thinking of buying a new amp, input welcome!

[mikes123]

I´m looking for an English made all tube head that you can use for either guitar or bass(nastier distortion ). I´m thinking either a Marshall super bass or one of those new Orange thunderverbs 50 or 200 watts, I´m thinking 50. Has any one had experience with any of these amps and like to chip in some advice. Thanks

-Mike

[bb5000]

Hey Mike,

I'm pretty green when it comes to Ricks so I may not be the opinion you want. That being said I recently bought a 4003,
and play it through my Orange AD200B MK 3 head. Sounds great. I own a few guitars and haven't tried any of them
through the Orange (have a Marshall for that), so I can't really comment on that one. The Orange from my experience
has amazing clarity, sustain, and can get a nice warm overdriven tone. It's not super abrasive or stomp box-y if that makes sense.
It more of a natural creamy distortion, like driving a tube amp too hard. Sounds and feels (dynamic)right.
The Orange however does not really color your sound much or make a Ric (or any bass) sound like something it's not.

It keeps things simple which is why i bought it. I'm not very fond of amps w/ a bunch of doo-dads and knobs, resembling
a stereo receiver + e.q. .
I know the Mk3 wasn't the specific model you were asking about but the friend I know w/ the thunderverb 50
said almost the same thing but for guitar. He hasn't tried bass through it.

Probably not the amp you want doing jazz standards (although it is very clear)
but I'm preeeetty sure you're not looking for that.

-brian

[JakeK]

I don't own a bass or even play bass...but get yourself an Ampeg, I hear they are the best.

[sloop_john_b]

I don't own a bass or even play bass...but get yourself an Ampeg, I hear they are the best.

He's looking for English-made, i.e. Marshall, Orange, Hiwatt.

[rickaddict]

I´m looking for an English made all tube head that you can use for either guitar or bass(nastier distortion ). I´m thinking either a Marshall super bass or one of those new Orange thunderverbs 50 or 200 watts, I´m thinking 50. Has any one had experience with any of these amps and like to chip in some advice. Thanks
-Mike

I tried one of these http://www.orangeamps.com/products.asp? ... View&ID=79 (AD200B/MK3) out on a few different occasions at my local music shop and with more than one Rick bass. Since you say that you want "nastier distortion" it might be the one for you. My experience with it was that I couldn't get it to not distort. Maybe the one I played was defective or something, but I just kept turning the gain down lower and lower until I finally had it around 1 or below and I just couldn't get a clean sound out of it. My conclusion was that it wasn't for me. I really wanted to like it. I like British stuff, and this amp is just the right size in terms of weight and power (I have an Ampeg SVT CL that sounds great but is too heavy for me). I have to have the ability to play clean.

I'd say 50 watts is too small if you're going to play the thing on stage. I also have a 100W Ampeg Portaflex flip-top tube amp and although it sounds great and will distort, it can't keep up with a loud drummer.

[1965]

Just get a Thunderverb and get it over with. They sound great, and it sounds like you know exactly what you want.

[Chris P]

Hi there!

I prefer British tube amps over USA made ones. I love Ampeg SVTs, bu British amps seem to push the sound a bit more. More Mid-ish.

I used to play bass through a '65 Vox AC50 with solid state rectifier and two EL34s. For me it was more than loud enough (I have a female fronted indie pop/rock band) and I played some quite large venues with it. Of course the amp was mic'd or DI'd and if I needed more bass I had my monitor.

This Vox broke down a bit to often and I bought an Orange AD200B Mk 3 (4 x KT88/6550). That amp is great! Huge tones, sweat, fat, always and instant a great tone! The nice thing is that you can overdrive or even fuzz the amp in a very nice and sweet way. I compared the PC-board Mk3 to an older PTP Mk 2 (The MK2's have some issues) and the overdrive of the Mk 3 was much more natural. Almost everyone I speak, who love vintage tones (We're not talking clinical sounding German ENGL ans Glockenklang amps here) loved this amp very much! The basic sound is just big, fat and sweet and you can dial in some bass, mid or treble. It really sounds like the AC50 but much louder and with more headroom.

And still I sold it, but that's to buy my dream amp, a brand new PTP Hiwatt Custom 200. I ordered it some days ago. I did an A/B with the Orange and the Hiwatt. They almost sound the same clean, but the Orange can overdrive and the Hiwatt has endlessly clean sounds. And I almost always play clean. If I want gritty sounds I use my EHX English Muff'n which sounds almost exactly like the overdriven Orange.

And about 50W vs. 100W vs. 200W:
For my indie band 50W was quite enough. Now I've got another band, which is a quite loud 60s/70s garage-kinda band. Because I sold the Orange I used my back up amp, which is a 100W 4xEL34 Pc-board eighties Hiwatt Bass 100. It was loud enough for that band, but I had to turn it up quite a bit. The Orange did it with more ease.

