Roots Of The Recto?

[afu]

I know there are other posts out there about the Rev C - G being similar to a Soldano SLO 100 preamp. I don't want to talk about that. I'm wondering about the overall concept. Whereas Soldano was hot rodding JCM 800 designs, it seems to me that the DR was as if someone wanted a modernized Bassman with a slew of new features, but retaining the spirit. What do you guys think?

I'm having trouble finding information. I'm really super happy with tube rectifiers and 6L6GCs. The feeling and the sound totally floors me every time I play. I'm curious about the decision to use them and about the development of the features up until the 3 Channel version came out.

 

[vick1000]

Almost every modern tube amp can be traced back to a Fender design. There are many gnereations of common alteration over the years, by all sorts of manufacturers.

Tube rectifiers are less noisey, and have the wonderful sagging quality that really enhances that "tube feel". I call it the "squishy effect".

 

[Shemham]

I remember reading Mesa statement in some old magazine that the design was Mesa's "first non-fender based design." I think it was ment to highlight that it was fundamentally different from the Mark series.

Nonetheless, if you want to look at the roots of Recto, you have to look its original design. First Rectos were definitely aimed at modern guitarist using rather heavy distortion. It was not really an amp that shined on its clean channel which would water down the take on Fender Bassman. Even the Rev G does not have anything to do with Fender cleans. You could say that clean sound is really trademark to Rectos, not the one with the 3-channel models.

And when we talk about roots of the Recto, I don't think we can avoid the SLO. Rather than saying that the two share some similarities in design, the first Rectos were practically SLO clones with some modifications. Major differences were Recto had two tone stacks, better fx loop placement (IMO), built in variac and switchable rectifier. The latter addition must be the reason for having lower power supply filtering. Other than that, the two designs were almost identical. The reasons why Mesa decided to base their new line of amplifiers on that design can be only guessed. If you wanna be REALLY cynical, you could argue that Mesa saw that the SLO design was too good to be left unexploited and all the bells and whistles in Rectos were introduced mainly to make some perceivable difference between SLO and Recto. Or alternatively, you could argue that Mesa just needed some design reasonably different from the Mark series to experiment on some new features without tampering with Mark series' reputation. There were many drastically different amps in the Recto series that were dropped eventually and you could say they were type of failed experiments. Now, the Mark V has adopted some of the features originally only in the Rectos.

In my view, the essential point of the Recto series has at least evolved to be about the number of features you can pack inside one chassis to have sorta swiss army knife of tone shaping.

 

[afu]

The Recto also didn't have the the clean channel running underneath the dirt channel. Maybe it was kind of like seeing something really cool, perceiving some "flaws", changing them, and adding something more to it?

The lack of negative feedback for Modern is kind of a nod to Vox. In the 3 Channel, Ch1 has no negative feedback either which makes the Pushed mode akin to Vox more than Fender, I guess.

The Raw mode had me thinking of a JTM-45, which is basically a Bassman. It would be more correct that it's a Bassman/Plexi kind of crossbreed with the voicing changes from the Vintage channel and from with the use of a tube rectifier and 6L6. The 5U4GB is the "normal" setting, after all.

I don't hold negative opinions toward a person or company who takes a good design and makes it their own. Early amps were more or less straight out of the tube manufacturers' handbooks. Marshall redesigned the Bassman with local parts and eventually came into their own. Mesa did it with the SLO and molded it until it was a Mesa.

Even small changes to a design can make a huge difference. The tube rectifier, 6L6, negative feedback/tone stack changes for modern, and small changes to the tone stack make a massive impact on the final sound. By the time of the 3 Channel, it was definitely molded to the point of being quite different.

My original question was less about the details and more about the overall idea. The long view.

 

[afu]

I found it.

"So Smith and his team began work on what would become the Dual and Triple Rectifiers. “I came up with the idea of making an amplifier that would be our rendition of a big, monster-metal head. I thought of the idea of putting the diamond plate on the front, which I thought was pretty **** tough. Circuit-wise, it’s pretty evolutionary, where everybody stands on the shoulders of those who preceded them and you can trace the circuitry back to a Fender 4x10 Bassman via Marshall, and so forth. We just put together everything that we knew and were completely blown away by the success of it.""

Maybe Authorized Boogie can comment about the way it was meant to stand out?

 

[screamingdaisy]

Their target was hair metal, but when they released it in '92 they thought they missed the boat. Initial sales were sluggish, then in 1994 Soundgarden's Superunknown and Korn's Self-Titled were released, things changed and sales started picking up.

