Does your Mark IV do this???

[guitardude05]

if i set the Lead bass, mid, and treble EQ all to zero, all of the gain goes away. it is like playing through the clean channel with a mild overdrive pedal on. and if i set the Lead gain higher than 8 with those EQ settings, then the amp goes completely clean, no gain at all. as soon as i turn up 1 of the EQ knobs i get gain. Do your Mark IV's do this?

i have tried tons of tubes in the past, never got that sound i was looking for. i have just discovered this little oddity so i am wondering if something is wrong with my amp or if this is normal?

i have played on the Mark IV for so long that i think it would be difficult to find another amp that suits my songs. it sort of defines me at the moment. but at the same time, every time i play through my amp i just get so depressed with my sound and feel sick to my stomach. i am only happy with the tone about once a month. bahhhhh.

 

[ryjan]

Welcome to my world brother. :lol:
Ive found out some pretty cool sh!t about the MK IV just by luck (and countless hours tweaking). Just about every knob on the lead channel effects gain. Thats rule #1. Where are you running the master at. I had mine on 2 and couldnt figure out why with the gain dimed it still sounded like I was playing a flat, hollow log. I was totally choking the preamp. Turn the output down a bit and keep the master above 4 or 5 and that alone may bring your amp back to life. The mid and trebble knobs are really important to "feel" I've found. You almost have to run the trebble above 6.5 or more to get the gain really crunchy and I like the mid above 6 as well, that really fills the sound up nicely after dialing up all that trebble and helps balance things out. Dont worry about the tone yet, thats what the GEQ is for. The bass isnt as sensitive and I keep it around 1 or 2. I run this on triode in either simul or class a depending on volume requirements through a 212 recto cab and I think it almost sounds perfect like this without the GEQ. By the way, why the hell are you turning everything down for? Dont do that. :lol: As far as anything being wrong with your amp, dont worry, all of them do that. When I first brought mine home I had all the tone knobs set at zero when I turned it on and I almost pissed myself because I thought my new amp was screwed up.

 

[zebpedersen]

Is this not just normal behavior for an amp with an active EQ?

 

[guitardude05]

lol, i was just tweaking around. i got a new MusicMan Luke and it has EMG's in it, with an alder body. its bright as hell, so i was playing around with all the settings. i dont think this amp is meant for use with EMG's, i played a recto in store with the Luke and it was massive sounding.

i always keep the master at 4-5, and channel volume to taste. whenever i want to get the speaker pumping, and i turn up the channel past 2, the amp just turns into a rock. the pick attack (on any guitar) is like taking a baseball bat to the ear drum. not good sounding.

but anyways, thats not a big issue i guess. i have more of an issue getting the thing to open up without sounding shrill and ear piercing. there is some kind of upper mid-range frequency that i just dont like, and the GEQ doesnt take out that sound. so i can either get FAT and pretty DULL, or thin and shrill. there's no FAT and OPEN and SMOOTH.

the only reason i still have the amp is that there is some kind of special tone quality to this amp that i have never found anywhere else. it is a unique twang that i love, but there are other qualities to the amp which i wish weren't there. i hear the tone in different layers. i dont just hear the whole thing as one and go "cool tone dude", i might have a ******* badass high end, but the low end blows, and vice/versa.

i have been tweaking this damn thing for more than 2 years; i think i've covered most of the bases. it is a great love/hate relationship!!

maybe i just need to get a recto and run them simultaneously. get that twang out of the mark, and that sag out of the recto. too bad i cant afford it. lol. :lol:

 

[bryan_kilco]

but you say that Lead Gain above 8 goes completely clean? that doesnt sound right....

 

[guitardude05]

yes it is a little strange.

also another thing that annoys me. when i am on R2 and i switch to R1, there is a huge volume increase in R1 for a split second and it pisses me off. even if R2 is on volume 1 and R1 is on 10, i still get the loud ass pop before it goes to normal volume. now is THAT normal?

 

[MrMarkIII]

Mesa Mark series amps are modified blackface Fender circuits, so if you turn all the tone controls to zero, there's no volume. Same thing happens with a Twin Reverb. Mainly this is because the signal goes through the tone controls before it hits the first pre-amp tube.

 

[ryjan]

Tried it on mine last night. It does the same thing.

 

[guitardude05]

im glad to hear that this is normal, i had suspected it was but i just wanted to make sure.

and i figured out why i wasnt liking the tone.

i just got a SWEET deal on an MM Luke. it has an EMG81 in the neck, and it is an alder body. super bright, and no chunk. so i plug in my gibson sg with JB/59, chuggy and awesome. plug in ibanez s series with dimarzios, chunky as well.

i think to appreciate this amp, one must be playing through a darker guitar, aka, mahogany body and passive pickups. something about mahogany or the pickups makes it so massive sounding. the low end just oozes out and the highs are not shrill at all.

time to sell the Luke... hahahahahaha, who would guess that i enjoy my beat up $600 guitars more than a brand new $1600 guitar. :?:

 

[bryan_kilco]

i have an S-470 and absolutely love it.

 

[mr_fender]

Is this not just normal behavior for an amp with an active EQ?

The knob EQ is a passive pre-gain tone stack that is very similar to blackface Fenders. Turning down all the EQ knobs is the same as turning the gain all the way down. The graphic EQ is active and post gain. The two EQ's behave very differently and have very different effects on the clipping and frequency content of the signal.