So the era of the large valve head is well and truly over?

Fiftyshadesofjay

Been thinking about this a while but it really does seem like the large valve head is pretty much on it's way out. Sure there will always be a niche for them but in general nobody seems to want them.

Take my Mesa Roadster that I've been selling, five to ten years ago people would bite your hand off for it, now you can't give them away.

This isn't a moan by the way, I totally understand. I use a powered Kemper most of the time and it does everything the Mesa does, and has effects, clever switching and you have a signal you can send to FOH or your DAW. And it can be a Marshall, Fender, Friedman or anything else.

Thoughts?

guitarfishbay

I was in this exact same situation.  That is the best valve amp I ever owned, I honestly think it can do pretty much every sound you'd need (if you've got a boost to tighten up the drive channels).

However I couldn't sell mine either, so traded it against the studio monitors I now have.

 Basically the majority of those previously in the market for a high gain multi channel head have gone digital.  And the players who are valve purists probably don't want that kind of amp anyway, they want a simpler and often smaller/lighter kind of amp aimed at cleaner/mid gain sounds.

I'll vouch for the clean channels on the Roadster though, IIRC they are derived from the Lonestar and they're genuinely fantastic.

andy1839

Nah, I’ve got a few big heads and still want your Mesa!

guitarfishbay

andy1839 said:

Nah, I’ve got a few big heads and still want your Mesa!

They're monsters.  You should buy it.  They look nicer than the treadplate Duals too

ICBM

I think the era of the complex, multi-channel, high-gain large valve head is nearly over. There will certainly be some people who don't think they can get that sound any other way (probably true), but fewer and fewer people are wanting very heavy, large amps which usually (not always) need to be turned up fairly loud to sound their best and which may have reliability problems in the longer term. I also think the current trend for fitting all sorts of bells and whistles - MIDI, USB, valve monitoring/biasing circuitry etc - is counterproductive and will make things worse rather than better from a reliability point of view.

I think if valve amps survive in the long term at all it will be mostly the simple single-channel types with mostly more vintage sounds, although I wouldn't rule out high-gainers as part of that - bearing in mind most serious pros use multiple amp rigs with external switching anyway, rather than single amps which have to cover all their sounds. Even if they do use channel-switchers, they're usually set to one channel and they use more than one if they need different sounds, so each one can be optimised for one sound and mic'ed separately.

nick79

I want your Roadster too! Currently using a Mini Rectifier, which is great and i love the fact it's very portable. For some of our gigs it's perfect if we are cramped with space. But i do have a longing for a big high powered Mesa.... i run mine sometimes through a 4x12 and it sounds good but i often wonder what 100w of Mesa Rectifier would sound (and feel like) through the same cab. 

guitarfishbay

Thing is nobody is really making the amps that would tempt the high gain switchers back from Kempers etc.  

The EVH EL34 50 looks like it could nail it - compact covering the 3 basic tones of clean, high gain crunch, and high gain lead.  But almost everything else misses the mark in some way - shared gain/volume controls (previous EVH 50) no proper clean channel (lots of amps) too big/heavy (lots of amps).  It's about 5 years too late for a lot of people though.

richardhomer

I recently went to see a drummer friend’s band in a pub - quite a small pub in fact. I’d been warned they were loud. The truth is, the guitarist was loud and the rest of the band seemed to have try to complete with him

He was using a JCM 900 100 watt head through a 2x12 cab. Early on the gig, the decibel meter on my phone read 87.5 dB....

Unless you’re a pro player in huge venues I just can’t imagine wanting that much power.

ecc83

Was yoos in the bog in the pub next door Rich? 100W into a decent 2x12 should put 100dB SPL into the room, 120dB at a metre!

90dB is not that loud, my lad's 15W dommy clone could do that into a V30.

Dave.

clarkefan

There's something about the quality of the sound of a big amp, regardless of using the amp as a volume device, that I think still has legs.

I was watching the Pedal Show episode on attenuators earlier.  Their 50w Marshall sounded fantastic, the LazyJ 20 sounded Shit.  To me.

Clearly a taste thing! But if you want *that* Marshall experience... it's a big amp thing.

richardhomer

ecc83 said:

Was yoos in the bog in the pub next door Rich? 100W into a decent 2x12 should put 100dB SPL into the room, 120dB at a metre!

90dB is not that loud, my lad's 15W dommy clone could do that into a V30.

Dave.

Peter Gabriel at the Manchester Arena only peaked at 85 dB! Believe me, he got louder - he ‘adjusted’ the master volume four times during the gig.

And you’re almost right - I did spend a fair amount of time in the bog just to give my ears a rest.

AlexHunter

Yes.....but having previously had the opportunity to play some outdoor stages and wind my Soldano up to 7 or 8 the sonic joy I experienced has never been matched, my nads are still reverberating to this day. So for that reason I'll never part with it.

