Conference napalm::guitar

    This is the main reason why I do not play Boogies!

    Well dawg, Roy. I'm thinking that you've just described the whole
    reason for having controls and devices that equalize or shape sound.
    You should have no doubt that the sound character will change depending
    upon the acoustics of differing environments. The reason you notice it
    more is that your Boogie has much more sound character than your
    earlier PV's. And when that characteristic changes, you find yourself
    fiddling with the knobs trying to dial that characteristic back in.
    
    You also probably got it your mind that you paid tall $$ for your amp
    and therefore since you find youself dickin' around with it more often,
    maybe something's wrong here. Not so. Everything's right. Your Boogie
    has more substance and therefore requires/allows you more/better control.
    
    
    "sakman"
    

    I've owned an S.O.B., a Mark IIB, and demo'ed the new ones. I love
    "the" Boogie tone, however, they seem to all share the same *little*
    problem...the awesome tone doesn't really happen until paint-pealing
    volume. If you're playing colliseums, stadiums, etc., you're all set! 
    Otherwise, that awesome tone may precipitate a few of those passes in
    front of the band by a waitress with one of those little "too loud"
    notes scribbled on a napkin. (You know the routine...turn around, 
    notice the master vol. is on 3, realize that turning down is going
    to make your $1500 amp sound like a Gorrilla G-25, pretend to lower the
    vol., play a slow one next, build back up to the rockers, and  start the
    cycle again!)
    
    Scotty - who'll take his Fender Deluxes anywhere!
                    

    RE:  .0
    I bought a Mesa MK-2c *head* last year and I was not impressed overall
    with it. I loved the clean tone, but I had a real difficult time
    dialing in a good dirty tone. What a pain in the neck! My Peavey MX
    tube amp blew rings around it, but you know what? After playing it and
    adjusting it (using two totally different cabinets - a closed 2x12 and
    a � open 4x12" cabinet) I finally got what I was loking for! It did
    take some time before I felt comfortable with it. What I have noticed
    (still to this day) is that in some places the bass seems way too much
    so I turn it down so it's alittle thinner sounding and other times it's
    way too thin. Make up your mind already! Dave Blickstein's MK2b has
    VERY sensitive controls where if you turn it up a fraction you find
    yourself in the next county! My Peavey MX is much like that as far as
    volume, but as long as you're aware of it you can make small
    adjustments. As far as major differences from night to night in the
    same location...  having dealt with tube amps over the years, they seem
    to be able to do this sort of thing giving us that "love/hate"
    relationship. New preamp tubes? Old tubes in general can make amps do
    CrAzY things and because Boogies run hot they tend to go through tubes
    alot. I've replaced all my tubes once in the past 6 months I've owned this
    amp. I don't think that is very much considering the amount of playing
    I do with it. I do keep my trusty PV-MX combo around just in case, but
    I've only used the Peavey when "I felt like a change" and *not* because 
    I don't like, or trust the Boogie. Yes, it is very hard to change controls 
    on the fly (especially if you sing too), but I've learned to adapt. 
    Whether you have a Boogie, or not you may still have this "tube amp" 
    inherent problem. Tube amps are just alittle more sensitive, a little 
    more flakey at times, but for me there isn't a transistor out there to 
    take the place of a tube.
    
    RE: Fender Deluxe...   yep, I'd stick with them too. I always liked
    those amps especially when you run them around 8.0! I had a 1966 a long
    time ago and it was a cool amp. Light in weight too!  :)
    
    RE: Boogie...   I'd keep working at it. I've found that it takes alot
    of time to understand it (in my case anyway), but once you find what
    you're looking for I really think you'll like it alot more! Boogie amps
    are just very sensitive. 
    
    
    Rock on,
            Fred (who_snubbed_Mesa_until_he_found_one_he_liked...    who knew?)

> RE: Boogie...   I'd keep working at it. I've found that it takes alot
>    of time to understand it (in my case anyway), but once you find what
>    you're looking for I really think you'll like it alot more! 
    
Especially with the MkIV!!  Thing has more knobs than can be found on Acacia
Ave !  :)

jc (Who was scared away from the demo-combo because of the knobs !)

    The Mark IV has as more knobs on the back than a Fender Champ
    has on the front.
    
    Jim (Who loves his '68 Deluxe Reverb)

    If ya REALLY hate it, I'll give ya $ 200.00 and take it off your hands
    8').
    
    Lowell
    

Thanks for all the response - re: .2   I think you are right, the Boogie
is very senstive and therefore you can carve out just about any tone
you want and/or adapt it to any environment, and yes this is what you
pay for.  But on the other hand there's the old case of getting "more
than you bargained for", and unfortunately for me I find the variability
of the tone in every setting and volume a little too much hassle for 
the live environment.  Now if I could afford to have it just sitting at
home as my studio amp.....    It may be that I need to spend more time
with it first, and I will definitely give it a chance.  Not being able
to practice at home at higher volume is definitely a problem.

