dudleydawson
Well-known member
- Joined
- Mar 2, 2010
- Messages
- 119
- Reaction score
- 0
Once upon a time, i sold my Marshall DSL50 because i wanted a combo amp. i really liked the boogies i had heard - so i went amp shopping and came home with an F-30. that was my main gigging amp for 4 years.
so - with my gigging days on hold - with bills to pay, my career in full swing, and family being the focus of my life - i decide to reward myself with a new amp for my sonic basement adventures. idea being that this would be my only amp purchase for decades.
immediately i knew i wanted a Mark V. i got distracted for a little bit. dabbled with an Electra Dyne... found it to be too much volume and not smooth enough for me - so i had a great transaction with a LSC owner and we traded. the LSC is an awesome amp... i had no intentions of ever getting rid of it until i got my hands on a MkV about a month ago. tried it for ~30 mins, went home, and posted the LSC for sale. sold it to a board member - sold a handful of pedals (i wouldn't need them anymore, after all!).
i started talking to Steve and Rob at Russo Music Center, who i met on this board - PLUG ALERT - and they hooked me up with a MkV head...(Serial # 13xx! silver bar - no ugly-*** tube cage! does that count as N.O.S.?) :lol:
they were great guys to work with - smooth transaction and they shipped it out to me real quick!
my main guitar is a double fat-strat with SDs (alnico pro II/JB w a 5 way switch), and i'm playing the head thru a mesa 3/4 back 112 cab.
i'm just getting started with this amp - but a few notes so far -
it took be minutes to find some sexy high gain tones out of the MkV i auditioned at GC. i could NOT get the same tones out of my own amp UNTIL i replaced V1 with a SPAX-7. i gotta say - i'm not a huge tube-changing guy - but i've got a handful of these, and i am a believer. they have made every amp i owned sound better. i also replaced V2 and V3 with some older mesa preamp tubes (white label russian-2's) - same thing - i have consistently liked them better than the newer stock mesa tubes.
very pleasantly surprised by mkI mode. prob my favorite at this point.
i've been playing primarily in fat clean, bold, 45W, diode, with the gain nearly maxed. i'm looking for a big, thick bass response which turns to smooth glass as i play the higher strings... i'm almost to the sound i want but not quite there yet.
haven't played too much with channel 3 yet. when i do - i dial in the audition settings and just rip. i have plenty of experimenting left to do.
if anyone has any ideas on how to achieve a clean sound which sounds EL84'ish/vox'ish/LSS'ish - i would LOVE to hear them.
happy holidays everyone!
so - with my gigging days on hold - with bills to pay, my career in full swing, and family being the focus of my life - i decide to reward myself with a new amp for my sonic basement adventures. idea being that this would be my only amp purchase for decades.
immediately i knew i wanted a Mark V. i got distracted for a little bit. dabbled with an Electra Dyne... found it to be too much volume and not smooth enough for me - so i had a great transaction with a LSC owner and we traded. the LSC is an awesome amp... i had no intentions of ever getting rid of it until i got my hands on a MkV about a month ago. tried it for ~30 mins, went home, and posted the LSC for sale. sold it to a board member - sold a handful of pedals (i wouldn't need them anymore, after all!).
i started talking to Steve and Rob at Russo Music Center, who i met on this board - PLUG ALERT - and they hooked me up with a MkV head...(Serial # 13xx! silver bar - no ugly-*** tube cage! does that count as N.O.S.?) :lol:
they were great guys to work with - smooth transaction and they shipped it out to me real quick!
my main guitar is a double fat-strat with SDs (alnico pro II/JB w a 5 way switch), and i'm playing the head thru a mesa 3/4 back 112 cab.
i'm just getting started with this amp - but a few notes so far -
it took be minutes to find some sexy high gain tones out of the MkV i auditioned at GC. i could NOT get the same tones out of my own amp UNTIL i replaced V1 with a SPAX-7. i gotta say - i'm not a huge tube-changing guy - but i've got a handful of these, and i am a believer. they have made every amp i owned sound better. i also replaced V2 and V3 with some older mesa preamp tubes (white label russian-2's) - same thing - i have consistently liked them better than the newer stock mesa tubes.
very pleasantly surprised by mkI mode. prob my favorite at this point.
i've been playing primarily in fat clean, bold, 45W, diode, with the gain nearly maxed. i'm looking for a big, thick bass response which turns to smooth glass as i play the higher strings... i'm almost to the sound i want but not quite there yet.
haven't played too much with channel 3 yet. when i do - i dial in the audition settings and just rip. i have plenty of experimenting left to do.
if anyone has any ideas on how to achieve a clean sound which sounds EL84'ish/vox'ish/LSS'ish - i would LOVE to hear them.
happy holidays everyone!
