Amp Demo Day - Nottingham, Saturday November 28th

Evildurka · November 2015

now working on 28th

vasselmeyer · November 2015

@hywelg Getting close...have you got an address and a starting time?

John_P · November 2015

I need new brakes on the car and won't be able to sort it till saturday so it's looking unlikely I'll make it

(Unless I can sneak out of work early enough on thursday to get it done)

hywelg · November 2015

@vasselmeyer, @darrenp, @John_P, @Tom_g, @paulmapp8306,@John_A

PM'd you all with details.

Let me know if nothing arrives. Or you cant see or figure out the map.

hywelg · November 2015

I'm hoping a new PEC Mil Spec 2W 1megohm pot for the powerscaling on my 1987 arrives before Saturday otherwise that'll be a no show. Confident it will, coming from Banzai in Germany, supposedly 1-2 days shipping.

paulmapp8306 · November 2015

John_P said:

I need new brakes on the car and won't be able to sort it till saturday so it's looking unlikely I'll make it (Unless I can sneak out of work early enough on thursday to get it done)

Sneak away .............

hywelg · November 2015

Sorry guys, my Plexi 1987 is still missing the replacement pot for the powerscaling so it'll not be available.

Though my mate is bringing his Maz18 in compensation.......

John_P · November 2015

paulmapp8306 said:

John_P said:

I need new brakes on the car and won't be able to sort it till saturday so it's looking unlikely I'll make it (Unless I can sneak out of work early enough on thursday to get it done)

Sneak away .............

I did - well hurtled out in time to drop it off so they could do them today but i won't be ready till mid morning. Bad timing but I guess I can have a lie in tomorrow and I'll try harder to be at the next one.

paulmapp8306 · November 2015

Bugger.

Ill not get there till early afternoon - but will still be there.

On a different note - which PRS to bring. The P90 loaded one I brought last time, or the BK Mule loaded one......

I am bringing my Broadcaster loaded Tele (as we had a lot of strats lst time) and my Tokai ES 135 Semi (Tone rider Alnico 2 loaded) anyway - so will have a range whichever PRS comes.

If anyone going has a preference they may like a look at - speak up.

vasselmeyer · November 2015

I'll be bringing my PRS DGT and my P90-loaded Telecaster. I'm also thinking about bringing my Godin Radiator which is set up for slide and has some Firebird-like pickups in it. We've got a bit of everything there.

hywelg · November 2015

Seems we might usefully try out a few geetars as well. I'll bring my two of my Warmoth wide neck jobbys.

SO if anyone with big hands wants to try some big necks. PM me for details of guitars and venue.

vasselmeyer · November 2015

Well today was a cracking day. Loads of amps, some brilliant guitars, some really cool pedals and really interesting chats with like-minded blokes. I really enjoyed myself.

Jumping straight in here's what we had to play with. Sorry for the poor-quality photos. Slightly low light and massive volume all round made the camera a little shaky at times.

Victory V40

What a really lovely amp. Single channel with a wide variety of flavours and sounded brilliant with an Xotic RC Booster hitting it up.

Egnater Rebel 30 212 Combo

This was mine. I was quite pleased to find out that it didn't sound too shabby at all in such August company.

Axe FX2 rig with aMFC floorboard, a Matrix power amp, a Zilla cab and some magical midi gubbins which gave it proper amp knobs

To me this was a revelation. It really was absolutely amp-like and was infintely flexible. I'm sure that if I got one I would just spend all my time tweaking it. I can see why people rave about them. It really was excellent.

Ceriatone Overtone Special plus @thorpyfx Gunshot and a Kingsley Minstrel

This was a monster amp and the cab put out so much bass it was like being thumped. I had a good play with the Gunshot but it wasn't for me. I could see myself using it as a low-gain option but I have that covered already. The Kingsley was a revalation though. What a fantastic overdrive pedal. Pricey though...

