Road King II Solo Feel?

[newfinator]

I was just wondering how the Road King II feels for playing lead. I think I have a sense of the tone from the various posts here but not so much what it's like for the picking hand and fretting fingers to play.

Is it sensitive, reactive and easy to achieve pinch harmonics with or is it more demanding in terms of pick attack etc. I play a lot of lead, have a light touch and, sadly, sometimes rely on the amps dynamics to get some notes out. So, I need an amp that pretty much picks up everything.

Thoughts?

 

[mrd]

It can do either... playing with the gain will get you from stiff and hard to cream-town easily. Alternately, you can just turn it up to 500dB and the power tubes will compress the **** out of everything you do so it will pick up you breathing on the strings from 30 feet away.

In all seriousness though... yeah, it can do what you want, it can do the opposite too. If you ever find that there isn't enough gain on tap for a lead sound, you can throw a pedal in front for some extra touch. For most intents and purposes though, there should be enough, except perhaps for some ultra-smooth liquid gold legato Satriani/Vai stuff or something.

Even then... if you turn it up loud enough, you'll get where you need. I love doing lead work on this amp... even single notes somehow lend huge Recto character.

 

[Kaz]

I recently got to fool around and molest my pal's RK...it is an epic amp for soloing, more so than the Roadster (they're supposed to be identical in terms of the tone stack...but I think the RK has something special). Very nasty.

 

[123thefirst]

I agree with these remarks. The thing is that each channel and setting can sound and feel so radically different from the others you really can't categorize The King.

I absolutely love the amp for lead. Though you do need to be aware that the "Recto" tone characteristics of a heavily cut mid-range and hefty bass do predominate in channels 3 and 4. So I often use an outboard EQ when soloing with those channels. That seems to be necessary if you want effortless pinch harmonics with vintage style pickups.

 

[nathan28]

Definitely a killer amp for whatever style you want to pulloff!! Pinch harmonix scream on this thing

 

[newfinator]

Thanks for all the replys.

Does anyone have any idea of how the lead feel compares to that of the Mark IV. I know that sound comparisons between the two have been discussed on numerous occasions but not the' feel' of each which, as you can tell, is important to me.

 

[sleepingtiger]

Channel3, Vintage mode, tube recto.....pinches easier than a cheap hooker. Can be made very smooth, very touch sensitive.

Tony

 

[MrMason]

I've only ever tried out the amp in a store, so I'm sure it'll sound better after having the amp for a while, but my experience there was that the feel was good but nothing spectacular. Tight bass is good for crunchy rhythm, but not so much for good leads, IMO.