Please Help!!!
- Thread starter pennman
- Start date
Help Support The Boogie Board:
YellowJacket
Well-known member
You want a tube practice amp for your apartment?
Hmm, check out Orange Tiny Terror or Vox Nighttrain. Both of these have great crunch and cleans although the Vox is much more vintage sounding. I'm sure you could pick up a theile 1 x 12 or a ported widebody cab to use with these guys.
Hmm, check out Orange Tiny Terror or Vox Nighttrain. Both of these have great crunch and cleans although the Vox is much more vintage sounding. I'm sure you could pick up a theile 1 x 12 or a ported widebody cab to use with these guys.
94Tremoverb
Well-known member
- Joined
- Dec 5, 2009
- Messages
- 1,340
- Reaction score
- 0
Do you mean you need something that will give you those sounds at band volume as well as in the apartment, but weighs a lot less than the Heartbreaker?
I will tell you a story...
In the late 80s and early 90s I used big Marshall amps and cabs. My favorite was the Club & Country combo, which is a 100W 2x12" that probably weighs about 90lbs. I too lived in a second floor apartment, and one night after carrying the Marshall back up the stairs, slipping because I couldn't see where I was going with it held across my chest and hurting myself trying not to drop the stupid **** heavy thing and wake up the whole building, I swore I would get a smaller amp. I measured the power it was putting out at my normal band settings with the MV just under half... 11W!
So I sold it and went and bought a 15W 1x12" combo. For a while I was happy, because it was easy to carry and it was loud enough. In actual outright volume, anyway... but after a while I began to miss the beautiful big clean sound and the effortless power of the distortion, so I gradually got bigger and bigger amps until I was back up to a 50W widebody 1x12". Still not quite right. Finally, years later - and admittedly after I'd moved back to a house, so no stairs - I got fed up with small tone and bought a Tremoverb. And I *wish* I'd done it years before, 100lbs and stairs or not. There is no comparison in sound quality.
I'm not young any more and I'm not a big guy either, I weigh less than 140lbs myself! But I've made myself get used to the Tremoverb, and not swear at it too much for being heavy... it *is* worth it. Think carefully before parting with the Heartbreaker - and consider fitting decent side handles if it's still stock without them, they make a huge difference to how easy it is to move the Tremoverb, I don't think I could do it with just the top handle. The Tremoverb is actually easier to move than a Fender Twin, despite being around 15lbs heavier. I think it just keeps me in shape now
.
And if you do still want a smaller, lighter amp - and one that isn't too expensive nowadays - try a Mesa DC-5. That was my last amp before the Tremoverb, and it's massively loud and full-sounding for such a relatively light amp... it was almost good enough.
I will tell you a story...
In the late 80s and early 90s I used big Marshall amps and cabs. My favorite was the Club & Country combo, which is a 100W 2x12" that probably weighs about 90lbs. I too lived in a second floor apartment, and one night after carrying the Marshall back up the stairs, slipping because I couldn't see where I was going with it held across my chest and hurting myself trying not to drop the stupid **** heavy thing and wake up the whole building, I swore I would get a smaller amp. I measured the power it was putting out at my normal band settings with the MV just under half... 11W!
So I sold it and went and bought a 15W 1x12" combo. For a while I was happy, because it was easy to carry and it was loud enough. In actual outright volume, anyway... but after a while I began to miss the beautiful big clean sound and the effortless power of the distortion, so I gradually got bigger and bigger amps until I was back up to a 50W widebody 1x12". Still not quite right. Finally, years later - and admittedly after I'd moved back to a house, so no stairs - I got fed up with small tone and bought a Tremoverb. And I *wish* I'd done it years before, 100lbs and stairs or not. There is no comparison in sound quality.
I'm not young any more and I'm not a big guy either, I weigh less than 140lbs myself! But I've made myself get used to the Tremoverb, and not swear at it too much for being heavy... it *is* worth it. Think carefully before parting with the Heartbreaker - and consider fitting decent side handles if it's still stock without them, they make a huge difference to how easy it is to move the Tremoverb, I don't think I could do it with just the top handle. The Tremoverb is actually easier to move than a Fender Twin, despite being around 15lbs heavier. I think it just keeps me in shape now
.And if you do still want a smaller, lighter amp - and one that isn't too expensive nowadays - try a Mesa DC-5. That was my last amp before the Tremoverb, and it's massively loud and full-sounding for such a relatively light amp... it was almost good enough.
Don
Well-known member
- Joined
- Jan 12, 2008
- Messages
- 1,468
- Reaction score
- 7
I think he's looking for an amp that sounds great but isn't such a beast to carry up and down stairs every time he wants to play with friends.
That's one of the reasons that I have an Express 5:50 1x12 combo. It weighs about 50 pounds. I can get it up out of my basement, down into my garage, in and out of my car, up into my friend's house, down into his basement, jam for a few hours, carry it back out of his basement, down into his garage, in and out of my car, up into my house and down into my basement without completely throwing my back out!
It sounds great and is versatile, too!
That's one of the reasons that I have an Express 5:50 1x12 combo. It weighs about 50 pounds. I can get it up out of my basement, down into my garage, in and out of my car, up into my friend's house, down into his basement, jam for a few hours, carry it back out of his basement, down into his garage, in and out of my car, up into my house and down into my basement without completely throwing my back out!
It sounds great and is versatile, too!
thanks for all the advice, i dont have a retailer close to me to try different boogies, but definately wanted to stay within the line. and no worries 94tremoverb i have no intention of letting the heartbreaker go, and if it werent for the custom cab id have put side handles on it ages ago. i can handle the occasional trip down and back up with it, but two to three times a week just to jam is a little much.
on a side not, how is the clean sound on the dc-5? ive heard it can handle the heavy stuff well but i just cant listen to thin chimey cleans for long without wanting to set fire to the amp thats producing them.
on a side not, how is the clean sound on the dc-5? ive heard it can handle the heavy stuff well but i just cant listen to thin chimey cleans for long without wanting to set fire to the amp thats producing them.
GD_NC
Well-known member
Maverick 1x12 combo or a DC-2/3
you can't go wrong with any of them.
you can't go wrong with any of them.
I can feel your pain, I live on the third floor and a couple times a week I have to lug my Road King head/cab and my rack up and down a bunch of stairs. Lightest of the 3 is my rack which is still way heavy. Getting this all back up the stairs at 3:30am after a long night of playing and some beer is always pretty "fun." Looking for a house right now and I can't wait to not have the stairs to deal with.
94Tremoverb
Well-known member
- Joined
- Dec 5, 2009
- Messages
- 1,340
- Reaction score
- 0
The cleans on the DC-5 are not thin and chimey at all - I don't like that kind of sound either. They're dark and gritty, and even more so (although you lose most of the tone control since it basically bypasses the tone stack) if you pull the Rhythm Boost switch. You can also assign the Graphic to one or both channels, which is a big part of why the amp sounds so huge for its size - set it to the classic Mesa deep V and it will shake the foundations... at least until the power section and speaker can't handle it. Which is actually why it didn't quite do it for me in the end - it's not that it wasn't loud enough, it just couldn't quite do the depth and bandwidth of tone that I wanted at that volume. I probably shouldn't have sold it really though. It's not super light - about 60lbs I think - but it is still about half the size and weight of the Tremoverb.
Similar threads
