One amp to rule them all?

TheDarkLord · December 2013

I'm looking for one amp to do everything. I'm not asking much am I?

It needs to be able to do small to medium pub gigs (sometimes on its own, sometimes miked up) plus be able to play at non-divorce levels in my house. The neighbours aren't an issue though as they are far enough away.

I'd like it to be a reasonably compact combo as well and loud enough to have a little bit of clean headroom ....... although, "clean" in my vocab is not that clean.

I'm not constrained by a budget of any kind and I'm looking for something of quality. Anyone have any suggestions?

The runners and riders (in no particular order) at the moment are:

Mesa Boogie Express Plus 5:25 Combo
Line 6 DT25 Combo
Tone King Metropolitan
Tone King Imperial

koss59 · December 2013

What sort of sound are you after? I can't recommend the new Badcat Blackcats enough, 1-12 combo in either 15 or 30 watt. Very good master volumes and half power switch so sounds good in the house. I've owned a lot of amps over the years boutique and vintage and these are the best I've had yet. I use them on gigs ranging from Jazz to rock to country to funk, soul, disco.

digitalscream · December 2013

Jet City JCA5012 combo. They don't really do clean clean, but you get a good slightly-dirty bluesy clean by maxing the gain on the crunch channel (great for heavy rock) and then rolling off the guitar volume. Lead tone is to die for.

bertie · December 2013

theres a large amount of deja vu with this thread..........might be me age tho

ThePrettyDamned · December 2013

Amt Stonehead for solid state, small, 4 channel amp.

Laney vh100r for a multi channel, crystal clean through to awesome amounts of bone crushing sludge amp.

TheDarkLord · December 2013

koss59 said:

What sort of sound are you after?

I'm rubbish at describing sounds. I'm a bass player, you need to be gentle with me. However, I'm a MASSIIIIIIIIIIVE Stranglers fan ...... and, in particular, a huuuuuge Hugh Cornwell fan. I like his sound. He appears to play an old Vox AC30 sometimes - although, I saw him in The States a few weeks back and he was playing through a Fender DeVille (I think).

Have a listen to this tone ...... which I recorded live at one of his gigs in the UK last year. This is what I want:

www.mclinden.co.uk/giaw.mp3

ICBM · December 2013

Mesa Trem-o-verb

It is, indeed, the One Amp To Rule Them All.

Really... it will do everything. Loud enough for any stage, compact enough for almost any, huge tone, great master volume that works down to very low level, great reverb, fantastic build quality, cheap for the amount of power and flexibility. The cleans are 'Marshall cleans' not 'Fender cleans', so it's not all that squeaky-clean, although it can get fairly close if you want it to.

And I'm selling one

. (Just to be clear, not both of them

. )

There is one little tiny disadvantage which I should probably mention, but you don't really need to bother yourself too much about it...

Weighs 98lb.

To be fair it has great handles and good wheels, and isn't quite as much of a pain to move as you might think, but it's still very heavy to lift straight up, like into the back of a car.

stickyfiddle · December 2013

I have a 5:25 (non-plus). It's brilliant. Every time I go a while without plugging into it I think it's not that special and I'd rather have something else, then I go back and check and I find whatever tone I thought it couldn't do with little more than a twist of the eq knobs. It's capable of Very Loud when you need it, but still sounds good low on the dial on the 5 watt mode. They're overpriced from new in the UK but are usually a proper bargain secondhand. Easy one hand carry too (one of my main criteria for an amp!)

grungebob · December 2013

I've had the DT25 and you should definitely give it a try, very nice amp can do loud and Home volumes easy,plus can do fender,vox or Marshall cleans with the bonus of huge amounts of gain if needed.

guitargeek62 · December 2013

Mesa Dual Rectifier, far more versatile than you may expect.

(I hear great things about the Trem-o-verb though ^^^)

spacecadet · December 2013

Good old garden variety Classic 30 should do the trick.

57Deluxe · December 2013

This is what Moses went up the Mount to find out... he came down a broken man...

thecolourbox · December 2013

Ive sadly nothing to contribute here except to say, if possible, as the Dark Lord it would be great if all your posts were as Tolkien related as this one. Lord of the Ring Mod thread is looking likely?

Hertz32 · December 2013

Carvin V3m and the Bugera Trirec Infinium are VERY good amps. and I'll have a V3m one day! They're rather lovely

ICBM · December 2013

57Deluxe said:

This is what Moses went up the Mount to find out... he came down a broken man…

That's because he was carrying a Trem-o-verb in each hand.

guitarfishbay · December 2013

Mesa Roadster is my pick, but it won't be small enough or light enough the way I like it best (head plus Rectifier 4x12). Beyond that I'd be inclined to go for a Kemper/Axe FX 2 rig for light and versatile.

octatonic · December 2013

None of the world-ruling amps are in the OP.

EdGrip · December 2013

Sounds like a Vox AC15 would be an obvious place to start - a Fender DeVille would be great but bigger, louder and more of a nuisance than what you're after - what's the smaller version? Blues Junior? Following that thought through, I bet it would be worth checking out a Fender Deluxe Reverb, or a Vibrolux. Traynor YGM-3?

fretmeister · December 2013

Last week I would have said a Dual Rec

Now I'm adding the 50W version of the EVH 5150 to the list.

It's brilliant.

Bucket · December 2013

Diezel VH4.

Given that you seem to be looking for a small combo, this post isn't of much use.

thumpingrug · December 2013

I played around with a DT25 a year back in a shop. Was very impressed with the clean and the dirty. Couldn't justify buying as I don't gig, but if i did I would be very tempted.

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One amp to rule them all?

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