The eagle has landed

[Desertdweller]

MK VII is DUMB. Mids cranked, gain, treble and presence at 6.5-ish. This damn thing is a BEAST The crunch mode even on channel one isBL crunch gone GNARLY AF

Remember the knob guide for Mark amps:

Gain: Gain
Treble: yeah also Gain for some reason
Presence: Treble
Mid: Placebo because you're going to cut the heck out of it on the GEQ anyway
Bass: boomy awfulness just keep it at zero

 

[JiveTurkey]

Remember the knob guide for Mark amps:

Gain: Gain
Treble: yeah also Gain for some reason
Presence: Treble
Mid: Placebo because you're going to cut the heck out of it on the GEQ anyway
Bass: boomy awfulness just keep it at zero

Yep. This VIi mode came alive for me with "non-standard" mark settings, though. A boatload of volume certainly didn't hurt either

 

[mbenigni]

Remember the knob guide for Mark amps:

Gain: Gain
Treble: yeah also Gain for some reason
Presence: Treble
Mid: Placebo because you're going to cut the heck out of it on the GEQ anyway
Bass: boomy awfulness just keep it at zero

I would love to see a similar cheat-sheet for the Mesa Express amps. Not that anyone plays them. I can't dial out the "raspiness" to save my life. There's no Presence on these amps, just the "Contour" knob. It's no help that there's no GEQ on this one, and it's a 10" cabinet, but I still feel like the preamp itself is spitting a lot of highs. I'm thinking of swapping out the stock speaker for a Creamback 10" and seeing whether that doesn't darken/ smooth things out a bit.

Some day I'll buy a real amp so I can keep up in these big boy threads.

 

[mbenigni]

Hmm, how can we cheer you up... Should I tell you about the MkIIc+ I sold for a few bucks, or about that time I passed on a job interview at Mesa Engineering?

 

[JiveTurkey]

Hmm, how can we cheer you up... Should I tell you about the MkIIc+ I sold for a few bucks, or about that time I passed on a job interview at Mesa Engineering?

 

[mbenigni]

These two incidents/ non-incidents took place within a few months of one another. I was clearly operating at peak stupid during that period of my life.

 

[Baba]

Can you do individual 5 band EQ settings for each channel that can be recalled by MIDI or the footswitch or is one EQ setting applied to all channels?

Why yes, yes you can, with the supplied footswitch:

I will. Probably won't do any recording with it. I don't have a separate load box and one thing I have come to see on this gen of Mesa's is that while it's great to have the cabclone; I don't like using it that way. The signal is either too quiet or too hot, my interface doesn't seem to like it, lots of wet blanket observations

I can take a tap out of the fx send with IRs and effects if needed but then you are skipping the power amp. Not a biggie but just part of what I have come to be with this era of tech.

Even the "lowly" Behringer Ultra G box has (2) -20db pads, (can be used in series for a total of 40 db), and can go right between head and cab, so you could tap off of that, for power amp tone, if you wanted.

I don't know if that amp has a built in load protection? If so, even better.

 

[JiveTurkey]

Why yes, yes you can, with the supplied footswitch:

Even the "lowly" Behringer Ultra G box has (2) -20db pads, (can be used in series for a total of 40 db), and can go right between head and cab, so you could tap off of that, for power amp tone, if you wanted.

I don't know if that amp has a built in load protection? If so, even better.

I have the Behringer DI but the pad switches no longer work I should grab another one as they are super cheap I haven't even opened the footswitch yet (it has too many switches lol). I have the FM9 set to switch channels via MIDI and it's pretty damn slick \m/

 

[spawnofthesith]

I would love to see a similar cheat-sheet for the Mesa Express amps. Not that anyone plays them. I can't dial out the "raspiness" to save my life. There's no Presence on these amps, just the "Contour" knob. It's no help that there's no GEQ on this one, and it's a 10" cabinet, but I still feel like the preamp itself is spitting a lot of highs. I'm thinking of swapping out the stock speaker for a Creamback 10" and seeing whether that doesn't darken/ smooth things out a bit.

Some day I'll buy a real amp so I can keep up in these big boy threads.

I used to have the 5:50+ which did have the EQ so maybe I can't help so much.... but man I -loved- that amp. The weak point was trying to do metal chugs in burn mode, but it could still pull it off, and frankly I think if I had tried it through a closed back cab it wouldn't even be the small "issue" that it was

Sorry I realize this post is completely unhelpful

 

[mbenigni]

I used to have the 5:50+ which did have the EQ so maybe I can't help so much.... but man I -loved- that amp. The weak point was trying to do metal chugs in burn mode, but it could still pull it off, and frankly I think if I had tried it through a closed back cab it wouldn't even be the small "issue" that it was

Sorry I realize this post is completely unhelpful

Not completely unhelpful. :)

Yeah, I think the GEQ is crucial on these amps. They stopped making the non-GEQ versions after a pretty short run. (I think the Express line is discontinued altogether now?) The burn mode has a ton of gain, but after a point it just squishes into an upper-mid band and gets kind of boring. Don't know exactly how to articulate that. Then there's something unpleasant in the upper registers that I can't dial out with the tone stack or contour, even with a boost/ OD in front. (The controls are so interactive, as we've all discussed before, and if you put a dirt pedal with interactive controls of its own in the mix, it's easy to get lost.) I actually like the Crunch mode on Channel 1 a little more, but if I use it I sacrifice the Clean mode...

