UberMetalDood
New member
My Rivera Clubster Royale 1x12 combo arrived early this afternoon. Man this amp is light! I freaking love how easy it is to carry around. It's like carrying around one of those little 15 watt amps but it's 50 watts - plenty of gigging power. If you are not already familiar with the Rivera Clubster, then let me tell real quick. The Clubster is a 45w combo amp that has been around for a while. It's an incredible little amp that you can use for small to medium gigs, maybe more with an extension cab.
The Clubster Royale is a modified version of the Clubster; taking on the cool vintage stylings of the Venus series, but adding a high gain channel (at least that's the way it was explained to me). It has a high and low input, effects loop with independent send/receive level controls, and real spring reverb. It's loaded with 2 EL34's and 3 12AX7's.
Now for my initial impressions... First off the clean channel is just so good that if you're a clean player, not ever playing a Rivera is like a jazz/blues guitarist who has never played a Gibson ES335. It's like missing out on something that amazing.
The clean channel is very much like a Fender. It's loose and really sensitive just like a Fender Vibrolux, but maybe not as flutey as a Fender. It has the kind a response to your playing that reminds me of a Carvin Legacy II that I used to have, but the Legacy II sounded compressed and this one doesn't.
I have to say that I might even like the cleans on this amp more than any Mesa Boogie I have tried before. It's a clean sound that makes me want to linger on the clean channel playing all kinds of blusey solos even though I really don't play clean very often. That it's inspiring is a good thing indeed.
The first gain mode is fairly gainy by itself. It has enough juice to do all kinds of rock rhythms and single note solos, but just begs for a tiny little push from an overdrive.
When you pull the gain knob it bumps up the 2nd gain stage which has a lot of gain. I think this amp can sound pretty brutal because of the kind of distortion it has. It's not buzzy or fuzzy of fizzy, at least not what I hear. It's a different kind of distortion that might be something between a Vox and a Fender Twin kind of distortion.
If this were an amp with only the clean channel and first gain stage, I would still buy it for the same amount of money. The high gain stuff is a bonus. I would buy it because it obviously sounds incredible, it's so light weight, it's loud enough for most applications, and it comes with real spring reverb and a few other standard options.
Two things you have to keep in mind in this initial opinion:
A) I only had about 20-25 min with it
B). I only played through the high input
Ready for the negative? Not really any show stoppers here but I have a few issues. Here's what I think so far:
1. The stock Celestion 70/80 sounds horrid! It makes the distortion sound nasally, but not in a midrangey kind of way like Joe Bonamassa gets. It's a thin, harsh kind of nasally sound. It lacks low end and midrange, but has a spike in the treble. It's rather thin overall.
2. It has been rather difficult to get a very low volume bedroom tone. Usually there is a little point where you get to at very low volumes where you start hearing less of the fizzy preamp. On this amp it's pretty loud for a home volume before the fizzy preamp sound goes away.
3. The reverb isn't that great. Until 1:00-2:00 it's kind of mild and not very exciting, after that point it starts sounding washed over in reverb. I am not liking the reverb that much at this point, but it's nice to have it as a subtle effect.
Two points I would like to make real quick:
A. I did not have much time with it so there is surely a great deal more I can learn about this amp.
B. Some amps reverbs sound better when those amps are played loud. This might be one of those, or could it be a preamp tube?
C. I think a speaker swap will add the missing low end, fill in the mids, and round off the treble.
D. I will change preamp and power tubes before trying a speaker swap.
Overall, I am very glad that I got this amp. In fact, I'm so anxious to play it now that I'm going to wrap up this little review and put some time in on it. I'll follow up later with some more info and maybe even a picture and sound sample.
The Clubster Royale is a modified version of the Clubster; taking on the cool vintage stylings of the Venus series, but adding a high gain channel (at least that's the way it was explained to me). It has a high and low input, effects loop with independent send/receive level controls, and real spring reverb. It's loaded with 2 EL34's and 3 12AX7's.
Now for my initial impressions... First off the clean channel is just so good that if you're a clean player, not ever playing a Rivera is like a jazz/blues guitarist who has never played a Gibson ES335. It's like missing out on something that amazing.
The clean channel is very much like a Fender. It's loose and really sensitive just like a Fender Vibrolux, but maybe not as flutey as a Fender. It has the kind a response to your playing that reminds me of a Carvin Legacy II that I used to have, but the Legacy II sounded compressed and this one doesn't.
I have to say that I might even like the cleans on this amp more than any Mesa Boogie I have tried before. It's a clean sound that makes me want to linger on the clean channel playing all kinds of blusey solos even though I really don't play clean very often. That it's inspiring is a good thing indeed.
The first gain mode is fairly gainy by itself. It has enough juice to do all kinds of rock rhythms and single note solos, but just begs for a tiny little push from an overdrive.
When you pull the gain knob it bumps up the 2nd gain stage which has a lot of gain. I think this amp can sound pretty brutal because of the kind of distortion it has. It's not buzzy or fuzzy of fizzy, at least not what I hear. It's a different kind of distortion that might be something between a Vox and a Fender Twin kind of distortion.
If this were an amp with only the clean channel and first gain stage, I would still buy it for the same amount of money. The high gain stuff is a bonus. I would buy it because it obviously sounds incredible, it's so light weight, it's loud enough for most applications, and it comes with real spring reverb and a few other standard options.
Two things you have to keep in mind in this initial opinion:
A) I only had about 20-25 min with it
B). I only played through the high input
Ready for the negative? Not really any show stoppers here but I have a few issues. Here's what I think so far:
1. The stock Celestion 70/80 sounds horrid! It makes the distortion sound nasally, but not in a midrangey kind of way like Joe Bonamassa gets. It's a thin, harsh kind of nasally sound. It lacks low end and midrange, but has a spike in the treble. It's rather thin overall.
2. It has been rather difficult to get a very low volume bedroom tone. Usually there is a little point where you get to at very low volumes where you start hearing less of the fizzy preamp. On this amp it's pretty loud for a home volume before the fizzy preamp sound goes away.
3. The reverb isn't that great. Until 1:00-2:00 it's kind of mild and not very exciting, after that point it starts sounding washed over in reverb. I am not liking the reverb that much at this point, but it's nice to have it as a subtle effect.
Two points I would like to make real quick:
A. I did not have much time with it so there is surely a great deal more I can learn about this amp.
B. Some amps reverbs sound better when those amps are played loud. This might be one of those, or could it be a preamp tube?
C. I think a speaker swap will add the missing low end, fill in the mids, and round off the treble.
D. I will change preamp and power tubes before trying a speaker swap.
Overall, I am very glad that I got this amp. In fact, I'm so anxious to play it now that I'm going to wrap up this little review and put some time in on it. I'll follow up later with some more info and maybe even a picture and sound sample.
