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It arrived this week:
Following on from an earlier thread where i was asking folks about the amp, and ended up ordering one from Jim at Lil' Dawg amps, I wanted to post a little review and initial impressions.
Firstly I wanted to say that working with Jim at Lil' Dawg amps was one of the best musical purchasing experiences I've had. He is super knowledgable and patient and answered all my questions and gave some great advice to make sure I ended up with an amp that suited my needs.
I have a couple of higher watt amps that have clean headroom and was looking for something smaller that could crank up to get that power tube overdrive at stage volumes in rehearsals and small bars. I mainly play blues and classic rock and have so far relied on master volumes, channel switching and pedals to get my overdrive tones. With the lil dawg I can crank the volume and then back things off to get my clean tones.
The amp is a 5e3 clone and has 12 watts running through a 5Y3GT, 6V6GT, 6V6GT, 12AX7, and a 12AY7. It uses a Weber 12A125A speaker (8 ohm, 30 watt, light dope). It has a bright channel and a normal channel with high and low imputs on both, two channel volumes and a master tone. Jim also added a little switch that engages or bypasses a "Paul C" mod that is intended to give a bit more range on the volume before it starts to overdrive. I haven't had much of a chance to play around with this yet, the standard setting is so good I've so far kinda forgotten to engage it. The build quality is fantastic, everything is hand wired point to point, using quality components.
I live in a pretty residential area and am not able to really crank the amp at home, so was limited to bedroom clean levels the first couple of days. Today i was able to take it to the local rehearsal space to really crank it up. (a drummer friend was going to join but family commitments intervened).
Firstly i was surprised at how much more headroom the amp has that i was expecting. Reading reviews of 5e3s folks were talking about ACDC levels of crunch pretty early on the volume dial. On this amp it gets fuller and hairy after about 4-5 on the volume control but didn't get into what i would define as full overdrive lead tones until about 9-11, with more sag and compression between 11-12. It was still in bluesy levels of gain and not approaching hard rock tones. At this volume it was pretty darn loud, and i was kicking myself that the drummer couldn't show, since i am pretty sure it would be competing volume wise. I think spent most of my time on the normal channel with the strat and the bright channel on the les paul. Also the amp is pretty quiet even when you crank it. With my les paul it was very quiet with very little white noise or humming. With the strat I got the normal single coil noise (actually I just ordered a set of mojotone quiet coils but that will be a separate thread).
It is very touch sensitive and amplifies all the nuances of your playing. I'm going to need to improve my technique, as any sloppy playing comes straight through. It responds really well to playing dynamics and really works with you when you back off or dig in.
I had the amp raised up on my amp stand and it projected really well. I used my Les Paul traditional with 57/57+ pickups and my 57 reissue strat with 57/62 pickups. They both sounded great and i could get a nice range of clean through mildly overdriven sounds through just the guitar volume and tone controls. I'm a bluesy player and this amp suits my style with a bit of grit that cleans up well. It had me wishing i could be better at playing Peter Green style blues.
I tried to take a couple of clips using my iPhone. They are very rough, and the iPhone cuts out a lot of the high end and 3D quality of the amp, so they are not the best representation of the amps capabilities, more like a quick musical sketch. On the clip with the strat you'll hear some low rumbling coming from a metal band that was going balls to the wall next door. I recorded the les paul clip while they were taking a break but then they came back and played intensely for the next hour straight (they were good but damn their bass was booming through the building). Also excuse the playing as i was focusing more on trying the amp out than what I was playing. Both clips on the normal channel, and i should have probably done some clips on the bright channel with it cranked up a bit more, but was getting my blues tones at less than full throttle.
It's early days getting to know the amp, but so far i've been really impressed and can't wait to try it out in a group situation.
Following on from an earlier thread where i was asking folks about the amp, and ended up ordering one from Jim at Lil' Dawg amps, I wanted to post a little review and initial impressions.
Firstly I wanted to say that working with Jim at Lil' Dawg amps was one of the best musical purchasing experiences I've had. He is super knowledgable and patient and answered all my questions and gave some great advice to make sure I ended up with an amp that suited my needs.
I have a couple of higher watt amps that have clean headroom and was looking for something smaller that could crank up to get that power tube overdrive at stage volumes in rehearsals and small bars. I mainly play blues and classic rock and have so far relied on master volumes, channel switching and pedals to get my overdrive tones. With the lil dawg I can crank the volume and then back things off to get my clean tones.
The amp is a 5e3 clone and has 12 watts running through a 5Y3GT, 6V6GT, 6V6GT, 12AX7, and a 12AY7. It uses a Weber 12A125A speaker (8 ohm, 30 watt, light dope). It has a bright channel and a normal channel with high and low imputs on both, two channel volumes and a master tone. Jim also added a little switch that engages or bypasses a "Paul C" mod that is intended to give a bit more range on the volume before it starts to overdrive. I haven't had much of a chance to play around with this yet, the standard setting is so good I've so far kinda forgotten to engage it. The build quality is fantastic, everything is hand wired point to point, using quality components.
I live in a pretty residential area and am not able to really crank the amp at home, so was limited to bedroom clean levels the first couple of days. Today i was able to take it to the local rehearsal space to really crank it up. (a drummer friend was going to join but family commitments intervened).
Firstly i was surprised at how much more headroom the amp has that i was expecting. Reading reviews of 5e3s folks were talking about ACDC levels of crunch pretty early on the volume dial. On this amp it gets fuller and hairy after about 4-5 on the volume control but didn't get into what i would define as full overdrive lead tones until about 9-11, with more sag and compression between 11-12. It was still in bluesy levels of gain and not approaching hard rock tones. At this volume it was pretty darn loud, and i was kicking myself that the drummer couldn't show, since i am pretty sure it would be competing volume wise. I think spent most of my time on the normal channel with the strat and the bright channel on the les paul. Also the amp is pretty quiet even when you crank it. With my les paul it was very quiet with very little white noise or humming. With the strat I got the normal single coil noise (actually I just ordered a set of mojotone quiet coils but that will be a separate thread).
It is very touch sensitive and amplifies all the nuances of your playing. I'm going to need to improve my technique, as any sloppy playing comes straight through. It responds really well to playing dynamics and really works with you when you back off or dig in.
I had the amp raised up on my amp stand and it projected really well. I used my Les Paul traditional with 57/57+ pickups and my 57 reissue strat with 57/62 pickups. They both sounded great and i could get a nice range of clean through mildly overdriven sounds through just the guitar volume and tone controls. I'm a bluesy player and this amp suits my style with a bit of grit that cleans up well. It had me wishing i could be better at playing Peter Green style blues.
I tried to take a couple of clips using my iPhone. They are very rough, and the iPhone cuts out a lot of the high end and 3D quality of the amp, so they are not the best representation of the amps capabilities, more like a quick musical sketch. On the clip with the strat you'll hear some low rumbling coming from a metal band that was going balls to the wall next door. I recorded the les paul clip while they were taking a break but then they came back and played intensely for the next hour straight (they were good but damn their bass was booming through the building). Also excuse the playing as i was focusing more on trying the amp out than what I was playing. Both clips on the normal channel, and i should have probably done some clips on the bright channel with it cranked up a bit more, but was getting my blues tones at less than full throttle.
It's early days getting to know the amp, but so far i've been really impressed and can't wait to try it out in a group situation.
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