Hot _Grits
Buttery Toneologist
Hi all,
I took a trip out of town to master an upcoming album for one of my bands, and had time to visit one of my favorite small boutique stores, Mojosound, who are Carr, Victoria and Custom Audio/Suhr dealers.
While amp stocks were a bit low, I did get to try some stuff I hadn't run the rule over before.
First up I checked out Mojosound's own radiotone amp:
-5w from one EL84, single ended, with a single 12ax7 and a weber 8inch speaker. This little guy sounded great, in a smoother Champ kind of vein. I was expecting nasal smallness from the weber 8, but it sounded surprisingly balanced and full. 899 NZ$, which is 680 US$. Pretty good value for a handwired amp.
Next up, I tried the Victoria Victorilux. I was very interested in this amp, as my idea of a post-tweed good time is a brown vibroverb type of tone. What I heard was interesting: definitely a rawer, brighter, more unhinged breakup than a vibrolux of vibroverb, and a beautiful, thick clean tone that is addictively playable. The reverb and trem were first rate as well, though the trem's lowest speed was pretty pacy. Overall a great amp but not the repacement for my old vibrolux that I thought it might eventually be.
Then I fired up the Carr Vincent. Now I have to say that I'm not really a blackface guy, though where I live you generally hear the reissues and badly maintained originals. But this amp was outstanding. blackface sparkle in droves, but beautifully balanced and never boxy and harsh in the midrange. Nice headroom and a very nice overdrive character. Outstanding with gibson guitars. It also had a very nice 7w single ended mode that didn't squash up too much. very impressive, and the best blackface style amp I've yet heard.
I also tried a secondhand Bad Cat Black Cat 30. My first experience with Bad Cat, and it was interesting. What I heard was basically a very scooped take on the voxy marshall 4xEL84 thing. I was very surprised at how gainy and scooped the amp was. The tone was very even, and I can imagine being able to play it for long periods without fatigue, but I wonder how the amp would cut through in a mix. Overall much more towards the metal camp than I thought it would be. Great master volume, though. Just the tiniest loss of openness.
Overall, the winner on the day was the Carr Vincent. A great amp that I'm sure a lot of fender diehards would be very impressed by.
I took a trip out of town to master an upcoming album for one of my bands, and had time to visit one of my favorite small boutique stores, Mojosound, who are Carr, Victoria and Custom Audio/Suhr dealers.
While amp stocks were a bit low, I did get to try some stuff I hadn't run the rule over before.
First up I checked out Mojosound's own radiotone amp:
-5w from one EL84, single ended, with a single 12ax7 and a weber 8inch speaker. This little guy sounded great, in a smoother Champ kind of vein. I was expecting nasal smallness from the weber 8, but it sounded surprisingly balanced and full. 899 NZ$, which is 680 US$. Pretty good value for a handwired amp.
Next up, I tried the Victoria Victorilux. I was very interested in this amp, as my idea of a post-tweed good time is a brown vibroverb type of tone. What I heard was interesting: definitely a rawer, brighter, more unhinged breakup than a vibrolux of vibroverb, and a beautiful, thick clean tone that is addictively playable. The reverb and trem were first rate as well, though the trem's lowest speed was pretty pacy. Overall a great amp but not the repacement for my old vibrolux that I thought it might eventually be.
Then I fired up the Carr Vincent. Now I have to say that I'm not really a blackface guy, though where I live you generally hear the reissues and badly maintained originals. But this amp was outstanding. blackface sparkle in droves, but beautifully balanced and never boxy and harsh in the midrange. Nice headroom and a very nice overdrive character. Outstanding with gibson guitars. It also had a very nice 7w single ended mode that didn't squash up too much. very impressive, and the best blackface style amp I've yet heard.
I also tried a secondhand Bad Cat Black Cat 30. My first experience with Bad Cat, and it was interesting. What I heard was basically a very scooped take on the voxy marshall 4xEL84 thing. I was very surprised at how gainy and scooped the amp was. The tone was very even, and I can imagine being able to play it for long periods without fatigue, but I wonder how the amp would cut through in a mix. Overall much more towards the metal camp than I thought it would be. Great master volume, though. Just the tiniest loss of openness.
Overall, the winner on the day was the Carr Vincent. A great amp that I'm sure a lot of fender diehards would be very impressed by.
