Musician Gear & Tech Discussion

Greetings.
The question is for gurus that been there and done that.

I have sold my Marchall JCM800 and Dual Lead 2000 along with stacks. Well, nice vintage piece of equipment, but I just could not get the sound I really want from it. Now, nothing wrong with Marchall, but just not my sound. Also heavy and bulky and I can't switch the tone on the fly. It will always sound the way it does.

A few years ago I got a Line 6 floor board to practice at home. Since than I have flashed the chip on it and completely re-programmed everything on it and got the tone, or rather collection of tones I want. To make matters worse I now switch tones during the song. Bummer. I can't get my amplification to sound like that, so since I moved from WI to CA I sold the amps...

Instead I want to go directly in to PA. I need thee most transparent amplification there is, light weight, affordable. The PA will be used only for a single instrument, and not to amplify the whole band. In short PA becomes my stereo amp. Thus I want the tone I get in Line 6 to be amplified in stereo and not modified in any way.

Yes I know this is not a standard way of doing things.

I was looking at Yamaha EMX312SC. It has a mixer in it which is nice because on the rehearsal I can pipe the second guitar from the Cubase until I find the second guitarist.

What would you recommend?

I have a POD PRO with full floorboard that I use occasionally. Its a line 6 product and works real well. It has a great JCM 800 tone that I have tweaked thru our pa and its my go too sound, if the pa is in stereo you can line it in in stereo. The only problem I have is getting all my programed channels level. When you change volumes on the pa it changes the dynamics of the unit.

Live these days Im using an amp a Mesa Subway Rocket 20 watts and my full pedalboard. Mesa makes an amp now called the Express that took the place of the Subway. If you are looking for gritty tones a small 15-20 watt amp might be better than lining in a preamp.

Good Luck

JW thank you for your post.

So Line 6 floor board through PA does work you say and is not a completely idiotic idea. Does it loose any of the tone quality, such as tone become less colored and flat?

Also you say it "changes the dynamics of the unit". All the custom tones in the two banks are leveled with the computer to the same db level. You say it will change once I hook it in front of a PA?

Thank you

AN,

I have the rack unit and big floorboard. I have 4 basic sounds programmed. As I said I love the JCM 800 patch tweaked like I want it. WHen you lay out other patches you will need to plug into a pa system like you will use and play at gig level to make sure each patch is equalized volume wise. My unit you can just tweak it touch and store in a matter of seconds. The problem is that each tweak works best and sounds best to my ears when the output is wideopen, so you have to go back thru and level them out.

I think these units sound great but its still not the same as playing on a good sounding amp. There is an interaction between a guitar, amp and player that just doesnt feel the same to me when I use the preamp. It will work and sound consisten night after night but its not the same to me.

If you have one of the floor units, try it before you go investing money in another rig. As Ive said earlier these days Im using a Mesa Subway Rocket 20 watt tube amp and old fashioned pedals, it works better for me than the POD. I love the POD for plug in and play situations.

Should have sold me your JCM 800 head. lol