As for the evolution of the design, I'm not sure they had an end vision in mind and I believe the amp was actually more of an experiment in what they thought would be cool to try, then they plugged in to hear how it sounded afterwards. A lot of the initial revisions seem to focus on practical improvements... improving the clean channel, fixing the effects loop, giving it a true 16ohm output, then at some point the decision was made to extend the power amp voicing an octave lower, giving the Rev G and beyond that distinct voice we recognize today.

I know a lot of people say that Mesa changed the voicing of the Recto to suit Nu-Metal but I think it was the other way around... Mesa changed the voice of the Recto and that's why Nu-Metal sounded the way it did.

The above is all just personal conjecture based on years of playing and reading about the Recto. The only way we'll know for sure is if someone from Mesa posts something. The drawback with Mesa is that most stuff I've read on the history is heavy on the marketing while being light on the technical details. But, in fairness they do have a business to run and trade secrets to keep.

 

[afu]

Considering I can cover so much ground with a 3 Channel, I don't feel like it's a Grunge or a Nu Metal amp. I get on Classic Rock, Stoner, and Blues kicks all the time and I don't need another amp. In fact, the only other amp I play anymore is a crappy Harmony amp from 1965 with radio tubes in it.

Also, Alice In Chains and Soundgarden had fairly traditional tones from classic Heavy Metal. Metallica's Load and Garage Inc weren't either genre you mentioned; I really doubt they recorded G.I. with Line 6, especially since several of the new tracks had that DR sound in them (probably Kirk) and don't sound digital. Monster Magnet used them for two or three albums for space rock, stoner, and hard rock. Tool was already playing powerful, quirky, and dark material when Mr. Jones found his for Aenima. By 1996, the success of a few of those albums, and Korn, cemented the demand for THAT sound in the studio.

I agree about the Nu Metal thing. Slack tuned Rock, Retro, Death Metal, Black Metal, Sludge, Stoner, Goth Metal, Doom, and Nu Metal were all in swing, being done to death, or coming into their own from 1992 to 2000. The guitar and bass worked as one with a whole mess of those groups. It was a paradigm shift and Mesa lucked out by providing a whole new set of colors to play with. I think the 3 Channel was more about giving a separate clean to go along with the dirt, to re-engineer the Blues mode into Raw, while giving more flexibility with the dirty modes and removing the cloning feature. Who puts a Pushed Mode and a Raw mode on an amp marketed to Nu Metal?

 

[siggy14]

Their target was hair metal, but when they released it in '92 they thought they missed the boat. Initial sales were sluggish, then in 1994 Soundgarden's Superunknown and Korn's Self-Titled were released, things changed and sales started picking up.

As for the evolution of the design, I'm not sure they had an end vision in mind and I believe the amp was actually more of an experiment in what they thought would be cool to try, then they plugged in to hear how it sounded afterwards. A lot of the initial revisions seem to focus on practical improvements... improving the clean channel, fixing the effects loop, giving it a true 16ohm output, then at some point the decision was made to extend the power amp voicing an octave lower, giving the Rev G and beyond that distinct voice we recognize today.

I know a lot of people say that Mesa changed the voicing of the Recto to suit Nu-Metal but I think it was the other way around... Mesa changed the voice of the Recto and that's why Nu-Metal sounded the way it did.

The above is all just personal conjecture based on years of playing and reading about the Recto. The only way we'll know for sure is if someone from Mesa posts something. The drawback with Mesa is that most stuff I've read on the history is heavy on the marketing while being light on the technical details. But, in fairness they do have a business to run and trade secrets to keep.

You are right on a lot of your points, the rectos where originally made for the 80's metal scene hence why they were called solo heads, Rev C and Rev D gave the SLO a run for its money in the soloing department. Unfortunately by the time they got the rectos out the music scene had started to shift to grunge. Randall started doing revisions for two reasons, first to get the clean channel better and the second was to turn the recto into more of a rhythm amp for the growing Grunge scene which was more of a mid/high gain with sag type music, this is why the Rev G has more sag (mushier) on the bottem end then the earlier revisions.

It just so happens that the Nu-metal crowd picked up these amps because they had the most gain and massive low end to handle the lower tuning. The 3 channel rectos where designed for the nu-metal scene to give them a cleaner clean channel and more distortion designed towards metal and this is why the original 3 channels are a bit more scooped then the two channels.

The tremoverbs and the Roadkings where designed more for people that wanted the recto tone but played more then just metal, the tremoverb has more upper mids and the Roadking 1 I have always said is a mix between a tremoverb and a original 3 channel recto, the RK1 has a bit more mids but not as much upper mids as the tremoverb.

The recto reborns where because the music scene somewhere in the mid 2000's started to switch to marshall style amps, Orange and Marshall where being scene on stage by new bands as well as bands that use to use Rectos. Because of this the sales of Rectos took a dive so Randall redesigned again and made them brighter and tighter and cut the low end slightly in order to try to win some business back, and he did win some back but they are not like in the hay day when almost everyone was using rectos.

