A couple of days ago, I went to a small local recording studio with my neighbour who runs the place. The point of the trip was to try out his Mesa Lonestar special. While the Lonestar was lovely for clean, I struggled to get a dirty sound I liked.
i spotted a battered old AC30 in the corner and as I have never had a blast on one, we set it up. Holy shit- it was epic. Fair play we ran it at proper loud level and my God was this thing nice. Straight forward, jumped channels, and my CS strat was just wonderful. And that was the start. Next we hooked up my pedals and then it really started to sing.
I had had a little tc mini spark booster at about 11 o'clock and that just tipped it into crunchy and a soul food on top for dirt. So I had a couple of lasting impressions:
- When digging in the natural valve compression is luuuuuverly and you almost don't need a separate compressor for funky clean stuff
- The detail is superb- but your playing has to be good. Any mistakes/sloppy playing is audible
- It responds really nicely to dynamics and clean/soft playing
- The base sound / tone is just lovely- just my thing
- It's quite big and heavy so probably a bit gig unfriendly by modern standards
- This particular one didn't have an fx loop or MV but didn't seem to suffer
Superb fun. All I need is a roadie and bigger gigs!
An official Foo liked guitarist since 2024
Comments
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
They do respond well to simple resistive attenuators too, as long as you're not expecting bedroom volumes.
(formerly miserneil)
One thing that's really surprising about them - and why smaller amps don't sound as good - is the amount of bottom-end they have, even with the Blue speakers. I recently A/B'd one with my Mesa Trem-o-verb - which is basically a Dual Rectifier combo, so has tons - and the AC30 had *more*. But not boomy or overpowering, just really full-sounding.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
Not worse, not better just different.
(formerly miserneil)
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
But *nothing* sounds like a proper AC30.
*An Official Foo-Approved guitarist since Sept 2023.