I'm going to run it into a closed back 4x12 this weekend, and if I find something useful, I'll take my chances with that Creamback 10. (The same speaker Mesa is putting in their 10" Mark Five:25 now.) It's hard enough to get any consistent feedback about speaker replacements, and much more so when you're dealing with an oddball 10" cabinet. But I'd like to make this combo a little more functional. It is a really cool-looking amp, and so portable.

P.S. I also find the Spring reverb on this amp to be pretty useless. Similarly, too much sssssssssssss up top, not a lot of character anywhere else.

 

[spawnofthesith]

Not completely unhelpful. :)

Yeah, I think the GEQ is crucial on these amps. They stopped making the non-GEQ versions after a pretty short run. (I think the Express line is discontinued altogether now?) The burn mode has a ton of gain, but after a point it just squishes into an upper-mid band and gets kind of boring. Don't know exactly how to articulate that. Then there's something unpleasant in the upper registers that I can't dial out with the tone stack or contour, even with a boost/ OD in front. (The tone controls are so interactive, as we've all discussed before, and if you put a dirt pedal with interactive controls of its own in the mix, it's easy to get lost.) I actually like the Crunch mode on Channel 1 a little more, but if I use it I sacrifice the Clean mode...

I'm going to run it into a closed back 4x12 this weekend, and if I find something useful, I'll take my chances with that Creamback 10. (The same speaker Mesa is putting in their 10" Mkar Five:25 now.) It's hard enough to get any consistent feedback about speaker replacements, and much more so when you're dealing with an oddball 10" cabinet. But I'd like to make this combo a little more functional. It is a really cool-looking amp, and so portable.

P.S. I also find the Spring reverb on this amp to pretty useless. Again, too much sssssssssssss up top, not a lot of character anywhere else.

Have you tried running the amp "backwards"? I know a lot of folks like the crunch mode so much that they set the blues mode on channel 2 up to be cleans

That clean channel is one of my favorites though, combined with an SD-1 was also a very magical sound. I don't really remember how I ran most of my knobs and it probably would be different considering GEQ vs. non GEQ

 

[Badonkey Kong]

Don't forget, if you have an HX variant, you have a good model of the 5 band EQ you could plop in the loop and use for individual channels/modes.

 

[mbenigni]

Have you tried running the amp "backwards"? I know a lot of folks like the crunch mode so much that they set the blues mode on channel 2 up to be cleans

That clean channel is one of my favorites though, combined with an SD-1 was also a very magical sound. I don't really remember how I ran most of my knobs and it probably would be different considering GEQ vs. non GEQ

Yes, "backwards" has been the best approach with this amp, if you want to try make good use of the channel switching (vs. using it as a straight clean pedal platform, which seems a shame?) Crunch to Blues, with some tap dancing on OD/DST pedals to get you wherever else you need to go. But sacrificing that Clean mode does hurt, and if I'm running "backwards" I can't find any margin for an "always" on boost that complements both Blues and Crunch. It's always too much for one, not enough for the other.

 

[mbenigni]

Don't forget, if you have an HX variant, you have a good model of the 5 band EQ you could plop in the loop and use for individual channels/modes.

OMG, this amp has been sitting in the corner so long, I actually forgot it had an FX loop.

Between EQ and reverb, yeah, that ought to help more than a little.

P.S. Never Sell Your HX Stomp™

 

[ejecta]

Congrats on the amp! Enjoy!

 

[JiveTurkey]

Congrats on the amp! Enjoy!

I am

 

[itchyfingers]

 

[mbenigni]

I thought my express was broken cause the drive channels sounded like s**t.

The channels need the volume pot to be a bit open to perform as designed (in my mind).
That results in volumes that are too much for at home playing though…you can mitigate that by putting something in the efx loop that reduces volume back to civilized proportions.
I use a boss GT core (=adding the GEQ if you want)…but whatever comes with a volume knob would do the trick.
Now I like the amps channels!

Yeah, I'm definitely guilty of starving the power section whilst meekly tone-hunting in the basement, trying not to keep anyone upstairs awake.



The amp has always delivered for clean/ mid-gain stuff, I'm just struggling to get any decent high gain sounds out of it. I'll try your recommendation with some kind of attenuator in the loop.

 

[JiveTurkey]

Yeah, I'm definitely guilty of starving the power section whilst meekly tone-hunting in the basement, trying not to keep anyone upstairs awake.



The amp has always delivered for clean/ mid-gain stuff, I'm just struggling to get any decent high gain sounds out of it. I'll try your recommendation with some kind of attenuator in the loop.

I always wondered about the Express stuff but it's one of those in between Mesa amps I can't seem to pry my eyeballs of a Rectifier variant to take a good look at?

 

[mbenigni]

I always wondered about the Express stuff but it's one of those in between Mesa amps I can't seem to pry my eyeballs of a Rectifier variant to take a good look at?

As I've said before, it never would have been my first choice. I just stumbled on it one night, convinced myself it was a good deal, and made an uncharacteristic impulse buy. The 10" cabinet has always appealed to me aesthetically, even though the 12" 5:50 (with 6L6's) clearly sounded better. (They were sitting side by side in the store, with a price difference of maybe $200 or $300?)

Once it was discontinued, it was that much harder to bring myself to sell it. I had it in my head that the 10" version was pretty rare, though I do see a few on Reverb now.