Re: Is a komet 60 head worth $300 US to ship?
Okie dokie, the full story.
The guys name is Aaron and he lives and works reasonably close to me. Both his job and his residence are within 20 minutes. He does sales for an area piano/musical store that has been in business for ages and he knows his gear. He has a fine little collection of amps and guitars including some nice LPs (he brought a 58 RI with the amp), an early issue PRS and he has a thing for late 60s Marshalls which is the reason he's selling the amp. He seemed like a straight up guy to me, so the sellers integrety isn't an issue. He and the amp are the real deal.
The Komet did show up here at my house in pristine condition and it has been well taken care of. I saw no real finish flaws and all the pots and jacks works without crackling and other noise except for the presence, but that is a design issue and the presence on those amps is a very proactive control, unlike the presence controls on older Marshalls that often sounds like an addition treble control. I cranked the amp up hard and played it throughout its range and it exhibited no unusual noise or popping. The pots, jacks, tubes and solder joints all passed muster.
The cleans were warm and bubbly, more like a Mesa Mark I or a Vox than a Fender. I was easily able to get some very jazzy and bluesy tones from it. By leaning into my pick attack I got some very subtle clipping that added alot of character to the tone.
The pushed tones were strong and gritty without the top end brightness that you can get with some amps when you dial them in below full stride. Pick attack variations offered up anything from a mild push to some killer crunchy type of grinding rhythm tones.
Running the volume up around 2 oclock or so (no numbers) and it gave my Marshall a serious run for it's money. The tone was very "plexi" and brown sounding and seriously juicy. I ran a set of Antys, my JP set and the C-5/PGn combo through this amp and the hotter C-5 added focus and tightness to the tone without sounding overly compressed.
The harmonic content was to die for and the overtones just rang out of this amp. It liked to grab single notes and the feedback rang out fat and juicy. I read the review on the Komet website and they aren't bull****ting. Everything their site says about that amp is true.
I was very impressed.
No master volume control and the amp is loud, very loud.
If you go to the usps website you can calculate shipping. I shipped 15 lbs to ireland not too long ago and global express insured was not cheap. But it is a killer amp and I don't see another way to get one other than to pay the shipping.
It really was one of the best sounding amps I've played in a long while.
