Well im set on the guitar (i think), now the amp....

[varkunus]

Right well with help from you guys i should be getting the ibanez rg1570 in lefty. I will then put a alinco V warpig in the bridge, a irish tour in the middle, and a cold sweat in the neck. After that i will hopefully get it set up with insanely wel by my guitar teachers mate who is renounded for his set ups where i live. Then i will take it to a tech, and get a coil split or maybe a coil tap for single coil sounds. Maybe you guys could tell me which is best. And then possibly i would get a killswtich installed.

Now at the moment i have a marshall dsl401, and its good, better than some. But in a band situation it lacks that big sound i want. And the sound almost becomes sterile. So later on (probs a year or two) after getting the guitar, and i have enough money im thinking of buying a new amp. Now it would be between the mesa single recto, and the engl blackmore. Both of which im gona find very hard to try, although i might well do. Now from clips on youtube the ENGL seems to be a bigger sound. Now i like playing lots of stuff so need something versatile, i want something which can get that sabbath grind, with lots of mids. All the way up to megadeth, with a big, clear, sustained, rich, but not to fuzzy sound. Also i want decent cleans which i heard the ENGL has, and good overdrive tone for hendrix and such. Also if possible i wana be able to get a good gary moore/santana tone.

So in summary, for my cleans i want a shimmery fender style cleans, with that almost woody element. For light overdrive i want a lynard skynard/allman brothers sound. For distortion i want a sorta sabbathy sound/led zeplin/purple. And for heavy stuff i want something which can pull off megadeth/some metalicca with a big sounding bass etc.

Cheers guys.

[varkunus]

well i can see its getting views, so could someone give me feedback on these two amps. Or others which might be better

[Acolmiztli]

If I were going to get a Mesa, it wouldn't be the single rect. It'd have to be the double or triple. ENGL make really nice amps, so that got my vote.

[maverickf1jockey]

First question; do you really NEED that level of power?

Oddly enough an orange rocker series would, also being both greatly cheaper and significantly more reliable than the mesa, be a quite decent choice.

They aren't quite as high-gain as you might like but you could set them up for power amp distortion more easily and warpigs should push it enough for at least the Sabbath sound. You could then use the saved cash for an overdrive pedal for the thrash stuff.

And anyway; it's always so much more fun to freak out people by outpowering them with a lower-wattage class A than underwhelm them with a monstrous class A/B which is about the same net output but can't be dialled in so easily (especially a MESA!) or cranked so well.

And for cleans the rocker has a fender-esque clean tone up to the point where the power amp breaks up (which I doubt you'll reach in any real situation outside of a stadium/arena.

Plus Gary Moore is listed on the Orange site as an endorser so you know it'll get that creamy saturation seeing as he uses PG blues in his LPs.

If you doubt the distortion levels of the rockers Rob Chappers, of The Black Hand and Orange amps demonstrator, reckons they have more gain than the thunderverb series, which is aimed at Nu Metallers.

[Roobubba]

All the way up to megadeth

Sorry, not a useful post here, but I'm almost certain that that is the first time I've read/heard such a phrase! Amusing!

Roo

[varkunus]

http://www.nme.com/video/id/RjkZHBJd5OY/search/tuning
On this video the engl sounds much bigger, and the mesa sounds more refined.

for the most part, my covers and shitee are gona be anything up to sabbath. But for my own sound, and band i want something big sounding. Thats why i was thinking these two amps.

[Roobubba]

To be brutally honest with you, it seems too soon to be considering this if you've not even got your guitar yet. When you have your guitar in hand, you can take it on a road trip to some gear shops to try out amps in person. Sure, you might not have any near where you live, but this is a big investment, you should take the time/travel out to hear how the amps sound in person with your guitar!

Also, the longer you wait, the more cash you have to spend (as long as you're saving ;)).

Also +1, the last thing I want to do is put you off buying a nice big amp, but these suckers with a 4 x 12 (or a 4 x 12 and a [2 x 15, 2 x8], tee hee :D) are BIG, HEAVY, AWKWARD and take up LOTS of space!
For me, that's no problem, because I can convince my wife that I need to put it downstairs, I can lift (just about) and drive them myself. My parents are very laid back, but I can imagine they'd not have been happy at all with me getting something like that at that age. Just something to bear in mind!

Roo

[blue]

i don't have first hand experience of this, but i have been told that a set of decent tubes and a re-bias will transform a Marshall DSL, give it a much bigger, more defined sound.  it would certainly be a much cheaper option than buying a Mesa or Engl.  you mention Gary Moore, i saw him live last year and his main live amp was a Dsl, sounded pretty good!

just a thought before you go off buying an amp you might not need.

