Road King II: another band jam experience

[LesPaul70]

Had another band jam last weekend, went with RKII all night. Yeah, so at least I didn't need to warm up my back-up amp so you can tell it wasn't a complete disaster.
But it wasn't a total success either.

The first jam, I had had difficulties with my volume. Turned out I had been playing on the 'Spongy' setting. Switch over to 'Bold', problem solved.

This time, it was different. Again, I tried to prepare as well as I could at home. Bold power, band volume (but without the actual band), I dialed the following sounds:

Channel 1: Tweed. I tried to capture that elusive JTM-45/Fender style crunch. It was not a perfectly plausible emulation to a corksniffer's ears but it did capture the idea pretty darn well.
Channel 2: Fat clean. Basically the same sound as our last jam except that I dialed some more high-end sparkle (to be able to hear my playing).
Channel 3: Raw mode, on 2xEL34+2x6L6. Basically, I was going for a vintage British-style 'Marshally' high gain but wanted to add in some more bottom-end thump (hence the 6L6s). Came up with a very full sound that sounded awesome on its own.
Channel 4: No changes from the last band jam. Modern crushing high gain, 4x6L6+2xEL34.

And here's what happened...

Our first song. Channel 3, British vintage high gain.
I sound awfully bright. Piercing highs. And a lot of fizzzz.

I turn down Presence and Treble in an attempt to tame the fizz.

Second song. Channel 4, Modern high gain.
More brightness, more fizz and sizzle.

Again, I tweak the channel EQ but don't quite succeed in getting rid of that fizz. I'm perplexed, this didn't happen at home (same volume!) or last time (my accidental use of Spongy power).

The first four or five songs, I'm tweaking my Road King II between every song. My bandmates are, "Come on, man! Let's play already!"
Understandably.

Eventually I find a solution.

Turns out that when I turn up the channel volumes (and turn down the master volume to compensate), the fizz goes away. I turn the channel masters up to 10-12 o'clock, and channels 3 and 4 start sounding acceptable. (My channel Gains were never very high to begin with...the highest were in the 12-1 o'clock area.)

The next problem. (You can probably see this coming...)

With the channel volumes so high, I'm overdriving the effect inputs in my FX loop. And of course our next song is an acoustic ballad. I get horrible crackle every time I strum a chord. I have to turn down the loop send volume, twice, mid-song, and then turn up the amp master volume to compensate.

After that, the rest of the set went smoothly enough, for the most part. But I still did minor tweaks between songs.

What I ended up with was
- Channel volumes between 10-12 o'clock.
- FX loop send volume at 9 o'clock (only 25% open!)
- Channel 3: 2xEL34 (instead of 2xEL34+2x6L6 I started with)
- Channel 1: 2x6L6 (instead of 2xEL34 I started with)
- Possibly some other changes too from what I had dialed at home.

It's starting to look like the Road King II is one finicky amp. Or at least takes some more tweaking to make it work with a band than I expected. Then again, I've only had it for a couple of months now, guess I'll figure it out eventually.

Anyone else with similar experiences?
Any helpful hints?

 

[discordance_axis]

The issue about the gain channel volumes needing to be higher to reduce fizz is something I have read about in the past. I remember reading that one player decided to utilize the solo volume output for his clean channels and the regular output for his gain channels. However, this was so he was able to match volume between the four channels without having to lower the channel volumes on his gain sounds. I know your situation with the FX input is different but perhaps you could use this idea towards your own benefit somehow?

 

[jbird]

Does the OP use effects in the loop? If not, try Hard Bypassing it!

 

[LesPaul70]

Does the OP use effects in the loop?

Unfortunately, I do. Otherwise I wouldn't have to worry about clipping their inputs, now would I?

The loop is where I put my two modulation pedals, a delay, and a reverb (plus an MXR 10-band EQ but I don't use it with this amp). For delay/reverb, that makes the most sense to me (if I placed them in front of my amp, the delayed notes would distort less and sound different), and I've also noticed that the two modulation pedals (an MXR phaser and a TC Electronics Nova unit) give me the sound I want only when placed in the loop.
Two of my loop pedals have warning LEDs for input clipping which helped me notice the problem almost immediately. (But not before we had started playing the ballad.)

The use of the Solo boost for volume matching is interesting idea. I've heard of people doing that with their Mark Vs, never thought of applying the same concept to a Road King II. Could be worth a try. I don't use the Solo boost for its intended purpose anyway since only two of my amps have it (the RKII and the MkV).

I guess I'm just a little worried about running the FX send level so low. That seems 'wrong' to me, in some ways. The send pot at noon is the normal recommended setting. But since the channel volumes are obviously before the send pot, maybe the cumulative signal level is what matters, not individual pot values.

I forgot to mention that there was a cab difference between my home dialing and the jam. At home, I had nothing but a Mesa Thiele box (C90). With the band, I used a Road King 2x12 cab - which I have had for much longer than the Thiele, so I don't think it was a case of speakers not having been broken in properly. The RK cab doesn't 'fizz' with my other amps. But maybe the sounds that you optimize for a Thiele box may not sound right with a RK cab? Could the fizz have been less obvious with the Thiele?

