Neural DSP shit sounds like overpriced garbage
Unpopular opinions on gear
- Thread starter Spaced Out Ace
- Start date
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TonyFlyingSquirrel
Cherokee Warrior
Waiting for my damn license activation. I'm looking forward to seeing what I can do with it
Rxcoma
Well-Known Member
Wow.. The thread is still going strong.. That kinda makes my day.. There just wasnt enough free thinking...anti brand slavery types floatin around.. Too many people (really.. Around 80%-90% of all customers ive had over the course) won't buy a dimarzio pickup that doesn't say dimarzio ON THE FRONT.. that actual reference influenced opening this thread.. I asked him if he'd plugged in with it yet and to look on the back plate/platform and he would see his ultra necessary or the tone sucks in his fragile crumbly cheese whiz filled cheesy mental milieu but NOPE.. wouldn't touch it. Ok.. No problem.. Too dumb for a dimarzio blaze anyways. 
then this thread was born
then this thread was born
Spaced Out Ace
Well-Known Member
I would be wary of a DiMarzio with a tag on the front anyways. I didn't know they made any other than overseas designed pickups and collaborations with other companies types they were "sorta" DiMarzios.Wow.. The thread is still going strong.. That kinda makes my day.. There just wasnt enough free thinking...anti brand slavery types floatin around.. Too many people (really.. Around 80%-90% of all customers ive had over the course) won't buy a dimarzio pickup that doesn't say dimarzio ON THE FRONT.. that actual reference influenced opening this thread.. I asked him if he'd plugged in with it yet and to look on the back plate/platform and he would see his ultra necessary or the tone sucks in his fragile crumbly cheese whiz filled cheesy mental milieu but NOPE.. wouldn't touch it. Ok.. No problem.. Too dumb for a dimarzio blaze anyways.
Aliascent
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It looks kinda ok on Solar guitars, but I still prefer clear, unroasted maple. Feeling is not do different to me. But if you like roasted, I guess you won't be lacking of options
Shask
Well-Known Member
Usually Dimarzios that come stock in guitars say Dimarzio on the front. I have a set like this in my Charvel.
Shask
Well-Known Member
I like them on many of the newer Charvel and EVH guitars. Especially the ones that are green or brown in color.It looks kinda ok on Solar guitars, but I still prefer clear, unroasted maple. Feeling is not do different to me. But if you like roasted, I guess you won't be lacking of options
Decapitated
Loser
I like the neck inlay on Solar guitars.
sakeido
Contributor
Alright alright here's something new... my Badlander 100 came in. People were mad that I got pre-approval to do an in-home demo and return it if I didn't like it, well they'll be happy to hear I didn't buy it at all. Didn't make it out of the store, demo'd it there and... I straight up didn't like it. It could have been a great amp, but some bizarre choices were made.
I started the demo on the cleans which were great, especially by Recto standards, then hopped to the Crunch channel. I really, really liked the crunch channel and started thinkin maybe I could replace both my Recto and Stiletto with just the Badlander - chords were nice and chimey, single note leads sounded phenomenal, was getting all kinds of sweet vintage and 80s metal sounds out of it. Jake E. Lee tones for days on this voicing, didn't need a boost or anything to be totally usable. So at this point I was gettin really excited, thinking I could replace both the Stiletto and Recto with just the Badlander... there were a few things I wasn't really digging, there is basically no low end response. Didn't like it for low riffing or chugs, it was gainy and saturated but refused to sound huge. But I figured, nbd, that's what the third voicing is for so I flipped it to Crush mode and imo it completely fell on its face. I expected it to come completely unhinged, with a big jump in gain, presence and low end like you get going from Vintage to Modern on a Recto, and it didn't deliver at all.
The guys saying it sounds like a Recto... I don't really know what they think a Recto sounds like, honestly. The Badlander straight up can't do the Recto Modern voice, at all, it doesn't even come close. Even a 3 channel Dual Rect, channel 3 vintage so it has the 2.1khz presence instead of 1.8khz, sounds more aggressive than a Badlander set to crush. With some pretty insane settings, literally treble 10 mid 0 bass 10, it would start to grind pretty good but its always too restrained and "cultured" sounding if that makes sense. The presence knob reminds me of the presence on my modded 6505+ combo, it sure takes presence out but never seems to add any in. Too smooth, the lows are too controlled. I tried three different cabs and finished the demo literally sitting on the floor with my ear by the speaker just trying to hype the amp up and nothing.