[Antag]

So in summary, for my cleans i want a shimmery fender style cleans, with that almost woody element. For light overdrive i want a lynard skynard/allman brothers sound. For distortion i want a sorta sabbathy sound/led zeplin/purple. And for heavy stuff i want something which can pull off megadeth/some metalicca with a big sounding bass etc.

I voted for Engl Blackmore.  I've never owned one but I have had a Mesa Single Recto (Rect-o-verb head) since '99 & currently use an Engl Savage 120 head.

I think the Mesa will give you 3 of the 4 sounds you want (the "vintage high gain" sucks) but only 2 at once - it's a 2 channel amp & the voicing controls aren't footswitchable (**NB: My Mesa is one of the very first Single Recto models which had several design flaws that may have been ironed out in newer models)

The Engl is a 4 channel amp.  Based on my experience with the Savage it will get you close to all of the sounds.

[varkunus]

hhm i know stack are flipping awkard. I mean my marshal dsl401 is heavy enough. But i would proberly just a 2 X 12, not need for a 4 really. Although would the 2 sound better than 1.  And i duno if my amp can get the sounds i want. i want a big sound as i said. And ive considered changing tubes and stuff. Maybe 6055s or w/e. But i dont if it will works because its pretty fizzy. Although not as bad as people make out. And on the ENGL what are the different channel? Clean> Overdrive>Lead>Heavy Lead? And what tubes does it use?

Now i know the ENGL sounds really big and whatever, but can you tame it down for subtle overdrive. Like thick and creamy sounding. And will it get metalicca style sounds. Also the ENGL isnt that expensive i dont think, because if i sold my DSL and then brought it. How much would a cab and footpedal cost? And would you say the ENGL cab or something else.

And i know it sounds like im planning my whole future before i even got my guitar, and in a sense i am. But i want make sure that if i upgrade that everything will work. Etc

[maverickf1jockey]

No matter as to how good the quality I abjectly refuse to pay over £100 for  an ENGL footswitch (and that's not even the MIDI-enabled ones; it's for a standard floor box with four buttons). Add to that a head that ritually costs over a grand (and possibly a half I haven't checked on the Blackmore but ENGL prices range from about £700-£2000+ new as far as I know) and a cab which costs about half a grand you would be much better off buying a simpler amp, more akin to what you are used to with the Marshall (ie; twin channel and using the volume control and a booster to vary your sound between your requirements). And the cab (which is not the best you will find for the money by any means).

I went through a phase of wanting an ENGL at one point but I found that I had to pay megabucks to get the sound I was after and even then it took so long to dial in that when I tried it I couldn't get rid of the ridiculous amount of treble the things have.

What you need is to concentrate on tonal quality and not gizmos; you'll save money that way and you'll sound better; it's win-win!

[Zaned]

I own an ENGL Blackmore, with an ENGL 2x12 cab (V30's). It's a killer amp! From GREAT cleans to killer high gain.

And it's unforgiving, it'll show mistakes. I hate when amps cover up sloppiness :roll:

And you won't have to crank it to 3 or 4 to get a great sound, the power section sounds very good even at 'sensible' volume levels.

Now, I have not tried a single recto so I won't try to compare them..

-Zaned

[varkunus]

so what do i do then? And can it get a deep purple sound? And is there any alternate switches? I mean at the end of the day it dont effect sound quality just literally an impulse to change the channel, and countour etc. And what do you mean there trebley as hell? In most of the vids they dont sound trebly. And who sells its for a cheap price and ship to UK. Also which cab?

[maverickf1jockey]

ENGL will do you a multiple switch setup (which seems to be designed for your inconvenence) at a cost of around £30 per pedal I believe. However you could use a set of Marshall footswitches to the same ends.

The amps I tried, the Thunder combo and the Fireball, had enormous amounts of treble. They made my humbuckers (they were stock at the time and not what one would call bright) sound like strat/telecaster coils. This may have been due to the influence of the cabinet, which is known for being very trebly.

The people who demo/endorse ENGL amps are all, to my knowledge, humbucker users. This may be to counteract the highs.

However, if you are prepared to put enough effort in you may find a setting which gets rid of these tonal problems.

ENGL do several variations on all their cabinets. Be sure to get a closed back one as that should give you the right sort of push.

[DeanS]

Err.. if this isn't gonna happen for a year or two I'd wait and assess things closer to the time......