Guitarjon
Well-Known Member
Love this amp! Picked it up used some months ago. Now I finally took some time to really test this amp and put it through it's paces. First lets get this out of the way: this thing absolutely DOES do the Mesa and Rectifier name justice. A lot of people will say stuff like 'I prefer big bottles', 'EL84's suck' etc. and sure, fair enough, if you like to play super loud on stage I can understand that headroom becomes an issue. But this little sucker is loud and it has plenty of low-end! EL84's definitely aren't as bad as some people like to think 
So I tried this amp with all the channels, modes and power settings. The power settings actually change the voicing of the amp. This is explained very well in the manual but for the red channel's modern mode it means that it makes the sound a little bit more gentle, so less fizzy so that it actually sounds much better at lower levels. So the overall eq curve is different, which is a cool feature!
I tried it with 12 different guitars in all sorts of styles, from super clean to 8-string metal. I only used a boost on the 8-string part but honestly, this amp sounds pretty tight for a Recto. Heck, I would say that I prefer this little fellow over my large Dual Rectifier. The small one just doesn't need a lot of work and with all the EQ knobs in the middle it already sounds really balanced.
Who else has one? What do you love (or hate) about it? Do you use it on stage? Which of the power settings do you like to use? Would love to know your thoughts on this amp. Also, if you own one of the bigger ones together with the small one: what do you think of the differences? Do they really matter that much? Perhaps in 10 years most people will use smaller amps. I have a bunch of them and I love them! I also love my big 120/100 watt heads though. Love 'em all!
Here's the demo:
I tried to do more than 'just' metal so there's a bunch of clean and crunch tones in there as well. There's mostly rock and metal at the end though and you can use the timecodes to skip to the desired sections if you please...
So I tried this amp with all the channels, modes and power settings. The power settings actually change the voicing of the amp. This is explained very well in the manual but for the red channel's modern mode it means that it makes the sound a little bit more gentle, so less fizzy so that it actually sounds much better at lower levels. So the overall eq curve is different, which is a cool feature!
I tried it with 12 different guitars in all sorts of styles, from super clean to 8-string metal. I only used a boost on the 8-string part but honestly, this amp sounds pretty tight for a Recto. Heck, I would say that I prefer this little fellow over my large Dual Rectifier. The small one just doesn't need a lot of work and with all the EQ knobs in the middle it already sounds really balanced.
Who else has one? What do you love (or hate) about it? Do you use it on stage? Which of the power settings do you like to use? Would love to know your thoughts on this amp. Also, if you own one of the bigger ones together with the small one: what do you think of the differences? Do they really matter that much? Perhaps in 10 years most people will use smaller amps. I have a bunch of them and I love them! I also love my big 120/100 watt heads though. Love 'em all!
Here's the demo:
I tried to do more than 'just' metal so there's a bunch of clean and crunch tones in there as well. There's mostly rock and metal at the end though and you can use the timecodes to skip to the desired sections if you please...
