40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

I haven't looked at Laney or H&K yet. I haven't ruled out a 50W JVM but I would like a better clean channel and lower noise under high gain. My 100w one is so noisy - I gotta find a way to tame that down.

Noise gate in the loop
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

I've heard the XXX/3120 crunch and lead channel are identical and both very high gain. I believe the JSX/XXX 2 crunch channel has more modest gain characteristics.
I used to have the XXX, and no, the Crunch and Ultra channels are not identical. Yes, they're close, and yes, they're both very high gain indeed, but the Crunch has a tighter bottom-end and crunchier upper-mids (slightly more Marshally), and the Ultra is slightly more compressed, has a bigger/looser bottom-end, and is a step more towards Mesa-ish land.

The JSX's Ultra channel is based on the the XXX's Crunch channel, and the JSX's Crunch channel is based on the Peavey Classic, I believe.
 
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Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

I used to have the XXX, and no, the Crunch and Ultra channels are not identical. Yes, they're close, and yes, they're both very high gain indeed, but the Crunch has a tighter bottom-end and crunchier upper-mids (slightly more Marshally), and the Ultra is slightly more compressed, has a bigger/looser bottom-end, and is a step more towards Mesa-ish land.

The JSX's Ultra channel is based on the the XXX's Crunch channel, and the JSX's Crunch channel is based on the Peavey Classic, I believe.

Interesting. Thanks for posting that. I'd only read about it and haven't had the hardware to try.
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

I'm about to buy myself a Jet City Amelia once I get my next paycheck.
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

I'm looking for a 50-watter that goes down to 25.

The EVH 50 watt combos have power scaling from 50 watts down to 1 watt. I don't know why this feature was omitted from the heads? Otherwise, the new versions especially, meet most of your requirements.
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

Noise gate in the loop

I've got one in there... I'm looking at ways that I can reduce the noise level in the amp by using different/better tubes in the preamp or maybe even a minor mod to the amp. The fact that I run a compressor as an always-on pedal doesn't help.
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

The EVH 50 watt combos have power scaling from 50 watts down to 1 watt. I don't know why this feature was omitted from the heads? Otherwise, the new versions especially, meet most of your requirements.

I'll look at those again.

5150s are amps that I really WANT to like, but somehow they just never hit the mark for me.
 
40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

I've got one in there... I'm looking at ways that I can reduce the noise level in the amp by using different/better tubes in the preamp or maybe even a minor mod to the amp. The fact that I run a compressor as an always-on pedal doesn't help.

What gate are you using? If it’s a Boss NS-2 or ISP G—String you should be able to get that amp dead silent.

Not sure if you know, but it’s imperative that the wet/dry mix knob is set to 100%.
 
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Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

Just looked at the Roadster... cool amp but again this is a 100w amp that goes down to 50. That's not what I want. I'm looking for a 50-watter that goes down to 25. I don't need the extra power and the weight of those Roadsters is considerable, even for someone that hauls a 4x12 around.
Yep, it is heavy, worst part about it.
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

What gate are you using? If it’s a Boss NS-2 or ISP G—String you should be able to get that amp dead silent.

Not sure if you know, but it’s imperative that the wet/dry mix knob is set to 100%.

I've got an ISP G-String and it works just fine. Thing is I like to turn the decimator off for extended periods of clean or light overdrive. The amp itself is just noisy as hell with the compressor on with the dirty channel and playing at volumes under 4 my sustain starts to get cut off. I'd like to figure out how to reduce the amp's extraneous noise levels WITHOUT relying so much on the pedal.
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

I've got an ISP G-String and it works just fine. Thing is I like to turn the decimator off for extended periods of clean or light overdrive. The amp itself is just noisy as hell with the compressor on with the dirty channel and playing at volumes under 4 my sustain starts to get cut off. I'd like to figure out how to reduce the amp's extraneous noise levels WITHOUT relying so much on the pedal.


Yeah, the JVM is noisy. I wasn’t able to NOT use the pedal. I had the switching set up so the gate was off on the clean channel and on for OD. You know how to set that up with this amp....yes?
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

Yeah, the JVM is noisy. I wasn’t able to NOT use the pedal. I had the switching set up so the gate was off on the clean channel and on for OD. You know how to set that up with this amp....yes?

