RE: FOR SALE: Mesa Boogie Mark I Combo Amp

["William Walker" <billwalker@baymoon.com>]

Well, yes I was being a bit sarcastic. I believe the JC120 came to promise
fro two reasons,
 1. It has self contained stereo chorused that at least gives its sterile
sound a bit of dimension. 2. It is  very dependable and loud, a favorite of
cartage and rental services as back line for touring bands.
 As one who has had to use provided back line amps, I always hope that a
fender twin is present and its tubes aren't so gassed as to make it sound
flabby. otherwise I would settle for a jazz chorus, and I never had a
problem with its clean sound, however, I can't believe that after all these
years , Roland has never gotten the clue that the distortion sound on these
things is basically useless, not to mention the reverb is pretty tin can
sounding as well. And this is a company that excels at signal processors. 
Go
figure. I had a mini brute, which I took to Berklee years ago. Ii was a 
nice
warm clean sounding solid state amp, made even louder by the EVM speaker I
managed to somehow cram in to its little cabinet. Later I had a Pearce G1
amp, because it actually had a very usable overdrive channel, soon after I
added a Pearce extension cabinet w/ slave power amp for stereo ,and later I
switched to a Pearce preamp running through a boogie power amp. I finally
abandoned the rack mount amp dance about ten years ago and went back to 
tube
combos for most of my live gigs, and a modeling amp when doing the looping
thing. I know a lot of great music has been played on these amps, and
certainly if what you desire is uber clean, the JC120 has few modern peers,
but for me, clean tube sounds better than clean solid state, and it feels
better, though the natural compression of a tube amp can be mimicked with a
good compressor (my old Pearce amps had a built in limiter similar to the
Gibson Lab series amps, which Dan Pearce helped design). If you want
something like a JC120, but without the back ache, You might try to find a
used JC77, the discontinued baby brother to the JC120. I found a link on
EBAY
http://cgi.ebay.com/Roland-JC77-Jazz-Chorus-Guitar-Amp-with-Xtras_W0QQitemZ1
40000830625QQihZ004QQcategoryZ47094QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
 I have developed a fondness for amps with a two ten speaker configuration,
I own a 70's vibrolux reverb, and 60's vox AC10 twin, and as a gigging
middle aged guy I appreciate the fact that I'm not risking a hernia every
time I load my amp in my trunk. I also like the tighter bass response the
tens give, they just seem punchier to me..
Cheers
Bill






-----Original Message-----
From: Krispen Hartung [mailto:khartung@cableone.net]
Sent: Friday, June 23, 2006 8:13 PM
To: Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com
Subject: Re: FOR SALE: Mesa Boogie Mark I Combo Amp


Don't worry Mark, I won't sell both of my VF1's! :)   They are amazing
little boxes.

Bill, what's wrong with the JC120?  I can't tell whether you were making a
fecicios comment about them or not. Forgive me if you weren't. Some amazing
jazz players, like Pat Martino and Mike Stearn, have used those amps.
Frankly, there really isn't such a thing as a "jazz amp." Jazzers of all
calibers use what fits their taste...I've seen it all, from solid state
Polytones, Rolands, and Gibsons, to tube Fenders, Boogies, and Music Man.
Some guitarists, like McLaughlin, have even bi-passed amps altogether at
times, plugging directly into processors and then directly into the board.
The breadth of taste is pretty amazing.

...I do wish I had my old Polytone Teeny Brute back...I was such an idiot
for selling that years ago.

Kris

----- Original Message -----
From: "William Walker" <billwalker@baymoon.com>
To: <Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com>
Sent: Friday, June 23, 2006 5:00 PM
Subject: RE: FOR SALE: Mesa Boogie Mark I Combo Amp


> Well Mark I'd be curious as to how you did the JC120 thingy on the 
>tonelab
> (and why???? in gods name) and  Actually like most of the stomp box
> effects
> on the tonelab allot except, the overdrive and distortion models on the
> front end; a klon clone, even more exaggerated mid range honk than the
> original, a tube screamer model , that just doesn't rattle my cage, and a
> rat model, zzzzzzzz, among others, though the octavia octave, and ring
> modulator effects are quite nice. My solution was, until a week ago, to
> pirate my fulltone fulldrive from my gig rig pedal board, and stick it in
> the tonelabs effects loop (which is at the front of the chain). Well last
> week I got my new twin tube pedal from Seymour Duncan, and I am just dumb
> struck at how good this thing sounds driving the front end of the 
>tonelab.
> Since it uses two subminiature tubes running at high plate voltage, it
> adds
> tremendous dynamics and dimension not to mention two channels of anything
> from clean boost with a hint of extra fatness, to very saturated, yet
> smooth
> and singing overdrive, all with great touch sensitivity. I just submitted
> a
> review to Harmony Central, in which I shamelessly gushed about how good 
>it
> sounds. Since I like many of the delay and modulation presets on the tone
> lab, and I'm not a big flange or chorus guy,  I was just searching for a
> more natural sounding overdrive to compliment the tweed, black face, 
>early
> marshall, and vox models I tend to use, and boy does this puppy fit the
> bill.
> Bill
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: mark sottilaro [mailto:zerocrossing2001@yahoo.com]
> Sent: Friday, June 23, 2006 10:11 AM
> To: Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com
> Subject: RE: FOR SALE: Mesa Boogie Mark I Combo Amp
>
>
> --- William Walker <billwalker@baymoon.com> wrote:
>
>> Mark has a point,
>
> I thought you couldn't notice it with my hair style!
>
>
>> Do take
>> note that the vox people did not see fit to model a
>> transistor amp, not jazz
>> chorus model ala line 6. So if that is your mind set
>> maybe the vox ain't for
>> you.
>
> Wait!  There's MORE!  I did find a way to get a good
> JC120 sound out of the Tonelab!  I forget how now...
> I'll check tonight and let you know.  I know the key
> was leaving out either the amp modeling stage or cab
> modeling stage.  Also, I found I got better results
> when I use the VF-1's stereo chorus (which I know Kris
> has a couple of)
>
> I have to say that as much as I like some of the
> stompbox models of the Tonelab, when I'm in the studio
> I ditch them in favor of the VF-1's which I feel are
> really great (and MIDI syncable which the tonelab
> sadly isn't)  Don't sell them Kris, you'll be sad.
> Also I found they're one of the best processor out
> there for putting distortion on keyboard sounds
> (though not for guitar)
>
> Mark
>
> Mark
>
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