Some of you other guys out there seemed to convey that you don't get this
problem with Fenders - is that the case?  - How about with Marshalls?  I 
would assume that all tube amps exhibit this characteristic to some degree-
maybe with the Boogie it's just more so.  

>maybe with the Boogie it's just more so.  

Boogies seem notorious for this...

I don't know much about Fenders, but Marshall amps (excluding the JCM900's,
which I've yet to play with significantly) seem pretty immune to the behavior
in question.  IMHO, Marshalls sound like Marshalls regardless of how you 
EQ 'em.   

I remember reading a Marshall glossy saying something about "Marshalls
legendary EQ" - Legendary tone perhaps, but the EQs (on Marshalls I've 
owned) seemed only semi-functional.  For instance, cranking the midrange
knob from 4 to 8 doesn't impact the tone very much.  However, I've heard 
that JCM900's are completely different...

I did own some baby Fenders that sounded AWESOME with all the controls
on "10" - they were vibrochamps though, and me thinks that in a live 
situation they would work too well (lack of volume).

jc (With his $.02)

	I think it's been discussed several times about how sensitive a Mesa 
is tonewise/volume. Of all the Mesa's I've used/owned and borrowed,I've always
found them to need tweaking to a certain degree,but once you really know how 
to play one there great. 
	When I demoed a Mark IV I was really impressed with the full tone I 
could get out of it,plus the flexibility of tone. I heard a big difference in 
tone quality in these new amps,the price is :^( . Going from a Strat to a 
Gibson always took a second setting setup for the Mesa.and that should be 
expected. You could make it easier on yourself by using one guitar :^)

	The Mark I's had the best sound for what I was trying to do,but no 
channel switching and kind of a one sound at a time amp, the Mark II's always 
needed tweaking to find that special"sound",Mark III's I never cared for.
	
Maybe a phone call to mesa would help you out? I'd also suggest you find
a friend who has a large basement or something where you can crank it up
and experiment with tone and volume.
	ditto on Marshall tone....Coop...

							Rick

ps. I'll pass on making you an offer,my roadie's are on vacation.

    
    I can do some serious eq knob turning on my JCM900 without seriously
    affecting the tone.  For example, I could give the presence knob a
    pretty good turn and still have a reasonable sound.  The amp really
    could skip the numbers and just have low-med-hi ranges on the eq knobs.
    
    I know that Buck says his model of JCM900 is more sensitive, but the
    Dual Reverb model is not very fussy.
    
    Kevin
     

RE: MArshall EQ.

Fortunately, they are voiced pretty well, so the lack of massive 'delta'
doesn't seem to hurt 'em to much.  Only Marshalls sound like Marshalls.
:)

    This is the wrong note, but only the early Marshalls has non-useful
    tone knobs.  With Rose Morris in 1976, things started to really work!

    My "the Twin" has plenty of tone control/adjustment. But since I just
    play at home, I have it dialed into my sound an only occaisionally
    change the gain or, to a lesser extent, the volume. The only thing I've
    noticed about my twin is there seems to be a knee in the volume for
    home use. It's almost like if I look at the volume knob it'll be either
    just a bit softer than I want it, or just a bit loader. But the keyword
    is home use - where I try to keep it soft enough so that the bother to
    everyone in the family is minimal, yet loud enough to "breathe" with
    some expression. Like any other amp that I've ever played, this amp
    gets better as the sound is turned up.
    
    "sakman" 

    Kevin Latham of Mac Mcloud fame (one of the finest axe men I know) used
    a 60 watt Mesa...I'm not sure what model; maybe Coop or Odie remembers.
    I do know that I played my Les Paul thru that baby one night at a blues
    jam, and in the entire time I owned my KH M3, I could NEVER get the
    sweet ringing tone and sustain I got from that Boogie that night.  No
    FX, just the LP and the Boogie.....it kicked.  As a note, I saw Kevin
    use the amp in several gigs with Mac, and I don't remember him having
    any trouble with tone finickiness...he did complain about the price,
    tho.
    
    FWIW,
    
    Steve (Coop, Odie, what model did Kevin use?)
    

    He's still using it, don't know what model.  Agreed, it's got the tone
    for days.
    
    Jerry

    Former noter Will Collum had a Boogie MkIIc which had incredible tone. 
    I never saw him mess with the knobs much, maybe he found the sound he
    wanted.  With his old Strat, he got an incredibly Hendrixy sound.  He
    also played it pretty loud...
    
    Greg

    
    	Don't need mine anymore... 
    