I hope I helped you out a bit.


BTW: I heard very nice things about the VBA400. Mani of Stone Roses/Primal Scream uses it, Andy Bell of Oasis uses it sinc the new album and tour.

[thisismusicinc]

I play a hiwatt 200, and it's great! Mine is an old one with 6 EL34 tubes. The 100 watters also work with the basses, up to a certain volume. Love the rickenbacker + hiwatt combo.

[thx1955]

Hi there,
I grew up literally on Vox, Marshall's, Sound City, Orange, and Hi-Watt and used various versions of their valve amps from the early 70's through till the early 90's when I moved to the US full time. I also used 4x12's and not 4x10's.

When I went back to buy a UK made tube amp (new or used) I couldn't believe how expensive they were, even in the second hand market. I loved playing my Rics through Orange, and at one time had two Orange AD-120's driving a pair of Orange 4x12's and a pair of 4x15's, insanely heavy but lovely tone.

Since the early 90's I've moved over to Ampeg, for the difference in cost I'd say that any of the current UK amps with the exception of VOX are on a par with an Ampeg valve amp, especially a US made model, the tone I get from my current Ampeg B-15, B-25, and SVT-II is as good, or sometimes better than that from any of my older UK amps. My B-25 matched with an Avatar 4x12 fitted with Eminence Kappa Pro's sounds better than my Orange AD-120 with an Orange (Cellestionj) 4x12.

I realise of course that as always sound, and sound preferences are very subjective and we all have our own favourites and opinions.

[johnallg]

Nice informative and interesting post, Jim. Thanks. With your previous use of the old British amps, I value this evaluation. Answers some wondering I have done, after perusing the Orange website.

[thinneckrick]

Ampeg, Ampeg, Ampeg, Ampeg !!!!!

[VRICKY63]

Traynor YBA200 sounds british ,made by Canadian Brits ?

[aceonbass]

I have an Ampeg SVP-CL pre-amp with four NOS Telefunken Tubes(2-12AU7's & 2-12AX7's I'll be selling soon.

[thx1955]

Carrying on from the previous post, I was doing some recollections on my experiences with Orange in the 70's and 80's.

As I mentioned I owned a pair of AD120's, bought directly from the Orange store in 1973 that at the time was located in Shaftsbury Ave in London. These looked awsome, and they appeared to be very well constructed with point to point hand wiring, and lovely Chrome covers on the two huge transformers.

That said both my AD120's spent significant time back at Orange for a number of issues over their life, both had to have new output transformers within 6 months, both ate through EL34's like they were candy, this happened despite the operational volumes I used. On one of the tone selector control stopped working on three separate occasions rendering the amp useless. Both amps ate through fuses to the point that I had Orange replace the standard glass fuse with a mini breaker. One eventually caught fire during a practice session and after that I stopped using the AD120's, and moved back to Sound City.

Sound City amps by the way were road tested and designed to stand up to The Who's punishments, and they did. looking back I'd say that my Sound City amps were a lot tougher and had very few issues compared to those I had with Orange.

I still loved the sound of an Orange amp, but in my honest opinion I think that the UK valve folks are milking the prices and the second hand market is as bad.
I recently got to try the Orange AB-200, and the Traynot YBA-200, both sounded very nice, and in the quck audition I had both sounded relatively close, but, the Orange was twice the price of the Traynor, it is most defiantly not twice the amp, and compared to a good Ampeg SVT tha AB-200 has lees power, and less tonal capability, again in my opinion.

There's always been a lot of debate over whether UK or US valve amps sound better, but, I don't think it comes down to one or the other, depending on your needs and application either will work, I still think you pay premium pricing for the fact they're from the UK, in my experience my Ampeg amps are built just as well, just as ruggedly, more so in some cases, and sound just as good, if not better.

In most cases the heavy weight amps all stem from approximately the same time, 1968-1969 Marshall, Sound City, and the new guys Orange, and Hi-Watt all had 100-120 watt amps based on an EL34 designs, Marshall had a lovely 200 watt amp. Over here, Ampeg, and Traynor both had been producing wonderful amps from the early 60's. Ampeg introduced the SVT line in 1969, and they never looked back.

Orange did make a very interesting amp called the "Killer-Watt", a 1000, yes one thousand watt valve amp that had about 16 KT-88's in the back, it was huge, heavy, but it was gloriously loud. !!!!

[johnallg]

Orange did make a very interesting amp called the "Killer-Watt", a 1000, yes one thousand watt valve amp that had about 16 KT-88's in the back, it was huge, heavy, but it was gloriously loud. !!!!

Ya think??!! Thanks again for the insights.