Music Man One Thirty HD & Victory Kraken V4?

[DarthTangYang]

I am building a W/D/W rig and am looking for an amp for my dry tones. I already have two 100W Hughes & Kettner Vortex Black Series solid state heads with two 4X12 cabs that will make up the stereo wet. And right after I finish writing this post I'm on my way to pick up a Victory Kraken V4 preamp pedal that will serve as both my main distortion as well as the preamp of my dry signal. My initial thought was to get an Orange Pedal Baby 100 and use that as the poweramp for this rig but after having bought the Kraken preamp I'm starting to think differently. If I've understood it correctly the Kraken allows you to hook it up through both the FX-return as well as straight into the front of your amp and can then be bypassed co pletely whenever you want, allowing you to use the preamp of whatever amp you're using instead of the Kraken. This would make it very adventageous to hook the Kraken up to an amp with sparkling clean tones. I have never played through an Orange Pedal Baby but as far as I've understood it is basically a poweramp and meant to serve as a pedal platform. Its clean sound is not really all that great and you don't really have a traditional EQ to dial it in without pedals in front of it. If anyone here disagrees with this statement please feel free to change my mind. Perhaps the clean sound of the Pedal Baby is really good?

However, I have been looking around on the used market for an amp head, somewhere between 20-100W, with an FX-loop and with sparkling clean tones and recently came across a vintage Music Man One Thirty. I have no experience with Music Man but as I've understood it they do have a fan base that swear by them, especially their clean sound. It does have a valve/tube poweramp but a solid state preamp, which is kinda' weird. Usually it's the other way around in hybrid amps. I know Leo Fender set up this company together with some other guy originally in the 70's but according to himself he didn't have anything to do with their amps. So, any thoughts? Would the Music Man One Thirty (HD) be a good pedal platform for my Kraken and does it have the sparkling clean sound that their fans claim?

 

[Mincer]

These are fantastic amps which should be more popular than they are. Forget the technology used to make the sound- if you see one at a good price, grab it. It is one of the best cleans next to a blackface Twin to me.

 

[misterwhizzy]

As I recall, guitfiddle used to have and love one.

 

[jeremy]

they are great amps. if you can find one in good shape for a decent price, jump on it

 

[DarthTangYang]

These are fantastic amps which should be more popular than they are. Forget the technology used to make the sound- if you see one at a good price, grab it. It is one of the best cleans next to a blackface Twin to me.

The guy wants $548 for it. You think that's a good price?

 

[Mincer]

Can you try it out?

 

[DarthTangYang]

Can you try it out?

Well, probably, but there's quite some distance to go to try it out (506 km = 314 miles there and back). He claims it has 4 new poweramp valves and 2 new transistors. He's been playing it through a Fender Vintage 115, Fender Bassman 115 Neo and 410 Neo and says they all sounded good. However, he calls this amp both a bass amp and guitar amp. I know nothing about bass amps but aren't they constructed differently than guitar amps?

 

[DarthTangYang]

Here's a picture of it.

 

[jeremy]

i use a '69 dual showman reverb as a bass head all the time. the amps arent that different, though there is some differences, but the speakers are quite different. you wont hurt a guitar amp running bass through it, might not sound great though since its voiced for guitar. if the amp has a lot of clean headroom, then it can sound fine. running bass through guitar speakers can lead to dead speakers

 

[DarthTangYang]

Well, according to the owner the Music Man doesn't have an FX-loop, which renders it useless for the appliction I had in mind. As A regular pedal platform it would probably be a great choice but not for the Kraken.

 

[guitfiddle]

As I recall, guitfiddle used to have and love one.

I still have it, and it'll still shake nails out of the walls....

 

[misterwhizzy]

I still have it, and it'll still shake nails out of the walls....

Miss seeing you around here, brother.

 

[zionstrat]

Yep, I've got the 410 version and it is a monster. Not just ridiculously loud, with tons of headroom, it's got a really distinctive clean which is very blackfacish And it can also crunch with an unusually grarly crunchy tone.

Probably the best kept secret out there and I love to see them at these prices. I think people get confused about the tubes being in the power amp but boy does it work. One sidebar I do have the triode in the preamp but from what I can tell the solid state sound exactly alike. Can't wait to hear more!

 

[Demanic]

Someone local had a MusicMan 60w 2x12 combo listed on Craigslist. I was sorely tempted.

Sent from my SM-A115A using Tapatalk

 

[DarthTangYang]

UPDATE!

I ended up buying an Orange TH30 and I sure don't regret it. It has an awesome distortion channel and I can't complain about its clean channel either. I know there are quite a few people out there who doesn't really like this amp but I love it. It is however my very first tube/valve amplifier so I'm surely no expert. But compared to all the solid state amps I've been playing through for the past 30 years this is awesome. The plan was originally (like you can read in my first post) to use the Kraken V4 preamp pedal as my main distortion and mainly needed an amp with a really nice clean sound, but the distortion in my TH30 now serves the purpose of main distortion while the V4 gives me two secondary distortion channels to choose from if needed.