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Posted by: PanicProne Mar 7 2009, 01:28 PM

...or am I better of using a MI Audio crunch box with the vox? I'm looking for an amp (preferably tube) with AC30-type cleans with good headroom and a nice firey distortion like the jcm 800 (listen to Firebreather by Thrice) which handles pedals well. Anyone know of a good amp? I play prog-ish metal/rock like the already mentioned Thrice, Oceansize, Radiohead, Cult Of Luna.

What's the Laney VH100r like? Would this fit my needs?
All suggestions and comments are welcome.

Posted by: ZakkWylde Mar 7 2009, 01:38 PM

I would say my newest addition would suit you pretty well: The Marshall JVM!

It is a 4 channel amp with diffrent modes per channel, so it's very versatile!
The clean channel is based on a fender wiring - and therefore the best Clean sound ever for a Marshall!
The second mode of the crunch channel is wired like the JCM 800 from the 80's; but the Thrice tone your looking for comes from a hot rodded JCM800!!! (No standard JCM800 gets that much gain!)
>That's what the JVM's third mode of the crunch channel is for - It is adding a lot of gain to the JCM800 tone, making it a hotrodded JCM800!

...If that's still not enough, there are two more high gain channels, and 6 more modes...I haven't found a sound I couldn't recreate with this amp! Give it a try!

Posted by: PanicProne Mar 7 2009, 03:21 PM

Cool man. How much roughly is it? How does it handle pedals? Recommended cabs to go with it? What are other peoples response to this amp? Any other suggestions?

Posted by: ZakkWylde Mar 7 2009, 05:13 PM

The 100 watt 4 channel head is 1379 Euro/2199$
The 100 watt 2 channel head is 1229Euro/1899$
The 50 watt 2 channel head is 1079Euro/1699$

I don't know what you mean with *handles Pedals* What pedals? I don't see how any amp shouldn't work with any pedal!

I like the Marshall 4x12 cabs with vintage 30 speakers best, but the standard cabs are great too

Posted by: 29a Mar 7 2009, 06:37 PM

Maybe you could put a seymour duncan twin classic in front of a vox to get a marshall like sound. Just an idea though

Posted by: inertia Mar 8 2009, 07:26 AM

the vox ac50 classic plus has a great clean that gets nice and dirty if you want or really jangly and the gain channel is actually quite heavy, similar to marshall, you may want to check that one out, it's very reasonable too as far as vox tube amps go comes in head and combo and also 100 watt if you want louder

Posted by: MickeM Mar 8 2009, 09:14 AM

I guess it could mean wether the pedals are allowed to color the entire signal in the loop or if only part of the signal is colored while the the other part stays "pure preamp". I.e if the loop can be parallell or serial, and if parallell if the level (how much of the signal) can be set.

I'm guessing the JVM got a free selection between serial or parallell and a level selector. Hence, it handles pedals very well.

Posted by: PanicProne Mar 8 2009, 05:30 PM

tack micke!

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Mar 9 2009, 12:29 AM

Tough question - whats your budget?

Posted by: JVM Mar 9 2009, 02:15 AM

Mesa f-30, the amp I bought Well, maybe not quite exactly a ac30 and a jcm800, but great chimey cleans and amazing saturation from a 30 watt el84 amp.

Posted by: Tjchep Mar 9 2009, 02:27 AM

Ac30 and Chimey never really went together for me.

I always felt like the AC30 had those huge warm clean tones, instead of the chimey, clean glassy ones.

Posted by: PanicProne Mar 9 2009, 12:08 PM

Well. Since I'm aiming pretty high even a cheap lad like me has to raise the roof of the budget a bit. So for both head and cab.. somewhere around 2000$ (20 000 swedish kronor) I think.

Offcourse if a cheap one is available I'll don't mind keeping some money.. But also if I find a reaaaaally nice head (looking for a head+cab/halfstack solution) I might spend some extra on that and save up for a cab later. (currently own a JJ Labs 4x12 which is allright but not what I'd like).

Still anyone who has experience with the Laney VH100R, feel free to let me know what it's like. And if this could be a good solution. Several bands I enjoy use this amp (Oceansize for example) so...

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Mar 9 2009, 06:57 PM

When you're talking Vox & Marshall, basically the only brand that crosses my mind that managing to blend (with great success) those British voicings naturally is Dr. Z

I recommend several models, depending what you need. These are heads only, cab is a different story all together.

The heads are listed from lowest to highest wattage

http://www.drzamps.com/maz18nr.html

18W MAZ-18 Junior NR - $1249 (no reverb head, with reverb +100$)

http://www.drzamps.com/stangray.html

30W Stang Ray - $1799

http://www.drzamps.com/kt45.html

45W KT 45 - $1649

Posted by: sted Mar 10 2009, 11:19 AM

wow they sound great, seem good value too!

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Mar 11 2009, 02:41 AM

They are awesome. But they are not for everyone. I think they suit the most to people who use good pedals and know how to control the sound using the guitar knobs like in the good old days. If you're one of those people, this could be a great deal for you mate. KT 45 I think has a great value, and it sounds very smooth, so might worth considering.