I do, but the gate isn't the only thing in the loop. the delay pedal is in there as well. So turning the loop off when I go to cleans would kill the delay pedal, and that's not going to work for me.

There's a local marshall tech here Ive gone to for years. I'll pick his brain to see what he can do to lower the noise floor on the amp. :)
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

I do, but the gate isn't the only thing in the loop. the delay pedal is in there as well. So turning the loop off when I go to cleans would kill the delay pedal, and that's not going to work for me.

There's a local marshall tech here Ive gone to for years. I'll pick his brain to see what he can do to lower the noise floor on the amp. :)

Let me know what you do for a solution.
Is it possible to run the delay in the other loop? I never tried that with my JVM so I’m not really sure what would happen.
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

I was gonna say Blackstar or Hughes/Kettner
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

Traynor YCS-50 if you can find one. They've been discontinued for a few years now. Retailed for around $1000CAD new and sell between $300 and $500CAD on the used market.

50 watts Class AB, switchable to 15 watts Class A. 2 channels plus a variable boost on the dirty channel. Lots of options to change the voicing.

Or, if you're looking for a good clean pedal platform, any one of the vintage Traynor models like the YBA-1. 50 watts, extremely loud. If you're in the position to crank them or can mod it with a master volume they break up nicely. At one time you could get them for only $200 or so, but they're climbing in value. I bought one in real rough cosmetic condition for $450CAD last year.

IMG_0679.jpg

IMG_0999.jpg
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

For something different, you might check out the Orange Cr120.

I’ve had one for a while. 100% analog, solid state, 120w with a great master volume, and sounds absolutely awesome.

It is a very high gain amp, but won’t do 5150 style aggression without some outside influences. I’ve ran mine through a couple different cabs and it is a versatile and great sounding amp that is very cost effective. Spend the rest on a couple pedals or whatever.

It’s well worth a look.
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

I've tried the 5150-based amps and I owned a XXX for a brief period a long time ago. The newer 5150 types are better for sure but overall I find them too gainy, compressed... not really my thing.

There's the ValveKing series of heads and combos. The new ones have built in attenuators to cut their output down. The ValveKing Combo 50 might be about right.
 
Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

I'm about to buy myself a Jet City Amelia once I get my next paycheck.

I've been looking at this too. The big seller for me is the independent tone controls for each channel.... I'm tired of shared EQ on 2 channel amps. The distributor also offers several "factory" mods. One is the Low Gear mod, which reduces gain a bit on Ch. 2 and voices the amp more for classic rock. They will also mod the footswitch to allow the gain or solo function to be controlled from the footswitch rather than from the front of the amp. I think that way it was $599. A good low price option.

Spawn also makes a 50w version of most of his amps, including the Quick Rod, which is the 2 channel beast. I don't know if he offers power scaling, but I bet he can or would do it. In the end, this is what I want. I just don't know if I can justify the price for a head and matching 2x12.

B2D, I think you would really like the Quick Rod, because it does every Marshall from Plexi to ultra hot rodded JCM 800. Even though I think it sounds better than a Marshall, it might be a bit redundant to your JVM. The Amelia is an interesting budget friendly option and I think it would suit your needs with money to spare. It is supposed to take pedals well and have a very decent clean channel. If it does do those things, I think it would cover your cover band needs. Can't recall if it does power scaling. Probably not at it's pricepoint.

I guess the new DSL40c or whatever it's called is an option too. Independent EQ's and master volume, effects loop and power scaling.... all well under $1000.
 
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Re: 40-50w tube head suggestions for club gigs.

I haven't looked at Laney or H&K yet. I haven't ruled out a 50W JVM but I would like a better clean channel and lower noise under high gain. My 100w one is so noisy - I gotta find a way to tame that down.

The one thing i will say against the irt line is the gain channels are really noisy. Much more so than a jvm. If u dont want to deal with noise gates, then id definitely go h&k cause 5150s r meh. Victory kraken maybe? Get u roughly in the same tonal ballpark. the noise issue though; isp gates are a bit of a one trick pony, id go for a tc sentry for a smoother better engineered cutoff. Also, maybe invest in a higher quality compressor? Tc hypergravity?
 
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