Still wouldn't be a big deal because the Crunch tone is to die for. I would happily run the amp with both channels set to Crunch, one on 20 watt, one on 100 watt, but you can't set one channel to triode and the other to pentode! It makes no sense at all why they would leave that feature out when almost every other amp Mesa makes has channel assignable power settings. And ditching the tube rectifier... man this amp was basically screaming for tube rectification. Anything to loosen up and add some lows.
So yeah, decent amp and all. The Cabclone built in is nice for people who want that, I guess. I have multiple amps and already have a loadbox & IR pedal so I don't need that or even really want it built into an amp. I would take a Recto MW, Triple Crown, or Mark V over it 10 times out of 10. I'm kinda wondering if the Badlander was voiced to be recorded, or listened to with Cabclone - I could see the right IR, like a Mesa OS with SM57, would add all the things the amp was missing in the room. One thing I kept thinking was that it sounded very "mix ready" and it didn't need any extra pedals or anything but when I'm droppin $3k on an amp it needs to be fun to play and sound sick, in the room.
And I definitely stand behind what I said - the Badlander is a sequel to the Mesa British amps, and is hardly a Recto at all. It ain't a Royal Atlantic, that's for sure, it's a Stiletto all smoothed out with the bass sucked out. Stiletto Fluid Drive mode has more balls than anything the Badlander can do.
I started the demo on the cleans which were great, especially by Recto standards, then hopped to the Crunch channel. I really, really liked the crunch channel and started thinkin maybe I could replace both my Recto and Stiletto with just the Badlander - chords were nice and chimey, single note leads sounded phenomenal, was getting all kinds of sweet vintage and 80s metal sounds out of it. Jake E. Lee tones for days on this voicing, didn't need a boost or anything to be totally usable. So at this point I was gettin really excited, thinking I could replace both the Stiletto and Recto with just the Badlander... there were a few things I wasn't really digging, there is basically no low end response. Didn't like it for low riffing or chugs, it was gainy and saturated but refused to sound huge. But I figured, nbd, that's what the third voicing is for so I flipped it to Crush mode and imo it completely fell on its face. I expected it to come completely unhinged, with a big jump in gain, presence and low end like you get going from Vintage to Modern on a Recto, and it didn't deliver at all.
The guys saying it sounds like a Recto... I don't really know what they think a Recto sounds like, honestly. The Badlander straight up can't do the Recto Modern voice, at all, it doesn't even come close. Even a 3 channel Dual Rect, channel 3 vintage so it has the 2.1khz presence instead of 1.8khz, sounds more aggressive than a Badlander set to crush. With some pretty insane settings, literally treble 10 mid 0 bass 10, it would start to grind pretty good but its always too restrained and "cultured" sounding if that makes sense. The presence knob reminds me of the presence on my modded 6505+ combo, it sure takes presence out but never seems to add any in. Too smooth, the lows are too controlled. I tried three different cabs and finished the demo literally sitting on the floor with my ear by the speaker just trying to hype the amp up and nothing.
Still wouldn't be a big deal because the Crunch tone is to die for. I would happily run the amp with both channels set to Crunch, one on 20 watt, one on 100 watt, but you can't set one channel to triode and the other to pentode! It makes no sense at all why they would leave that feature out when almost every other amp Mesa makes has channel assignable power settings. And ditching the tube rectifier... man this amp was basically screaming for tube rectification. Anything to loosen up and add some lows.
So yeah, decent amp and all. The Cabclone built in is nice for people who want that, I guess. I have multiple amps and already have a loadbox & IR pedal so I don't need that or even really want it built into an amp. I would take a Recto MW, Triple Crown, or Mark V over it 10 times out of 10. I'm kinda wondering if the Badlander was voiced to be recorded, or listened to with Cabclone - I could see the right IR, like a Mesa OS with SM57, would add all the things the amp was missing in the room. One thing I kept thinking was that it sounded very "mix ready" and it didn't need any extra pedals or anything but when I'm droppin $3k on an amp it needs to be fun to play and sound sick, in the room.
And I definitely stand behind what I said - the Badlander is a sequel to the Mesa British amps, and is hardly a Recto at all. It ain't a Royal Atlantic, that's for sure, it's a Stiletto all smoothed out with the bass sucked out. Stiletto Fluid Drive mode has more balls than anything the Badlander can do.