Victory Kracken

This was supposed to cover the "modern" end of the spectrum but it really was surprisingly versatile and its clean sounds were really very good indeed. Some monster downtuned sounds were had from it.

Victory RD1 and Fender Machete

The RD1 was a simple single-channel job with minimal EQ but was really quite decent. Very loud for its rating and took a booster very well. The Fender Machete was a complete surprise. It was unbelievably flexible and did everything from clean, crunch, saturated lead and modern downtuned stuff, all from the same box. I would never have guessed this was a Fender from the sounds it could put out and its conservative styling. Outstanding little box.

Dr Z Maz 18

Simple, single channel but utterly awesome tones. This was something special and I could have played this all day.

Overall, this was a brilliant day. There was so much ampy goodness on display that I could have spent all day there. I would be really hard-pressed to pick any favourites. However, if forced, I would take the Dr Z with the Kingsley Jester. Honourable mentions to the V40 and the Kraken. Special "revelations" awards to the Fender Machete combo and the AxeFX II rig.

Brilliant day and a huge thanks to @hywelg for organising it. Thanks to all those that turned up with cars full of gear.

10/10 would come again.

Evildurka · November 2015

Gutted I ended up working today but happy to see some love for the victory amps from impartial people unlike me just banging on about them

hopefully I will make it to the next one if there is another and I can bring the silverback and some PRS goodness

paulmapp8306 · November 2015

We had 3 prs's tovplayy with. A DTG, a ce 22 with p90's and a cu22 with mules.

TimmyO · November 2015

Looks like it was a fantastic day!

darrenp · November 2015

@jdpointing (Jacob) and I would also like pass on our thanks to @hywelg for organising such a great event.

Previously a bit of a digital sceptic, I'm now a complete convert :-) and, if I didn't have the V40, I'd be out shopping for a Maz 18 right now.

It was also really interesting to see other people trying things with the amps that I haven't, particularly running the Kraken with really low gain settings as the flexibility it offered was a real eye-opener.

hywelg · November 2015

CHeers chaps. I enjoyed myself too. We did in the end have loads of gear to play with and after you lot left Paul and I had a play with his Axe.

We set about creating 'Loud' sound but a lower volume, if you get what I mean. And what I heard was indeed impressive. I've long thought that what you hear on a recording is a lot less dirt than you think and because the amp is setup really loud some of what you're hearing is not preamp compression/dirt, it's power sag and speaker compression along with a smidge of power section distortion added in.

I hope Paul saved that patch because next time I want you to all hear it

What you will hear is clarity that you do not get by adding a dirt pedal in front of an amp, and you dont get it by cranking a pre-amp/PI.

Thanks for the pics Howard, I did bring my camera but got so involved with the gear i forgot to bring it out. I was going to set it up to record some video with the Rode Stereomic, maybe next time.

Paul and I had a chat about a date for another one. I'm thinking February. Lets get Christmas well and truly out of the wa,y people back to being less busy, so tentatively Saturday 13th Feb.

Will start a new thread shortly.

vasselmeyer · November 2015

@darrenp The Kraken really was very versatile wasn't it? I was impressed by all the Victorys.

paulmapp8306 · November 2015

Played with a parametric EQ block today - trying to find those compressed frequencies/mid emphasis my cab has.

The main dominant freq seems to be around 800 hz. The body that was missing (next to Hyweigs cab) is a hump around 200hz - and the push we tried to get was around 1800-2000 hz.

So - I dropped a block with a low Q around 200 hz pushing up 2db, a cut with a highish EQ at 800hz of around 4db, and a slight lift if 1.6db centered at 1900 hz with a medium Q. Put this on all my patches (using a global block - so one change is reflected in all patches) and the result is very nice. Hollows out that dominant mid range and lets the patches breath more. Harmoinics seem to come out more readily, theres more body and more push.

Not tried it "loud" but sounds promising. Might not need a new cab/speakers.....

fretmeister · November 2015

What's the midi thing for the Axe FX

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Amp Demo Day - Nottingham, Saturday November 28th

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