New family member

[LesPaul70]

Say "Hi!" to my family Mesa family member. He's a IIv2 (if not obvious from the pic), and that makes a full house of Mesa goodness:

A write-up to follow later, once I'm able put the guitar down and stop playing... Maybe much later.

 

[LesPaul70]

Some background & initial impressions...

It's been a long road that led me to the King. For several years, I had been trying to make up my between RoadKing/Roadster.
Second-hand RKIs and Roadsters were popping up frequently in my area but, somehow, I wasn't sold on either of them. Both seemed to lack something that I specifically wanted. I had played a Roadster so I knew how good its clean sounds were. The cleans on the RKI were...not quite as impressive. And, on the other hand, when you have an amp with so many different modes, it doesn't seem to me that having only 6L6s or EL34s would do justice to all of them. I would never be able to decide whether to put 6L6s or EL34s in a Roadster if I had one!
And then there was the RKII, which had neither of these limitations. But it was heavy as sin and cost a good bit more than either of the other two.

I was mulling over this year after year, until I made the inevitable conclusion. And I'm happy I did - I feel that I made the right decision, for me. If I had picked anything else, I would have been second-guessing forever.

Let me start by saying that the clean sounds are wonderful. Along with the Mark V, this amp has the best cleans of all Mesas I have. (Well, theoretically, the MkIIc+ could have at least as good cleans as the V, but you cannot dial in a great clean sound and a great lead sound on a Mark IIc+ because of the shared controls.) The Fat mode especially is immensely deep and resonant. Actually quite different from the Mark V Fat mode, which may have somewhat better clarity and definition but not that bottomless depth and richness of sound. Both are great, but I would say I prefer the RKII Fat.

Moving on to the semi-distorted/crunch modes, and continuing the inadvertent Mark V comparison, the Mark V would appear to hold an edge, since it offers 3 edge of distortion/low distortion modes (Tweed, Edge, Crunch) compared to the two on the RKII (Tweed, Brit). However, to take real advantage of those sounds, you have to put EL34s in your Mark V. This is where the Progressive Linkage pays off big time. Simply use those modes with a pair of EL34s...and get the Fat mode on 4x6L6 from the same amp. That's...just sick. Unreal.

And it gets even better when you move on to the more gainy modes. Vintage & Modern modes on six power tubes, 4x6L6 + 2xEL34, and 120W power deliver some of the most crushing Recto tones ever heard. Only a Triple Rec could compete with that.

Ok, I could do without cabinet switching (more cabs to lug around? no thank you, sir!) and the second effects loop. But Progressive Linkage...that's got to be one of the best features Mesa ever invented! It's like having 5 different power amps in a single package and being able to assign them on a per channel basis or switch them on the fly, as you please. I'm sad that Mesa hasn't put Progressive Linkage on any amps created after the Road King. It's a killer feature!

So how does the Road King compare, as a Dual Recto, to my old 2-channels?
Pretty well, I would say. No, it doesn't sound exactly like either of them. It's obviously closer to the G than to the C - but there's still a big difference. The King sounds smoother, more even and more modern. It is recognizably a Recto sound, yes, but compared to the G, it is like hearing a post-production track whereas the G delivers the more visceral, raw, 'unprocessed' version of the same basic sound.

 

[LesPaul70]

First live band jam with the King yesterday! A ~90 minute setlist, and as usual, first time live, things do not go quite as expected...

Here's how I used the channels and how things turned out:

Channel 1: There's one sweet acoustic ballad in our setlist. I thought that the lush, rich Fat mode (4x6L6) would serve it well and dialed the mode accordingly. All fine and dandy except that I should have cranked the Treble and/or Presence. The wonderful resonant lows of the Fat mode got kind of lost in the band mix, and without sufficient high sparkle, I could hardly hear myself at times. At least I'll know better next time.

Channel 2: We have a handful of songs that could use a Plexi Marshall style sound. I tried to capture that with the Brit mode and 2xEL34. The result was not quite what I expected, really. My sound was vintage-y enough but lacked body/depth. It was too thin. Also the top end was brittle and unsatisfactory. I tweaked the sound between the songs but never quite got where I wanted to be. Maybe I should have tried 2xEL34+2x6L6? Or Tweed mode on channel 1 instead, and use this channel for the clean ballad?

Channel 3: I set up this channel for a warm Vintage mode Recto sound, with enough midrange fullness for leads. I never could get it sound quite as warm as my old Rev G Rec, and the top end was unsatisfactory again - fizzy, piercing, brittle highs that I hear a lot from modern Mesas. Of course cranking volume helps but not enough. However, when I switched to 2X6L6+2xEL34 (from the usual 4x6L6), I got the exact sound I wanted! The extra bite, midrange body and focus delivered by the EL34s fixed this sound nicely for me.

Channel 4: I set up this channel for a crushing, no-holds-barred, rip-your-face-off Modern distortion. Diode rectification, 4x6L6+2xEL34. This one delivered. In spades. Yes, it too required some volume for the lift-off, but when it did, oh man! It was almost too much for what we played!


Other thoughts/observations:

I was surprised how high I needed to run the channel Masters / Output to hear myself in the band mix. Both were near noon (even on 4x6L6+2xEL34). My old 2-channel Rectos get unbearably loud long before that!

Before the next gig, I really need to use a tape to mark where I want to plug the cords in the back panel and how to set the switches. I spent an inordinate amount of time trying to figure that out in dim light and still couldn't get it right! I had plugged my fx loop send/return cables into external channel footswitch jacks! Good thing I was paranoid enough to doublecheck everything before powering up. (Hate to think what could have happened if I had plugged the cab cables in the wrong jacks!)

The unique mix of EL34+6L6 sound is what I would consider the 'signature' sound of this Recto variant - it is something you don't hear on any other Recto design. And yes, it is very good!