Chester

Used market is difficult for most amps on sale for over a few hundred quid, both here and the US. Size, weight and power are certainly issues, but the used amp market seems very sluggish in general. Not sure new higher end sales in retailers are doing any better either

prlgmnr

One day I'll grab a Roadster or a Road King but it's not at the top of the queue for me right now.

Maynehead

Just did a pub gig last night with my multi-watt Dual Rectifier. Got through about 30 odd songs ranging from Kinks to Metallica, and the amp sounded immense for all of them, most of which were using pure amp drive with no pedals.

I don't get why people think 100w heads are heavy and impractical. The head itself weighs under 20kg, and paired with my Orange 1x12 fitted with a Celestion Century Neo that weighs only 12.5kg, they can easily be carried in a single trip. In fact together they weigh less than some 2x12 cabs alone.

So personally, I see no reason whatsoever to switch to something smaller. I must admit I've never played a modelling amp in anger but it's hard to imagine anything that can beat a Dual Rec set to ch3 modern in terms of pure chest thumping power.

spark240

Ive not had a big amp background really, always used 2 x 12 combos, and I now use a Kemper.

That said, since I became the temp custodian of the recent HarrySeven haul, Ive had the pleasure of trying all sorts of amps, valve heads, Hybrids, SS, small to large and I have to say some are quite impressive, so I can I will end up hanging on to one or two.

guitarfishbay

Maynehead said:

Just did a pub gig last night with my multi-watt Dual Rectifier. Got through about 30 odd songs ranging from Kinks to Metallica, and the amp sounded immense for all of them, most of which were using pure amp drive with no pedals.

I don't get why people think 100w heads are heavy and impractical. The head itself weighs under 20kg, and paired with my Orange 1x12 fitted with a Celestion Century Neo that weighs only 12.5kg, they can easily be carried in a single trip. In fact together they weigh less than some 2x12 cabs alone.

So personally, I see no reason whatsoever to switch to something smaller. I must admit I've never played a modelling amp in anger but it's hard to imagine anything that can beat a Dual Rec set to ch3 modern in terms of pure chest thumping power.

Rectos aren’t that heavy.

Blackstar S1 104is 27kg, about the same as my closed 2x12, EVH 100 is really wide and about 25kg IIRC.

I have no idea how Mesa get more stuff into a smaller and lighter head but they do.

Chalky

There will always be a small number of buyers who want such an amp, but that number seems to be getting smaller.

thomasw88

I think they'll come back into fashion

Alnico

I got messed around twice trying to sell my S1 200 head, eventually at £350 and I still got messed around so now it's wrapped up in cling film for when I need or want something like that again.

It's stupidly heavy, massive in physical size but it does have power scaling from 20w - 200w so it doesn't have to rip your head off.
It's an immense amp and in many ways I'm glad they messed me about.

thomasw88 said:

I think they'll come back into fashion

Me too.

Now is the time to get a JCM800 2203X.
No vintage value and a low used market value because of the trend towards digital tech/modellers.

Hey it's the 90's all over again!

tampaxboo

clarkefan said:

There's something about the quality of the sound of a big amp, regardless of using the amp as a volume device, that I think still has legs.
....
Clearly a taste thing! But if you want *that* Marshall experience... it's a big amp thing.

i agree. for much the same reason as rotary effects (leslie etc) can't be touched by digital equivalents. with the leslie it's about swirling air. with big amps (100w) it's about vibrating air.  feeling something warm resonating in your chest. with bass that can feel like a second heartbeat. hits you at a primitive level. the old jaw bone on the tree trunk savage feeling.
it's a moot arguable point but i don't feel solid state or digital PAs amplifying smaller amp break up do the sound justice. and smaller amps break up in a different way to bigger amps. sooner and higher.
i'm no amp tech or physics grad, so i accept this is a personal anecdotal and instinctive/intuitive impression.
so 100w totally valid for gigging and recording musicians who work on a certain scale.

for bedroom poseurs who want something at home that looks impressive, links them to a musical hero who inspires them, and may feel fancy amp ownership entitles them to present in communities as a serious and fully paid up real musician, the case for huge amps (that could be subbed with smaller or ss/modelling) is also subjective, but less convincing.
to be brutal, that's probably a greater number of big amp owners than than gigging recording musicians who work on a big room or studio scale. but that's a capitalist society disease and not limited to musicians. insecurities aggravated by advertising and peer pressure, buying crap you don't need to get 'serious contender' status within a subculture to which you aspire to belong, expressing your identity through purchasing activity as a displacement activity or distraction for not being able to achieve real things in society at large, etc.
and then there's the sheer big-desire-gratified joy of ownership of a fancy thing.

personally, i think 30w for guitar is a good starting point to work up from to bigger stuff, if you go on to bigger and more pro things. and 50w if you play bass, to cut through. and a decent PA can carry the volume up and distrbute around the venue as necessary.
but if you regularly play bigger venues that keep crap PAs, then there's still a place for 100w.