Also, this is the first 'modern' Rectifier I have personally owned. My other Rectos are old 2-channel models, and I've never had any 'fizz' issues with them. I've heard people talk about fizz in the context of newer 3-channel Rectos.
I did use a (borrowed) Roadster for some time and didn't notice it there either. Maybe the RKII is voiced slightly brighter than the Roadster, and you have to dial it more carefully or you get the fizz?

 

[steve_k]

I've got one that I bought new and basically just gave it a quick play through and haven't touched it since. When I get time with it though, from your experience it does sound like some major tweaking will be required - @ band volume. That's always an issue with anything in the Recto line up and dialing in at low volume and thinking you can just turn the levels across all channels up with the master isn't gonna work. Something in the power end of these amps takes some work to get right. I got this amp really to have access to all the channels for some other work I was doing. However, I imagine it is not unlike any 4 channel amp (except for a VH4) and can be tricky to find that point where all the channels come together. Been trying to get out of a multi-amp rig and thought the RK2.2 would do the trick.

Will check out your settings for leveling the amp out. Thanks for sharing your experience.

 

[afu]

On my 3 Channel DR, I found that a low compression setting (between 1.3:1 and 2:1 and only for peaks) makes the channels easier to balance. A little bit of dynamics are lost, but it isn't too much. It also makes the sound more focused. I use less distortion than many people and pick really frickin' hard. The compressor lends the feel (smoothness) of a more distorted setting, but is clearer and also has more clarity when my picking isn't so aggressive.

My Gain for Vintage is usually around 9 O'clock or a hair above; Gain for Modern is between 10:30 and 12. One is Zep, the other is Sabbath. YMMV.

 

[LesPaul70]

Thanks for all the helpful suggestions and encouragement. Much appreciated.

Guess it's just a case of learning that the RK II is not quite as "plug-and-play" as I expected it to be...and no, I don't mean the back panel, that obviously isn't "plug-and-play" simple (it is actually part of the reason why I got the RK II in the first place) but the individual channels. Coming from the 2-channel Recto world, I expected that an individual channel with its limited number of knobs would be straightforward enough to dial in - at least as compared to, say, the average Mark amp. On my 2-channel Recs, I dial a tone that sounds good to me (and most of them do!), and when I play with the band and add some more volume, it sounds even better. With the RK, a kind of opposite thing happened.

However, I don't think that, in this case, the main issue was the volume. When dialing the amp at home, I happened to be alone and could crank the amp as much as I liked and, when dialing the RK, I consciously tried to use the same overall volume I expected to use with the band, and got it almost spot on. I only needed to increase maybe 10% (a very slight nudge) when the full band kicked in - so unless I hit some special magic volume level threshold, that volume difference should not account for the sonic difference. The different cab was a part but yes, then there's one difference that's more important...

When you play alone, you can hear your full frequency range equally.
With the band, you have other players competing for the same frequencies.

In my case, what I suspect happened, the other instruments masked my bass and low-mid frequencies. I could only hear my upper-mid/top-end frequencies, and the fizz - undetectable at home - immediately stood out.
(My 2-channel Recs are not as 'fizzy' so I never had this problem with them.)

So I'm still learning. The RK II is turning out to be a real beast but I'm confident I will tame it in the end. 8)

 

[knotts]

When you play alone, you can hear your full frequency range equally.
With the band, you have other players competing for the same frequencies.

In my case, what I suspect happened, the other instruments masked my bass and low-mid frequencies. I could only hear my upper-mid/top-end frequencies, and the fizz - undetectable at home - immediately stood out.

I notice this very same thing with my Roadster. I leave the amp at our rehearsal space (so it's not like the knobs are betting messed up in transport) and if I warm up by myself I tweak the knobs to dial out some treble. I noticed that once I start playing with the band, my overall tone gets muted by the frequencies of other instruments.

As I'm writing this, I just realized that we recently added a large rug to the space (maybe 16x20) which sits in front of the speaker cabs. It's in a basement so there's lots of concrete and the sound bounces a lot. Oddly enough, it helped tame this difference a little bit. I guess if there is less sound bouncing around the room, it's produces more consistent results because it's not 4 instruments bouncing sound off the walls vs just your amp alone.

What kind of space does the band rehearse in? Just curious if it could be related.

 

[LesPaul70]

What kind of space does the band rehearse in? Just curious if it could be related.

The venue in question was a lounge - we were in an alcove-like sideroom, with carpeted walls, just large enough for our gear. The carpeting probably eliminated most of the 'bouncing' soundwaves, and it could have been worse otherwise.

It's just interesting that the RK seems so much more fickle with a band than any other Mesa I've owned so far, and I've had a few. But, like said, I'm still learning new things about it, and will figure it out eventually.