screamingdaisy
Well-known member
I recently traded my LSS combo with ifailedshapes for his Stiletto Ace. The LSS was a cool amp that really excelled at a couple of tones I used it for, but overall it wasn't quite what I was looking for in an amp and it had a lot of crossover with tones my Mark V was capable of so it was getting seeing a lot of use. With any luck he'll find more use for it than I did.
My first impressions of the Stiletto Ace are that I'm really impressed. I have very little prior experience with a Stiletto (1 time, low volume in a store) and was a little nervous due to the constant complaints that it's too bright... particularly with V30s. All I can say is that I don't know what's up with people... within about 5 minutes I had a thick, chewy tone dialled in and was most impressed. Yeah, if you do the Mesa thing and set all the knobs to 12:00 crunch mode gives you a tone reminiscent of crushed glass, but if you dial it in like a Marshall it sounds kind of like a Marshall.
I was really taken by surprise by the liquid gain mode. I didn't expect a Stiletto to produce the amount of gain/compression that it does. It's a seriously sweet lead mode that I think I'll make a lot of use of.
Tite Gain mode was also kind of cool. It's kind of like crunch mode but with more gain (I like Crunch mode better). I don't remember what the clean sounded like.... although I'm sure it was alright. I mostly used crunch mode with the guitar's volume backed off for cleans, which sound really good in that mid heavy, EL34 sort of way.
Anyway, it's a sweet *** rock and roll amp. I don't know what the Deuce/Trident are like, but the Ace produces just enough sag to make things interesting rather than stiff. I can't believe it doesn't get more respect considering how sweet it sounds.
And as a bonus, it looks sweet as f*ck!
*** And for reference purposes, ifailedshapes shipping was quick and the packaging was outstanding. The amp arrived in perfect working order. ***
My first impressions of the Stiletto Ace are that I'm really impressed. I have very little prior experience with a Stiletto (1 time, low volume in a store) and was a little nervous due to the constant complaints that it's too bright... particularly with V30s. All I can say is that I don't know what's up with people... within about 5 minutes I had a thick, chewy tone dialled in and was most impressed. Yeah, if you do the Mesa thing and set all the knobs to 12:00 crunch mode gives you a tone reminiscent of crushed glass, but if you dial it in like a Marshall it sounds kind of like a Marshall.
I was really taken by surprise by the liquid gain mode. I didn't expect a Stiletto to produce the amount of gain/compression that it does. It's a seriously sweet lead mode that I think I'll make a lot of use of.
Tite Gain mode was also kind of cool. It's kind of like crunch mode but with more gain (I like Crunch mode better). I don't remember what the clean sounded like.... although I'm sure it was alright. I mostly used crunch mode with the guitar's volume backed off for cleans, which sound really good in that mid heavy, EL34 sort of way.
Anyway, it's a sweet *** rock and roll amp. I don't know what the Deuce/Trident are like, but the Ace produces just enough sag to make things interesting rather than stiff. I can't believe it doesn't get more respect considering how sweet it sounds.
And as a bonus, it looks sweet as f*ck!
*** And for reference purposes, ifailedshapes shipping was quick and the packaging was outstanding. The amp arrived in perfect working order. ***
