12 cabs for years and it's super well built. Their prices used to be really cheap considering the quality of their builds but they may more expensive now.

 

https://avatarspeakers.com/

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Kemper update 5 weeks later.

 

I've had a little more than a month with the Kemper since I posted above, and it keeps getting better and more fun. A couple of weeks ago I purchased the remote foot controller, which opens up a whole new world for using the amp.

 

With the Kemper, an amp instance is called a profile. A profile with effects attached to it (or not, but usually you'll put something, even if it is just a noise gate, EQ, or reverb,) is called a rig. You can make a collection of up to five rigs and that is called a performance. The foot controller gives you the ability to scroll through performances with dedicated up and down scrolling switches, and then there are five switches giving you access to all five rigs in the performance. Plus there are four switches to turn off and on multiple effects on each rig. There's also a switch to activate the internal tuner, and a switch for tap tempo. The five rig switches can also function as a looper.

 

The Kemper can store up to 1,000 rigs and 125 performances. If you are in a band with a 30 song set list, you can build a performance for each song and have everything easily at your feet. If you're going to a blues jam, you can make a single performance that will cover pretty much everything you'll need. It's just amazing how these pieces are all integrated with each other.

 

Kemper released a new software version a couple of weeks ago that had two new overdrive effects added. The first is called the Full OC Drive which is an emulation of a Fulltone OCD. It's controls include Volume, Gain, Tone, and a button to select High Peak or Low Peak, just like the pedal. The other drive is called the Kemper Drive. It models a TS 808, a Klon, a Blues Breaker, a King of Tone, a Timmy, and a Horizon Precision Drive. The Kemper already had a good Tube Screamer they called the Green Scream, and but it's great t have another option that is even more tweakable.

 

I've looked into a different speaker cab possibility, and I found that Mojotone makes a 2x12 open back empty cab. That would be a great solution to get that and two Kones.

 

Mojotone makes good stuff. Just for comparison check out Avatar speakers. I've had one of their oversize 2x12 cabs for years and it's super well built. Their prices used to be really cheap considering the quality of their builds but they may more expensive now.

 

https://avatarspeakers.com/

 

Prices seem inline with the Mojotone cabinets. So it's good to know there is another option out there. Thanks!

 

Looks like a going rate for a 2x12 is right around $300. The going rate for a Kemper Kone is $180 x 2 = $360. So with taxes, we're looking at around $700.

Edited by Maverick
Link to comment
Share on other sites

So here's the Kemper, the Kabinet, and the remote foot controller.

 

https://flic.kr/p/2kd9QEx

 

Hope you are planning on gigging that rig in the future, it would be a terrible waste otherwise.....

 

I will if/when I get the opportunity. But honestly it is a lot of fun to play just at the house.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

So here's the Kemper, the Kabinet, and the remote foot controller.

 

https://flic.kr/p/2kd9QEx

 

Hope you are planning on gigging that rig in the future, it would be a terrible waste otherwise.....

 

I will if/when I get the opportunity. But honestly it is a lot of fun to play just at the house.

 

Yeah, I don't see it as a waste to have an involved guitar rig and not gig with it. For those of us who aren't in a position to be in a band, building a rig is a hobby. It can be an expensive one, but it's still a hobby. I've been building mine piece-by-piece for the past 30+ years, and I won't venture to guess how much money has gone into it, but adding pieces, swapping amp tubes, trying new pedals, making modifications, tackling problems, and ending up with something that works well and sounds good is really rewarding. There are plenty of hobbies that are way more expensive.

  • Like 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

So here's the Kemper, the Kabinet, and the remote foot controller.

 

https://flic.kr/p/2kd9QEx

 

Hope you are planning on gigging that rig in the future, it would be a terrible waste otherwise.....

 

I will if/when I get the opportunity. But honestly it is a lot of fun to play just at the house.

 

Yeah, I don't see it as a waste to have an involved guitar rig and not gig with it. For those of us who aren't in a position to be in a band, building a rig is a hobby. It can be an expensive one, but it's still a hobby. I've been building mine piece-by-piece for the past 30+ years, and I won't venture to guess how much money has gone into it, but adding pieces, swapping amp tubes, trying new pedals, making modifications, tackling problems, and ending up with something that works well and sounds good is really rewarding. There are plenty of hobbies that are way more expensive.

 

I still need to add an expression pedal or two so I can get volume pedal and wah pedal going on the same rig, in addition to whatever else I can take advantage of effects wise with an expression pedal.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So here's the Kemper, the Kabinet, and the remote foot controller.

 

https://flic.kr/p/2kd9QEx

 

Hope you are planning on gigging that rig in the future, it would be a terrible waste otherwise.....

 

I will if/when I get the opportunity. But honestly it is a lot of fun to play just at the house.

 

Yeah, I don't see it as a waste to have an involved guitar rig and not gig with it. For those of us who aren't in a position to be in a band, building a rig is a hobby. It can be an expensive one, but it's still a hobby. I've been building mine piece-by-piece for the past 30+ years, and I won't venture to guess how much money has gone into it, but adding pieces, swapping amp tubes, trying new pedals, making modifications, tackling problems, and ending up with something that works well and sounds good is really rewarding. There are plenty of hobbies that are way more expensive.

 

I still need to add an expression pedal or two so I can get volume pedal and wah pedal going on the same rig, in addition to whatever else I can take advantage of effects wise with an expression pedal.

 

Expression pedals are dicey. Spend too little and you'll get one made of plastic and has a pedal that doesn't stay put when you take your foot off. Spend too much and you'll get pissed off for spending so much on a piece of gear that you don't use that often. After buying a couple of crap pedals I settled on this one:

 

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/SingleExp--electro-harmonix-expression-pedal-single-output

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...