it's awesome guys.
I won't really have a good report 'till I gig with it tomorrow night but some early impressions:
First ..... it's small ...... the same size as my Blue Angel. I worried about combo vs head & cab because of the weight but I'm glad I went combo ...... one thing to carry and nothing to hook up ..... set it on the floor and you're done.
At 65lbs it's not a featherweight but it's easily handled, by me at least.
It has casters which I usually think are stupid 'cause I have a dolly and little hard casters beat the shit out of an amp rolling it on concrete etc.
But Mesa has an awesome rail system with a push button where you can take them off easily and it just uses standard casters so you can replace them easily or get bigger ones. And they are neat for moving it around the house ...... score one for Mesa!
If you've looked at Mesa's site and read what it does, you know it's basically 9 amps in one.
I can tell you, there's not a bad sound among them.
I quickly zero'd in on my favorites but that was with my strat. I feel sure that with a humbucker git, I'll likely choose different ones.
Channel 1, the clean channel, is wicked ....... on the 'clean' setting you've got pedal-steel clean with no dirt at all ...... and Fat is much the same but with more 'body' to it.
But Tweed is the shit ......... sounds like an old Bassman combo with just a little bit of breakup to it ....... just enough to add some nice harmonics to the sound but not really distorted.
Channel 2 ....... for me it the Mark 1 setting ....... I loved Mark ones and this has that sound.
It's gonna be my choice for crunch rhythms but it does a great lead sound too. Easy pinch harmonics ........ a really good sound.
I liked it enough to where I didn't really investigate the other two settings much.
Channel 3 is the hi-gain channel although I liked channel 2's Mark 1 sound so much for leads that I might play around with dialing the gain way back and using 3 for crunch rhythms.
But 3 is a gain monster ....... I liked
the Mark IIC+ best although maybe the Mark IV ...... I'll have to see.
I didn't care much for the Extreme setting but with a different git I might.
The EQ is amazing and the presets ( 'V' setting) is useful .... you have a knob that progressively deepens the 'V'. Since I know how to use an EQ, I found my own choices preferable to the preset so I used the sliders but you can assign either to any channel.
And the EQ can come on automatically in a channel or just by footswitch or even not available in a channel.
Separate reverb levels for each channel and a nice 'verb at that.
Not quite as lush as my Blue Angel but the Blue Angel is the reverb king and Mesa themselves told me that it was comparable to
the Blue Angel but not
quite as good ....... I'd agree. A VERY nice 'verb comparable to a nice blackface .....
Tube or disode rectification at 45 watts .... auto selected as tube at 10 watts and diode at 90 watts.
All of this stuff is channel assignable and you have a seriously sturdy 8 button footswitch ..... it even has a mute button for tuning and there's an out for the tuner.
But wait ..... there's more!
This is not for the tweak-averse. The tone controls are very interactive and there's a zillion different ways to use just about everything.
I think it could be so versatile that it could cover ANY studio use ....... no need for anything else because you can get so many different sounds. You could have this amp alone and you'd be able to do anything and sound like you had lots of different amps.
And the modes ...... you know how many times an amp has different modes but they don't really sound that different? Just EQ'd a little differently?
This isn't like that ....... it's much like actual different amps. Even the gain can change enough to where you'll have to set the tone and volumes way different for each.
And the wattage assign ...... wow that's cool. You can have a channel on 90 watts for pristine cleans and another at 10 watts and dimed out for true power tube distortion.
And there's a global volume boost for solo'ing if you need yet another sound.
Plus ..... what other company will return your call in a day and then spend 45 minutes on the phone with you telling you the pros and cons of the amp?
The only thing Mesa said that some players complained about is that if you have one channel set at 10 watts and the others at 45 or 90 ...... you'll get a pop when you switch channels. He said there's no way to avoid it because you have all this power that has to be dissipated plus you're going from multiple tubes in A/B to a single tube Class A. I did notice the pop but didn't find it to be enough to be an issue when playing.
It doesn't happen if
all channels are on 10 watts or any combination of 45 and 90 watts. ONLY if you have channels set on higher wattage and switch to one at 10.
This amp is gonna occupy my time for a while .......... if all you want to do is plug in and go ....... this ain't the amp for you ....... while you can just plug in and go because it sounds great ...... there's no way you're gonna sit down and dial it completely in one afternoon. There's just too many possibilities.
I'm sure I'll be tweaking it over the next few weeks as I gig, which is the only way to know for sure about some of my choices. And at this point I've only tried every channel at the 10 watt setting which is Class A triode so there's a whole 'nother bunch of sounds I haven't even heard yet.
But even though I'm just getting started to learn this thing I can already tell that for someone like me, who goes from Merle Haggard to ZZ Top to Maroon 5 ..... it's amazing and versatile and, if it holds up, possibly the best amp ever!
