Musician Gear & Tech Discussion

I still want /need a little amp for my practice space here in the house.
I have been enamored with the snipits of sound and some reviews from this little Vietcong amp. My Ibanez TB15R just does not have the flexability for the projects I'd like to start doing.
Thus far I've not been able to find one in the store here to listen too.
Anyone with personal experience with this amp?

Sans, I don't think you'll be happy with anything in the 15w range. Those little practice amps just suck all the way around. You wouldn't be any happier with it than your Ibanez. I have a Peavey Blazer 158 transtube (ss) that's the best I could find for a 15-watt starter amp.

I'm going to give you a good piece of advice here. How you choose to use it is entirely up to you.

Generally, I would say don't go under 25-watts for a practice amp. But when you buy one new, you'll be spending let's say $100- $120. For something that will be no better than your Ibanez.

I would say spend a little extra to get something that sounds decent.

I know, I KNOW, you hate ebay. But I found one of these on there just now:

http://xrl.us/be7zay

Dude the difference between one of those and any practice amp is astronomical! It puts ANY practice amp you'll find in a store to shame. Even if you ended up getting it for $150- $175. The difference is HUGE when it comes to the quality of the amp and sound!!

Not to mention, it would be a good backup to your Carvin. It's not as thick in the distortion. But it is 85 watts. More than enough for any small to medium sized venue without mic'ing.

85 watts, footswitch, Fender reverb. Awesome for recording. Great for practice. In a practice setting, you wouldn't even get the vol. knob past 2. You should be all over this amp! These little suckers blow away my Marshall MG-50 (which I paid $350 for) without even trying. And they're no bigger than a 25-watter.

These are the amps that HaleAmano regularly gigs with, and I promise you they sound great. To get one for under $200 is a good deal in my opinion. By the way, we'll be recording our cd with one of these.

Well, that would be my advice. If you don't have an ebay account, find someone who does and snag this gem. Rather than just looking for a practice amp, you could have 2 usable gigging amps as well as a practice amp.

Thanks Shredd6.
You know I appreciate your advice on amps, you have never steered me wrong.
I doubt if I can swing the 85 before bidding closes but I am going to look into it.
Thanks again, and may God be with you when you go to studio brother.

Sans, those amps pop up about once every 2-weeks. The deal is Fender discontinued them. So you have to either snag one on ebay, Craigslist, pawn shops, etc. I've never seen one go for over $200. If you can get one with a footswitch, even better, The footswitches are sold seperately for $40.

Even though it's a discontinued amp, they're built solid and last quite a while. I can't imagine a better amp for the prices these go for. It's obvious most people think they're just little practice amps. I did myself when I bought my first one. But much to my surprise, it went far beyond what I expected.

Keep your sights set on one, and you'll be 10x's happier than you ever would with a practice amp.

There are a few ways to search for them:

Fender 85

Fender Studio or Fender Studio 85

Fender Eighty Five

Fender Deluxe 85

All of these models are the same amp with different names.

Kewl.
I have a bro thats an ebayolic. This dude..... well I aint sure he dont buy his underwear off ebay.
I am deff going to find me one of these on your recomendation.
I am always paranoid my Carvin is gonna go wack at a show.
That would SUCK without some back up.

Nice story about my Fender Studio 85.

Last night we played a show with a band and we provided the back-line.

The guitar players in the other band (who were actually the headliners) kind of laughed at the 85's we brought.

It was a small venue, the amps were mic'd w/ SM 57s, but for some reason these guys seemed to think we should have brought Fender Twin Reverbs or something like that.

During sound check, the first guitar player starts complaining that his amp was squealing when he turned up the volume. So I walked up to check out the situation. I asked him, "what guitar is it plugged into?" I turn around and it wasn't even plugged into a guitar at all. The other end of the cord was just laying on the ground. "Yea dude, maybe when you plug in your guitar that sound will probably go away. These are good amps, I promise". Dude gives me a tssskk, and laughs under his breath.

Second guitar player decides he doesn't like the way the guitar sounds through his monitors, and would rather just use the amp at a high volume. The sound engineer explains that it's mic'd fine, and that he'll make necessary adjustments. Dude doesn't care and turns the amp to about 7 (which will distort the mic and front-line sound).

Just before their set starts, second guitar player turns the amp up to 10. What a douche! Not only is that a disrespectful thing to do to someone else's amp, it's 100% unnecessary. I guess I should have brought down a full-stack for the guy.

So I make it clear to people involved that if my speaker blows, $200 is coming out of their pay, and the guy can just take it with him. Otherwise, I'm walking on-stage right now and turning it down to 5. It was agreed that I'd get paid if the speaker blows. They didn't want to disrupt the show.

When their set was done, dude unplugs his guitar and leaves the amp on at 10. I'm pretty pissed at this point. I didn't even wait 5-seconds before going up there, turning the amps off, and basically saying, just hurry up and get off the stage. Freaking amateurs.

Ryan and I played our set with the amps at 3, and our sound was a lot better, because we used the front-line PA to our advantage, and we knew we could trust the sound engineer.

I guess my point is Sans. My Studio 85 took a beating for over an hour last night. Completely maxed out. Today I checked it out and the amp is fine. I'm not so sure however, that a tube amp would take the same beating without doing some damage. My Hot Rod DeVille would have most likely sustained damage due to over-heating. I don't even think it would have lasted their whole set. I think it's a good testament as to how durable an 85 really is.

