cratz2

Man... that really sucks.

I can get behind you being a mod though from more of a time factor than changing the direction of changing enforcement of any given rules.

I'm not a Journey hater by any stretch but I have to admit, Schon was who came to mind as I was clicking on the thread.

I'm pretty easy going and I know a lot of members have a more narrow view of how they'd like the forum to be. I know who to ignore and who tends to write about things of interest to me. I like it here and at TGP. It feels more laid back here but the Electric Guitar forum here is going the direction of Guitar Jam and the Amp forums... that's fine with me. It's either that I'm easy to please or maybe that I just don't care. I dig folks that post clips and try to comment on most of them but this isn't really the 'post clips here' section of Harmony Central in general or the gig info or the recording sections for that matter.

Thanks guys! Thanks man. Really digging it. Did a little tube swapping today and I have to say, it sounds even sweeter. Thanks man. I thought so to the first time I played one. Really dig the swell and sag of the rectifier. Agreed! Sold the Twin II? In a perfect world, I'd have one of those, among all the other fender amps I'd like to own. The princeton is another amp I really, really like. Still got my twin, and bouncing back and forth, I can't really say which I like better. Love the twins bottom end and glassiness, but this amp sounds sooooo sweet and toneful. Played it today with my partner that I do a duet gig with and it really sang. Yup, sold my Twin II, Super Sonic 60W, Tweed Deluxe, AC15H1TV and AC15CC1 and hope to get one of the aforementioned Allen Accomplices and something quality and Voxy like a Morgan AC20 Deluxe. Going to try to ditch about 5 guitars this year as well and am looking to get a semi custom strat built up and a big jazz box. The only think better than downsizing or upgrading is downsizing AND upgrading.

Very nice, WD. I bought Doc Morbius's DRRI, tried a few speakers in it and it was my main amp for a year... maybe two. Time gets jumbled, ya know. I traded it to forum member for a different Fender amp... it's all good. And sold my big Twin II. Bottom line, yeah, it's a cool amp. Some folks like the huge headroom and bottom end or a Twin with proper speakers, some like the near instant crunch of a Tweed Deluxe. I like both of those but between the tree, I'd go with a Deluxe Reverb if I could only have one. I've been Fender less for a couple years now and I'm chomping at the bit to get something like a Princeton/Deluxe Hybrid. Most likely an Allen Accomplice.

Yeah, that's a pretty sad commentary.

Do you have the amp back yet? I'd be interested to know what the issue was... transformer or component(s) on the board. I doubt I'll buy one, but I really like the idea of those amps. There have been two for sale for quite a while locally, but they aren't the ultra. Sorry to hear of your trouble though.

So, is something introduced at a high price and then discounted over its lifecycle to be considered overpriced on launch or not? Hard to say... sometimes I think it's a matter of a manufacturer not quite knowing their market or how large it will or won't be. Sometimes the price is lowered, sometimes it's completely blown out and sometimes they just didn't advertise it well enough.

I guess it's a matter of semantics. It's only 'overpriced' if people won't pay those for it. It's only overrated if folks something based on its ratings or hype, then find it doesn't live up to expectations. Guitars like the 1984 EVH jobbie, the copy of Clapton's Blackie, Harrison's Gretsch reissue, Andy Summers' tele... they sold quite a few copies of all of them. If something is priced beyond what YOU want to pay for it, well... it's just priced out of your comfort zone. Ferrari's for example. They sell pretty much every one they build, and in many instances, the entire production run is sold before the first one leaves the factory. They are expensive and they are extravagant, but they are not overpriced. On the other hand, for a number of years while Ford still owned Hertz, they would intentionally build more of the Taurus model than they were going to sell to actual customers. They knew this and intentionally did it anyway so they could claim the Taurus as the #1 best selling car. They'd sell the leftovers to Hertz then a few months later, would clear them out as last year's model for a little over half off the sticker price. That means the Taurus was overpriced and Ferrari's are priced properly. It's just economics.

My observation on that one would fall into the "overpriced" category.... I hear ya... and my opinion isn't any more or less valid than yours, but how much is an all tube Marshall amp? They sell many of them, right? A decent number of those purchases likely end up with an 'I love the sound, but I wish I could get it at a much lower volume'. I dunno... I'm probably wrong though. I'm not being defensive though... I have zero interest in them and have zero interest in the Class 5. I prefer getting my Marshall tones with a pedal through an amp that has great cleans.

I have never played a Dragons PRS - but I know they are overpriced. Which is what he said about the Marshall Right on... and I'm probably wrong. I mean, it's not like there are more people looking for the Marshall tone available at bedroom levels at a reasonably affordable price than people looking for $15,000+ gaudy guitars that would be embarrassing to play in public. Oh wait... did you really just compare a 1W Marshall to a PRS Dragon?

^^ The Gibson capacitor is a fine candidate for this award. I also saw an acoustic strap from them that was selling for 130 bucks on amazon. Luckily, the acoustic doesn't need capacitors. WRONG, you noob! Those fake Bumblebee caps are SOOOO good, just dropping them in the soundhole of a D28 will increase its toanz at least 400%.

