peep my new rig

[fluffytone72]

Just completed my new rig which I'll be using for a bunch of shows this fall.  For the first time in over a decade of tone searching I'm in complete tone heaven!    Tone searching often torments the soul, with the sounds in your head often left untaped due to lack of knowledge/experience, especially if your like me and are on a serious budget.  Somehow though, it seems right that I would finally just now be satisfied with my rig because it really forces yourself to become a better player if your forced to get great tone from a pretty shitty rig.  Anyhow, now to the task at hand.  Here are pictures of the new rig and a brief explanation that may or may not be interesting to anyone.

https://plus.google.com/u/0/112170940303471517930/posts/FmWpjQAg9Xf?pid=6042037073209838082&oid=112170940303471517930

I took these on my computer so everything is mirror imaged.  Essentially the core tone is a KOT high gain with right side volume dimed and drive at 3 oclock> ts9 silver mod used as a clean boost>analogman comprossor set mildly.  I kick on the left side of KOT for over the top moments of devastasion.  Also, the boss DD3 is on most of the time (it's a 1987 model made in japan, really warm sounding), set around 20% delay volume.  The maz 18 I got recently and it took a minute to dial in the EQ and learn the sweet spot, but I'm loving it.  The magic thing that made this rig sound great was the combo of KOT>ts9 silver>comprossor.  The KOT is a really open sounding, un compressed pedal and the ts9 silver sounds great stacked with it, then when you add the comprossor to compress and smooth it out, it sings.  also, you can't see it but I use a steel guitar black box as an impedance matcher.  So full line of fire is as follows: american standard stratocaster w/warmouth pro compound radius neck+seymour duncan custom custom bridge pup>steel guitar black box>polytune>wilson wah>earthquake devices the depths univibe>KOT high gain red side>ts9 silver>analogman comprossor>tc electronic X4 delay>boss dd3 delay>boomerang V2>maz 18 jr 2X10

So there you go!  JAM ON!

[Heady Jam Fan]

Looks nice!

I've heard the Maz 18 can be tough to dial in at home, but sounds great in a band mix.

[Mister Buddy]

Isn't this the point at which Poster criticizes everything you own; describes how he owned all the gear you own years ago, knows the manufacturers, had it customized by them personally, but that it all sucks anyhow; tells you what you ought to be playing with instead; tosses in a whole bunch of random insults glued together with bragging; gets sneered at by everyone for being a chode; insists that he was trying to be helpful and asks why is everyone so butthurt, but throws in a bunch more insults anyhow; deletes all his postings and says he will never post here again; and then posts again?

[fluffytone72]

Looks nice!

I've heard the Maz 18 can be tough to dial in at home, but sounds great in a band mix.

Yeah, it sounded great at band rehearsal, tough to dial in at home.  brake lite helps.  I'm going for a jam type tone so I hit the preamp super hard, and at low levels it can sound a big harsh.. any ideas on how to smooth this out?  Favorite preamp tubes?  I'm super excited about being able to open it up tomorrow at a local jerry bash my band is playing.  4 hours of jamming in a pretty big venue.  I don't think I'll be able to open it up like that for a while after.

[Heady Jam Fan]

Looks nice!

I've heard the Maz 18 can be tough to dial in at home, but sounds great in a band mix.

Yeah, it sounded great at band rehearsal, tough to dial in at home.  brake lite helps.  I'm going for a jam type tone so I hit the preamp super hard, and at low levels it can sound a big harsh.. any ideas on how to smooth this out?  Favorite preamp tubes?  I'm super excited about being able to open it up tomorrow at a local jerry bash my band is playing.  4 hours of jamming in a pretty big venue.  I don't think I'll be able to open it up like that for a while after.

I don't know much about a Maz 18 to be honest, so any suggestions I'd have are really not specific to your amp, but general.

My first thoughts are to try some tweaking at band-volumes before considering any changes to your rig that cost money.