    	

    Tom, if you ever wanna match your Oddessy up with my 5150, lemme know

RE: Bulldawg and Scary

Kevin Latham used a .50 calabre (50wt, I think).  A smokin' boogie for sure.
And from what I know about Boogies (not much), it's one of the simpler layouts
(tone wise).

He did, no doubt, have INCREDIBLE tone...'Specially with that sickly pink
paisley tele (brrrr).

:)

    He's a strat man .... period.  Paisley strat (in pink !).  Fugly 4
    sure, but he certainly knows how to play it !!!
    
    
    Jerry

    I can plug almost any guitar into my (solid-state) Fender Showman and
    it sounds pretty good with no adjustment. The Mk IV requires more
    fiddling to get the best sound for each guitar, but at that point, it
    sounds much better than the Fender. So far, I think it's worth the
    trouble.
    
    I've have some ways to minimize the pain. For rehearsals, I use Triode
    and Class-A , for gigs, Pentode and Simul-Class.  I keep the guitar's
    volume controls most of the way up and use the Master to adjust overall
    volume. I have R1 set for a very clean sound and it is relatively
    immune to different guitars, although I usually need to adjust the Bass
    control when switching from an archtop to a solidbody.
    
    I was recently rehearsing some rock stuff using my Polytone Baby Brute
    and a Les Paul 25/50. I usually like the sound of the Baby for jazz,
    but all during the rehearsal, the combination sounded so pathetic that
    it was actually affecting my playing--I kept thinking about how bad I
    sounded and forgetting to play. For the next session, I used the same
    guitar with the MKIV and open back cabinet: after a spectacular
    one-note solo during which I played the attack sensitivity of the amp
    to its fullest (Neil Young, eat your heart out), the rest of the band
    strongly suggested that I use only the Boogie. Okay, so this is an
    extreme example, but this is the first amp I've owned in years that
    makes me enjoy the sound of a solidbody guitar, and I'm still willing
    to put up with its foibles.
    
    Danny W.

re .last

Seconded about the use of the Triode/Pentode and Class-A/Simulclass
switches. Also you might experiment with using the harmonics switch on the
back in "mid" at low volume and the other setting for high volume.
I tend to have the Lead "bright" pulled at low volume, but pushed in
at stage volume levels.
*DC

    Haven't read all the way thru this stream (look at the timestamp on
    this note, my eyes are about to fall off the lids).
    
    But there are a couple of things you can do to "tame" to boogie's
    master volume knob.
    
    The main thing is to run a passive volume control thru either the
    effects send or return (not sure which it is).  Turns out you
    only need it going into ONE, not both (you don't need to both send
    and return to the volume control - have some electronics guy explain
    why - I just play).
    
    I've used a volume pedal, but I'm thinking of buying one of those
    cheap passive mixers (that come in pseudo stomp boxes) and just
    permanently plugging it in.
    
    What can I say about Boogies.  Everything you've said about it is
    probably true, and my boogie has frustrated me on MANY occasions.
    
    However, when I get that amp setup right (which is not often), the tone
    is just by far the most happening tone of anything I've played and
    it inspires me like no other piece of equipment ever has, nor likely
    will.

    For what it's worth: 
    
    I decided to buy a small second amp.  I ordered a Boogie 
    Subway Blues from the local distributer.  When
    it came, it had a loud hum with no guitar plugged in, and 
    the volume didn't start until about a quarter of the way up. 
    
    I took it back, got store credit (I know, I shoulda got
    my money back) and tried all the other amps in the 
    store.  Most of them seemed to be _broken_ one way or 
    another, even though they were out on display!
    
    Suddenly size was not an issue, and I was searching
    for a new primary amp.  GTS had gripped my heart.  I took my
    store credit to another branch of this store, and tried
    a Boogie Studio Caliber.  Found one that had not been plugged 
    in yet, and therefore not destroyed by living in a music 
    store for too long.  Couldn't quite get the sound going, BUT 
    bought it anyways!  Kinda irrational I know.   
    
    As this chain of notes says, there are some less than great
    sounds in this amp. And I managed to find them!  But I dialed in 
    some good ones after I tried the suggested settings in the manual.  
    Then I got _real_  nice clean and low gain sounds.  Without that 
    starting point, I was over tweaking the controls and getting 
    some cheesy/plasticy or compressed tones.
    
    I'm also not crazy about the reverb.  It seems weak, and is effected 
    greatly by the other tone nobs.  Anyone recommend a good analog reverb 
    unit?  I remember my Princeton Chorus having alot more 'slap'(?) in the 
    reverb than this Boogie.    
    
    Conclusion: I'm gonna keep it and play with it.  I'm shopped-out. 
    A couple obvious pluses are that lighter picking sounds great, as 
    does finger picking on the electric.  The sound is thick 
    and deep and very responsive to variations in attack.   
    
    Next time: I may try buying direct from Mesa just to be
    sure I get an actually new amp.
    
    Dave