Whoa, hold on there, this forum isn't for saying things that make sense, it's for blind accusations, blanket statements, and general bitching. You take your common sense elsewhere, sir. Oops... my bad.

Has anyone played any of the 1 watt Marshalls that didn't go to NAMM? How can you possibly find it to be overrated if you haven't played it yet?

You take my life but I'll take yours, too!

I haven't had any of the Adamas picks, but I had a couple graphite picks years ago that started off smooth enough (no smoother than Tortex or Ultex really) but the area that touched the strings got worn and actually came to feel like fine grip sand paper. How much are those jobbies going for? I wouldn't mind getting a couple for the collection.

You actually thought Motley Crue peaked with Girls, Girls, Girls? Too Fast For Love and Shout At The Devil, man... Having said that, if the only options were Metallica circa Load/Reload/St Anger or Motley Crue circa Theater of Pain/Dr Feelgood, I'd probably stick with the memory of music in my head.

Any list of great guitarists that has Gilmour at 80 something and completely omits Chet Atkins and Brian Setzer should be enough to prevent ANY guitarist from ever opening another issue of that magazine.

Thanks for the input. After screwing around with the amp half the night trying to satisfy my curiosity, I guess I have to conclude that the speaker has just finally broken in all the way. In addition to my living room MiM Strat, I tried two other guitars in the same setup (CV 60s Strat and Ibanez SZ520) and all three just sound better on a variety of Mustang I presets, both with and without the Bad Monkey, and through my Rocktron Utopia G300 floor unit. I've discovered that at higher volumes, it doesn't sound as 'farty' as it did before either. I've never seen a speaker take this long to loosen up; I have at least 80 hours of play time on it (though mostly at living room volumes while watching TV, so that may have delayed the break in). What I usually do to break a speaker in is record a few minutes of guitar loop (usually a little 12-bar rhythm and lead) on my Jam Man, then plug it into the amp in an upstairs closet and let it play the loop overnight for several nights. I had purchased the Mustang to take with me on vacation last summer and didn't get a chance to do this to it. I was already pretty damned happy with the Mustang as a versatile little noodling-around-in-the-living-room-while-watching-TV amp, but now I'm even more impressed with it. I had been considering trying to shoe horn a spare Ragin' Cajun 10" into the Mustang, but considering how much better it suddenly sounds, I'm in no hurry. For a $99 amp, this thing sounds stellar. To add to the pot, perhaps it was only your imagination that made you think it sounds better... maybe just on one guitar, but once you believe it sounds better, it DOES sound better... to your ears. It's not a bad thing, my friend and to be honest, I'd just quite questioning it.

This is much more than that ... it's like the sound was 'thickened' without any change in audio settings. Well... seriously... if there aren't any tubes involved... and no changes were made... do you think it's more likely that the capacitors and resistors heated up in a different manner one morning vs the night before or that you perceived the same equipment in a different manner? Occam's Razor, my friend.

It's all in your mind. Or your mood. Or maybe the air is more dense in the room. Or maybe it's a subconscious manifestation of your desire to convince yourself to buy more gear that is more 'consistent'. But probably the first one.

In terms of underrated amps, the Pro Reverb and Tremolux are the first two that came to mind. I'd also throw the Vibrosonic in there, but it's kinda heavy. It's basically a Twin with a single 15". 10 or 15 years ago, I'd have thrown the Vibrolux in the mix, but it seems to have made a bit of a comeback. In terms of pure value, the Silverface Twins have to be at the top if you don't mind the weight and many of the Rivera-era II series amps for for chump change, the Fender 30, Super Champ and esp the Concert are some of my favorites of the lesser-knowns. Some folks seem to hate the Red Knob era but most that I've plugged into were pretty great-sounding. They are just harder to work on than most of what came before. I'm no Champ expert by any means as it's not really my kind of amp, but usually going from a quality 8" to a quality 10" won't make a radical difference if you are wanting more volume or more headroom. A high-efficiency 12" would definitely make a difference but for a 10" to make a big difference, it would have to be a GREAT 10" like an EV 10L or something along those lines.

I wouldn't say I was ever a fan, but I had a friend whose mom was big into the PMRC and she took us to see them on the To Hell With The Devil and she bought me that album for Christmas. I haven't listened to any of that since maybe 1987 or so but I remember really liking the song 'The Way'. I think I remember reading that Michael Sweet was singing with Boston... maybe just a few gigs, maybe for a year or so, but I think they were working together.

There are a number of boutique pedals that will do exactly what you are asking... but to get into the really believable Marshall tones, I think you need a truly British-voiced speaker. My guess is you can run the Wampler Plextortion into your SCXD with the stock speaker and make it sound a lot more Marshally than with the Wampler, but if you run the same pedal into the same amp but into an external cab with a Greenback or ET65, you'll probably get much more favorable results. Of course, this will depend on your expectations and if you've ever owned or played a Marshall for an extended period.