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Anybody plugging GTO or Mesa pedal straight into a power amp?


FWAxeIbanez

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My lead singer has been trying to write more and more and his stuff is really good, just not for our band... He's decided he wants to play guitar with me in a side project and I'm tryin to find the cheapest way to get him up and running... I have two cabs, so he's set on speakers, and he has a poweramp of sorts, so now for the preamp...

 

anybody plug one of those Soldano Supercharger GTO pedals or that Mesa V-twin preamp pedal straight into a poweramp? How awful would it sound? if it doesn't sound tight or very well defined, that'd be ok, but it can't sound shrill or thin... We are playing heavy stuff, melodic stoner drone sort of stuff I guess... we are trying to mix bands like Achilles or Engineer with bands like Jesu, would this work for anything at all? What about one of those Damage Control units? Do those things even have those tubes at an operational voltage? or is there a nice neat red led behind it?

 

He's going to (possibly) plug this into the effects return of a GK1001RB bass head since he does have a bass rig. its solid state and I'm sure it will be a bit stiff, but will it be unusable? He really cant spend more than 300, he's got a baby on the way in a month so his woman is waaaay too far along to work

 

This doesn't have to sound particularly good :D

it just can't sound completely bad :thu:

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Originally posted by Knut E Evenmo

I`d guess that you need a pedal with a line level signal to get a really god sound with just a poweramp, since most poweramps have a line level input. The Mesa V-twin has this, I believe, but the GTO is like a normal stomper with instrument level output.

 

 

{censored}, I should have known this... haha, thanks man, its appreciated... those Damage Control pedals have a line level out too tho, because they are supposedly good for direct in recording

 

which just reminded me... what about that V-amp?! that thing is damn cheap and gets amazing gain tones, that band produced by one of the guys in ALOL used it... check them out on myspace, they are called When Knives Go Skyward, do you think that'd sound ok going through a bass head like the GK?

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right on, that's good to hear... probably gonna be either that or a v-amp for my buddy.

 

Does the v twin emulate two channels? and can the v-amp be controlled by a pedal? this isn't just a question for potaetoes either... two separate levels/styles of gain would be great because there are gonna be really busy sections that need precision, and there are going to be heavily delayed ambient parts that aren't going to need so much clarity so much as needing to be a giant wall of sound

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i don't understand what you mean by "emulate two channels"

 

the v-twin is a full-on complete two-channel preamp, with three modes. you can switch between clean and blues, clean and solo, or blues and solo (basically, pick any two), plus there's a bypass. they share EQ and everything, but the channels balance nicely and switching works quite well. they have lots of output options, and they're really useful little buggers. they also take fairly well to boost pedals and such.

 

i used the blues mode mostly, with a duncan invader pickup to hit it pretty hard. it can deliver a pretty heavy crunch that's tight and solid, and still clean up with the guitar's volume knob or a switch to a single coil pickup or coil split. solo mode has quite a bit of fairly thick gain. the cleans aren't bad either, pretty nice sounding with a good bouncy warmth.

 

it's worth trying a couple different tubes, as the difference is fairly noticeable.

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Originally posted by potaetoes

i don't understand what you mean by "emulate two channels"

 

 

I was under the impression you dialed in a main setting and then had a "boost" switch... as you can tell I know almost nothing about this thing. I like how its a tube preamp, but I'm worried its not gonna deliver the kind of sounds I'm wanting... the V-amp is sounding better, it can't do much, but the one thing it really can do which is heavy stuff it does really well...

 

He wants his own rig, but I just bought a new amp, so maybe I can talk him out of it, and get him to use mine. Hahaha, although I'd really like to use two amps each, thats just not feasible for a side project.

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