Yes, that was a good story. Glad your amp made it through all the abuse.
What is it with some people, I mean I always talk about "playing loud" but we really dont play all that loud. We like to let our PA do it's job so all aspects of the music and vox are clear.
I ran sound for some bands earlier in the year. These young kids with the full stacks cranked so loud, it was just freaking noise.
We had no idea what their vocalist was saying. And they flat refused to listen to any reason.
Finally I just told em, fine, if you want your band to sound like sh*t, be my guest, and I walked waaaay to the back and had a seat.
And that is what they sounded like.
I got a comment latter from a fan, Why was your band the only one we could understand the words? Did you screw with their sound?
I just said, No, but I cant help them if they are not willing to listen.

I think that a lot of people, (musicians?), don't realize the relationship between volume levels, and distortion, (I mean signal distortion, not effects distortion). I have been playing and doing live sound for 40 years and my worst experience was actually last year at a school variety show.....These three kids get up to play "an original number"......this announcement seemed to awe the audience, (mostly parents). The one kid is playing through a VOX 100, I'm not sure what the bass player had, but they started wailing on their instruments at FULL volume.......It was actually physically painful.....most of the audience got up and walked out. My son and his friends got up to play an old CCR song through a my VOX 120, and a vintage Traynor Mark III tube head with a 4/12 cabinet. They had the audience rocking within 2 seconds, and got a standing ovation.......Not that they did the song that well, but I think that the audience was impressed that they could perform at a listenable volume for the venue.
I'm glad I disn't give in and loan any equipment to the other kids.
As far as a good portable practice amp, the Marshall MG30 is good....I was going to buy the equivalent Peavey 'cause it was cheaper, but when I played them side-by-side, the Marshall had way more depth, so it was worth the additional $30.
The best small amp I've heard in a mic'd live application, was a Traynor Custom Valve 50.......50 watts to a 12" speaker....amazing sound through the PA.

Myke C.

Thanks for the input Myke.
One of the features I like about the MG series is that I could use the headphone out to my PA to reduce the ambient sound from my amp whilst recording through the PA.
But DANG I love the sound and feel I get out of my Carvin Nomad.
Even with the volume at 2-4 and adjusting the soak I get plenty of distortion for my Les Paul and it is sooo thick an rich.

The best small amp I've heard in a mic'd live application, was a Traynor Custom Valve 50.......50 watts to a 12" speaker....amazing sound through the PA.

Myke C.

Shhh.. Keep that on the down-low for about another week. There's a Traynor YCV80 at a pawn shop here that's about to drop to $500 next Sat. I'm gonna snag it on layaway.

Thanks for the input Myke.
One of the features I like about the MG series is that I could use the headphone out to my PA to reduce the ambient sound from my amp whilst recording through the PA.
But DANG I love the sound and feel I get out of my Carvin Nomad.
Even with the volume at 2-4 and adjusting the soak I get plenty of distortion for my Les Paul and it is sooo thick an rich.

Sans, as you probably already know, you're not going to match that richness with a practice amp. My MG-50 has a slightly thicker distortion than my Fender. But the clean channel of the Fender is miles above the Marshall. Not to mention, you have high caliber NOS tubes in your amp. So even the Fender is no match for your Carvin.

BUT.. There is another amp you should consider.

http://xrl.us/bfdgui

This is another discontinued amp. So you have to find them used. But a Marshall 8040 or 8080 combo uses a 12ax7 for the distortion channel and has a SS Clean channel. So if you were to acquire one of these, you could literally tailor the distortion to how you want it to sound, and it could come close to your Carvin. Not quite, because it has no power tubes and it only uses 1 12ax7. But for a practice amp price, I could make one of these sound miles above the Fender in the distortion channel. I have a Marshall 8100 (the head version of these amps) and I've heard it with damn near every 12ax7 I've purchased. Even the ones I sold you.

If your Carvin were to have any troubles (knock on wood 3-times that it doesn't happen) you could put your RFT in one of these Marshalls.

My wife and my Carvin said they would divorce me if I even look at another amp right now.

Better keep it at home.

Very much understood.

I would have been a divorced man myself today if I was married.

New plan: I went to check and see tha the Traynor was still there, and it was gone..

But lo and behold, what did I see in the corner of the room?




I winced at the sight. I slapped my face a few times. "you can't afford it, you can't afford it, you can't afford it".. Then I gave it a big bear-hug and took it to the counter.... "Can I try this out please?".."You can't afford it, you'll have to sell something, you got bills coming up"... "Oh man, listen to that nice clean sound!"..

"I'll take it!!"

Good God Sans, the cleans that come out of this amp are freaking sex. I played around with it for a while and hooked it up simultaneously with my Fender studio 85. Two baddass clean channels IN STEREO!! many exprosion!!



They are distinctively different, but compliment each other very well. Next up, hook up the effects!

Man thats a sharp amp, I have heard good things about the Roland amps.
LOL it's an infection I'm a tell ya!

Personally, I'm not a big Roland fan......mostly because of their current prices, and their total lack of customer service.....but that looks like a great deal. I do own one Ace-Tone 100W instrument head, (Ace was the predecessor to Roland), and it's great for just about anything from guitar, to keys, to subwoofer. As far as what you did with the two amps, my Vox 120 does all that in stereo, in one box, as well as a power switchable stereo cabinet output, and stereo line outs for PA/recording. But I mostly like the Vox for it's clean tones, and great depth, both for acoustic, and electric, as well as compressed electric.........It has some great distortion and effects, but I'm playing 12-string so I don't use them much.
Traynor is a little-known secret in much of the US.....the vintage tube amps have the best of the old Marshalls and Fenders. I used to work with Pete Traynor for Yorkville Sound back in the early days. Surprisingly, a lot of them made their way into the US, and if you can find one in a pawn shop, they will usually let it go for very little because they've never heard of the brand. I bought my Mark III for $100.......They were selling on ebay for between $500 and $700.

Myke C.
Myke C.