From your description, it sounds like your playing really quiet and going for a pushed-tube sound just in your preamp. I think that can sound harsh itself, especially at low volumes, but it might sound nice and smooth when you have pushed power tubes smoothing out your preamp drive.
- Can you tweak your rig when your playing louder? At band practice when your band takes a break? At my old apartment (first floor of a house) where most of my gear still is, I would turn my Mesa up until the power tubes were overdriving - far louder than 2 EL84s! You might be able to get away with playing louder than you think, maybe on a saturday afternoon.
- What kind of jam tone are you going for that you have your pushing your preamp tubes? I usually use my amp as a pretty clean platform where my dirt>comp is around unity gain, my lead boost pushes my amp just to the edge of breakup, and I sometimes even use the 2nd input on my DR which is 'padded' down to roll off some volume and treble keeping the amp cleaner and smoother (not sure if the 'Lo' input on the Maz is the same thing).

The way I setup my volume is turning on my comp (but not my overdrive) and clean lead boost + delay. I turn up the volume on my amp until its clearly overdriven and the delay repeats are yucky, muddy and compressed into my original signal. Then I back down the volume until the amp sounds and feels pushed / squished, but there is good separation between the delay repeats and original signal. I'm not sure how good the Master Volume is on the Maz - MV's sound terrible on most Fender's, but works awesome on a Mesa. Maybe the Maz, like a Mesa, doesn't need the MV wide open, but on a Fender, anything lower than 75 or 85% of the way up sounds pretty bad - even better if there is no MV in the amp circuit at all. Try really opening up the Master Volume if you can! If you hear the power tubes overdriving, either back off the input volume or leave the MV where the amp is clean, but pushed. I know some people can't play that loud at home, but worth trying to at least see if the harshness is just because your playing too quietly for your amp.

I always found EL84's to be a bit 'bitey' in the upper midrange. This cuts through in a band mix, but can sound harsh especially at home. Some tubes definitely sound smoother than others. NOS tubes usually do, but can cost a pretty penny. I have some old Amperex and RCA tubes that sound great, especially the RCA Black Plate that was in my DR when I got it, but those cost probably more than they are worth. I don't know EL84's well, but there are also probably NOS ones that would be smoother than whatever came in the amp. As far as new production tubes, JJ's are generally considered darker, which can be smoother. I like my Ruby 12AX7 AC5 HG that is the first tube in my Mesa.

How new is your amp? Is the speaker broken in? It takes about 20 hours at band volume. That might be another thing. I love hemp cone speakers too, very smooth and thick sounding. If you think the harshness is a strong peak at a specific frequency, sometimes find a speaker to mellow that peak is a solution. An EQ could help too.  Here is a screenshot of the frequency plot of my guitar track on my band's newest song - not huge peaks in the frequency (note, the treble goes a bit higher, just a quieter point in a quiet track, so its not visible):

A frequency analyzer in recording software (such as Garageband) can help pick up where extreme peaks are occurring. Try EQing that frequency range and if the harshness goes away, then consider ways to remedy that (adjust the amp, use and EQ, don't worry about it and just fix it for recordings, try a new speaker, change around effect pedals...).

[fluffytone72]

so i got to open it up tonight.  the tone was the best I've ever achieved and that is an amazing feeling.  My verdict is that the maz is an incredible amp at gig volumes, maybe the best I've ever played.  We played dead tunes all night so you know it was a good time.  Scarlet>Fire was off the hook.  it's crazy how much better you play when you can get some real tube breakup (my previous amp was a twin reverb).  I liked what you said about setting up your mesa, thats a really intelligent way to set tone.  I will try that with my maz, the brake lite is really helpful.  I'm moving soon to a nicer apartment so hopefully I'll get to open it up more often!  We recorded the whole show tonight so I may post some highlights so you can hear the maz in action, I'm hooked!

[Buffered]

Isn't this the point at which Poster criticizes everything you own; describes how he owned all the gear you own years ago, knows the manufacturers, had it customized by them personally, but that it all sucks anyhow; tells you what you ought to be playing with instead; tosses in a whole bunch of random insults glued together with bragging; gets sneered at by everyone for being a chode; insists that he was trying to be helpful and asks why is everyone so butthurt, but throws in a bunch more insults anyhow; deletes all his postings and says he will never post here again; and then posts again?

You sir hit the proverbial nail on the head. Dayum!