Good Head/Cabinet for Metal?

[Pacarazzi]

I have a Marshall JVM 410 Head and a Marshall 1960BV cab.

The head: It can go pretty high gain, so what I've come down to is the JVM or a Mesa Boogie. The Mesa Boogies I've tried make it hard to decide, sometimes they sound too fuzzy but other times they sound better for metal than the Marshall. Also, I want something vesatile, with metal being the most important sound I want to achieve. My favorite tones are definately Children of Bodom and Rammstein.

The cab has vintage 30s which initially seemed good but they seem really middy..would a 1960 A or B sound better for metal? I'd probably want to keep the cabs Marshall, since i like the sound plus I can't pay for any super expensive cabs.

Suggestions?

[SG Thrasher]

Some sort of ENGL would have you set, head over too www.Rocksolidamps.com and check out the soundclips, I'm sure one will take your fancy.

[the_bleeding]

for head, i'd say 5150 or engl.

Both fantastic for metal, both tight as hell. The tightness might be a bit adverse to what you want in a rammstein tone, but im sure you'll like it enough anyway.

For cab, dont replace it entirely, i'd say just replace 2 of the speakers with g12t-75's and make your own uberkab. It will sound amazing and blow your head off. I promise :)

[Roobubba]

for head, i'd say 5150 or engl.

Both fantastic for metal, both tight as hell. The tightness might be a bit adverse to what you want in a rammstein tone, but im sure you'll like it enough anyway.

For cab, dont replace it entirely, i'd say just replace 2 of the speakers with g12t-75's and make your own uberkab. It will sound amazing and blow your head off. I promise :)

+1

Or indeed a pair of G12K-100s from Celestion. Cracking speakers for that fantastic bass response and superb high-gain grind :)
If you can find a second hand 5150 or 5150-II (as I did), this can be  relatively inexpensive way to brutal crushing metal tones.
I suppose if depends a lot on what your budget is, too.

Roo

[MDV]

It takes more than just that to make an ubercab ;)

But the ubercab, the real one, is in my experience, the best metal cab out there. Its attached to my powerball. Not toooooo sure about the powerball being the 'best', but it is very good and amazing with an EQ in the FX loop.

[Ben_W]

Yeah, 5150 will do the job well, as will an ENGL.  Replacing the speakers in the cab could be a good choice too. I replaced my valveking cab's terrible stock speakers with some V30s and it sounds so much nicer, it's unreal.

[lamp]

Just swap out a couple of the speakers and keep the JVM - it can certainly do metal :S

[dave_mc]

what mesa are you looking at? if you looking at a recto or a roadking, there won't be too many amps you can afford, you should take a look at things like vht, soldano, brunetti, diezel etc., and also engl would be cool for the high gain thing with a bit of versatility thrown in.

[TomAwesome]

Are you sure it's the speakers you find to be too middy, or is it the combination of those with your mid-heavy Marshall? V30s are pretty much the standard for rock and metal. Most metal albums you listen to probably were recorded with V30s.

The Recto should do more or less what you want it to. They're great for metal and are fairly versatile. They just take a while to dial in sometimes.

[noodleplugerine]

I think I'd rather a Fireball to a 5150, better clean channel.