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Great review! Do you have a favorite Boogie for high gain tones? If you could have one dream Boogie which channels from what amps would put in it? Meaning which Boogie got your favorite channels?
sakeido
Contributor
oh shit that's a good question. Of all the tube amps I've had, I've owned a 3 channel non-MW Recto for by far the most amount of time so I guess it must be the Recto. The non-MW Rectos are supposedly the worst ones they ever made, which is nbd because the worst Recto is imo still one of the best and most classic high gain tones of all time. I like the flexibility a lot of the 3 channel, sure it doesn't really have a clean but it's a great tone in its own right. I mean, a Christian rap metal band got that "clean" sound to #1 on the charts so it has a use
but imo almost everything Mesa makes is top class. Recto is one of my favorite modern sounds, Stiletto/Triple Crown are outstanding hot rod Marshall type sounds, and the Mark series are my favorites for really tight, grindy tones. dream Boogie would be a 4 channel behemoth. 100 watts, 6L6 tubes. Channel 1 would be the same as the one on the MW Dual Recs clean/pushed but with a crunch setting added. Channel 2 would be Stiletto channel 2 with crunch/tight drive/fluid drive. Channel 3 would be Recto channel 3 with raw/vintage/modern except with the presence at 2khz instead of 2.1. Channel 4 would be JP2C channel 3. For simplicity's sake you'd have to share a power amp.. I'd want something in between a normal Rectifier and the Badlander. tbh the Badlander they had the right idea but I think they went too far in taming the Recto tone, something that's a 50/50 split between classic Recto and Badlander would be sick.
Then throw a graphic EQ in there, make it channel assignable, 20/50/100 watt modes for all channels and switchable tube/diode rectification. I think this amp would be impossibly complicated and expensive so you could probably ditch the JP2C channel and just make it a 3 channel and I'd still be happy as hell.
That would be a killer amp! Maybe in the future we'll see/hear people modding the Badlander to make it fatter : )oh shit that's a good question. Of all the tube amps I've had, I've owned a 3 channel non-MW Recto for by far the most amount of time so I guess it must be the Recto. The non-MW Rectos are supposedly the worst ones they ever made, which is nbd because the worst Recto is imo still one of the best and most classic high gain tones of all time. I like the flexibility a lot of the 3 channel, sure it doesn't really have a clean but it's a great tone in its own right. I mean, a Christian rap metal band got that "clean" sound to #1 on the charts so it has a use
dream Boogie would be a 4 channel behemoth. 100 watts, 6L6 tubes. Channel 1 would be the same as the one on the MW Dual Recs clean/pushed but with a crunch setting added. Channel 2 would be Stiletto channel 2 with crunch/tight drive/fluid drive. Channel 3 would be Recto channel 3 with raw/vintage/modern except with the presence at 2khz instead of 2.1. Channel 4 would be JP2C channel 3. For simplicity's sake you'd have to share a power amp.. I'd want something in between a normal Rectifier and the Badlander. tbh the Badlander they had the right idea but I think they went too far in taming the Recto tone, something that's a 50/50 split between classic Recto and Badlander would be sick.
Then throw a graphic EQ in there, make it channel assignable, 20/50/100 watt modes for all channels and switchable tube/diode rectification. I think this amp would be impossibly complicated and expensive so you could probably ditch the JP2C channel and just make it a 3 channel and I'd still be happy as hell.
Mathemagician
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It does sound like that crunch channel is to die for though. Hoping to see that show up modeled in Axe Fx/similar soon.
So I just did a sound test between my two guitars. One is loaded with Black Winters, and the other is loaded with Dean Time Capsules
The results are...quite interesting. I'm deciding whether or not I want to make a post having people guess which is which.
The end result is essentially, there's no need to swap the Dean stock pickups. As to exactly why, I won't say just yet.
The results are...quite interesting. I'm deciding whether or not I want to make a post having people guess which is which.
The end result is essentially, there's no need to swap the Dean stock pickups. As to exactly why, I won't say just yet.
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Fenriswolf
Well-Known Member
Ya, but which one will be cooler on social media?
My second best sounding guitar I don't know what pickups are in it other than one says Seymour Duncan.
I'm trying to make this as "scientific" as possible. I recorded two tracks with each pickup. I'm using the exact same amp setup. The amp is something people should be familiar with, as is the speaker..and the settings are all at noon.
I'm gonna do an isolated guitar tone as well as the tone in a mix.
That way everything is covered.
Fenriswolf
Well-Known Member
I've used the same pickup in 2 guitars that were both basswood superstats with maple necks, rosewood boards, TOMs and the same scale length, and they sounded completely different. I still think there is either something to tonewood, or there is some black magic and voodoo that go into making guitars.
We shall see..