 

[siggy14]

Considering I can cover so much ground with a 3 Channel, I don't feel like it's a Grunge or a Nu Metal amp. I get on Classic Rock, Stoner, and Blues kicks all the time and I don't need another amp. In fact, the only other amp I play anymore is a crappy Harmony amp from 1965 with radio tubes in it.

Also, Alice In Chains and Soundgarden had fairly traditional tones from classic Heavy Metal. Metallica's Load and Garage Inc weren't either genre you mentioned; I really doubt they recorded G.I. with Line 6, especially since several of the new tracks had that DR sound in them (probably Kirk) and don't sound digital. Monster Magnet used them for two or three albums for space rock, stoner, and hard rock. Tool was already playing powerful, quirky, and dark material when Mr. Jones found his for Aenima. By 1996, the success of a few of those albums, and Korn, cemented the demand for THAT sound in the studio.

I agree about the Nu Metal thing. Slack tuned Rock, Retro, Death Metal, Black Metal, Sludge, Stoner, Goth Metal, Doom, and Nu Metal were all in swing, being done to death, or coming into their own from 1992 to 2000. The guitar and bass worked as one with a whole mess of those groups. It was a paradigm shift and Mesa lucked out by providing a whole new set of colors to play with. I think the 3 Channel was more about giving a separate clean to go along with the dirt, to re-engineer the Blues mode into Raw, while giving more flexibility with the dirty modes and removing the cloning feature. Who puts a Pushed Mode and a Raw mode on an amp marketed to Nu Metal?

The different revisions even though were designed/redesigned for a certain style of music, can still do most any type of music, funny thing now is I see more recto's on country stages and pop bands then anything.

FYI the first sound garden album was Peaveys and the 1st two korn albums did not even use Mesa Boogies. Korns self titled album was Hughes and ketner and Peavey. Life is just peachy was marshalls with Mesa recto cabs. Follow the leader was when they first started using the 2 channel triples. Limps first album was also Marshalls and then they moved to Rectos.

Kirk picked up a rackmount recto early on that he still uses to this day in his life setup (if they are using amps) and mostly uses it for soloing and for songs that they have used Rectos on. Before James switched to the VH4 he used Triple recto I believe with his rack setup for certain songs.

 

[afu]

The different revisions even though were designed/redesigned for a certain style of music, can still do most any type of music, funny thing now is I see more recto's on country stages and pop bands then anything.

One thing I've read is that some singers/front people rent equipment for the backup band to save on trucking costs in the States. The Recto is pretty much everywhere, is solid, and is consistent from amp to amp. Of the two or three amps that might show up, one is a Mesa.

 

[siggy14]

The different revisions even though were designed/redesigned for a certain style of music, can still do most any type of music, funny thing now is I see more recto's on country stages and pop bands then anything.

One thing I've read is that some singers/front people rent equipment for the backup band to save on trucking costs in the States. The Recto is pretty much everywhere, is solid, and is consistent from amp to amp. Of the two or three amps that might show up, one is a Mesa.

Bands tend to rent when they are overseas, if they are a USA band and touring the states/Canada it is usually the guitarists own equipment. But you are correct, rectos are built tuff and take pedals well. I know a lot of the country/pop bands will use the either the pushed or the raw mode and they get that nice gritty rock tone.

 

[Third Age Amps]

Come on, I love my Mesa amps (MkIII and Rackmount Recto) but when comparing the sheer number of components with the same value and placement, the Recto is UNDOUBTEDLY a rip off of the SLO. Which is quite different from taking a Fender Princeton, completely gutting the circuitry, and ending up with a different beast.

They definitely brought that design to a new market with affordability, the channel switching was innovative, and the options added to tweak the tone give it far more flexibility than the SLO. But putting a nicer paint job on a classic mustang doesn't make you a car designer.

I suppose I'm mostly bothered by the ego RS seems to show in his videos about the Rectos ... With the schematics for both amps available for comparison, one would think a bit of humility would be advisable.

Of course Soldano is in the same boat, but instead of boasting he whines about how "his" design was stolen. Which makes Jim Marshall roll over in his grave, and when Jim gets done rolling, Leo Fender's ghost flips off Jim while mooning him. And while that's happening the engineers at GE and Westinghouse are placing curses on every amp "designer" that exists today.

 

[siggy14]

Come on, I love my Mesa amps (MkIII and Rackmount Recto) but when comparing the sheer number of components with the same value and placement, the Recto is UNDOUBTEDLY a rip off of the SLO. Which is quite different from taking a Fender Princeton, completely gutting the circuitry, and ending up with a different beast.

They definitely brought that design to a new market with affordability, the channel switching was innovative, and the options added to tweak the tone give it far more flexibility than the SLO. But putting a nicer paint job on a classic mustang doesn't make you a car designer.

I suppose I'm mostly bothered by the ego RS seems to show in his videos about the Rectos ... With the schematics for both amps available for comparison, one would think a bit of humility would be advisable.

Of course Soldano is in the same boat, but instead of boasting he whines about how "his" design was stolen. Which makes Jim Marshall roll over in his grave, and when Jim gets done rolling, Leo Fender's ghost flips off Jim while mooning him. And while that's happening the engineers at GE and Westinghouse are placing curses on every amp "designer" that exists today.

Randall Smith created the cascade gain stage amplifier, so if you want to be specific anyone after him using a cascaded gain in their amps are ripping off him, which includes Soldano. In the amp world everyone rips off everyone, goes back to the original amps, but certain companies like Boogie made modifications that made a huge impact on modern amps.

So yes the recto pre-amp is close to the SLO, but there are enough differences and changes that make the amps still very different. Which is better, well that depends as the SLO does that one tone better then anyone else, but when it comes to great tone and versatility well Mesa wins hands down when you put it up against the SLO. The SLO is a great amp if you want that tone, but the loops suck, the clean channel is blah unless you are using it as crunch and for the price I would rather have a boogie. Now if I could get a 1 channel Soldano with the exact pre-amp and power amp of the SLO for $1500 that would be my main sound and main amp, the Avenger comes close but just not there.

 

[afu]

....but when comparing the sheer number of components with the same value and placement, the Recto is UNDOUBTEDLY a rip off of the SLO.

They definitely brought that design to a new market with affordability, the channel switching was innovative, and the options added to tweak the tone give it far more flexibility than the SLO. But putting a nicer paint job on a classic mustang doesn't make you a car designer.

While I agree with some of what you said, I think a person can innovate on an existing design and still be a designer. No one can completely re-engineer the wheel, but adding a tire, balancing the tire, then etching a tread, then making the materials and treads different all require some trial and error to find an acceptable balance, which is the design process. Not every innovation is equal, being that some of them only change small details, but someone who has survived hydroplaning because their tread can now throw water and re-grip the road isn't going to complain that a truly innovative design would be square.

The comparisons to a SLO are apparent, though. That wasn't the point of the OP. I was wondering about the ideas behind what they were going for. If they wanted to outright copy it for the exact sound, I guess they could have, but the rectifier options, feedback changes, 6L6 bias, and voicing switches are pretty significant changes for a "rip-off". Looking at the schematic for a 3 Channel further travel from SLO territory with more voicing changes and a pretty good clean channel.

My speculation is that RS wanted to see what would happen if 20 years of hot rodding had been applied to the Tweed Bassman instead of a Plexi. I was wondering if anyone had an opinion about that aspect of it or if there is any information as to the

 

[screamingdaisy]

My speculation is that RS wanted to see what would happen if 20 years of hot rodding had been applied to the Tweed Bassman instead of a Plexi. I was wondering if anyone had an opinion about that aspect of it or if there is any information as to the

Having been on this forum since day 1, I can say that I don't think we've ever had a detailed conversation about this. There's been a number of debates over the SLO-ness of the Recto, but I don't remember anyone really wanting to look beyond the technical details up until now. Additionally, most people seem to focus on the preamp similarities and there's been virtually no discussion about the power amp.

 

[Third Age Amps]

Afu, you're right. I should have deleted that part.

I agree the improvements make it an altogether different beast. And a well made one at that. It's just the lack of humility that he seems to have about this particular designs origins make me cringe.

 

[siggy14]

It's just the lack of humility that he seems to have about this particular designs origins make me cringe.

Not sure what you mean by that?

 

[afu]

Afu, you're right. I should have deleted that part.

I agree the improvements make it an altogether different beast. And a well made one at that. It's just the lack of humility that he seems to have about this particular designs origins make me cringe.

Naw, man. People can disagree about things. I only deleted it to not have it part of my reply. I followed this board before I joined. You have opinions I find valuable.

I sometimes feel like Mesa is a bit elitist as a company, but the quality and precision of their amps are hard to beat, even if some of the designs aren't always on the mark (channel popping, fx loops, and such).

My perspective: Can you imagine making an amp aimed at one market and then that market dries up and blows away? Then, the amp becomes a success anyway and is a "modern" classic? That's a trip.

 

[3124+]

Bassman -> Marshall -> SLO -> Recto.

 

[siggy14]

Bassman -> Marshall -> SLO -> Recto.

There is a bit more to it then that, if Randall did not do cascading gain the SLO would have not been, so technically you have to put the Mark series between the Marshall and the SLO