Marshall 2203KK JCM800 Kerry King Guitar Amplifier Head
August 28, 2008 by unknown~ · Leave a Comment
When you take the amp that has been the source of pure rock and roll crunch for decades and mix it with one of the most powerful metal guitarists ever to unleash havoc on this planet, what do you get? Read more
Crash Course in Guitar Tone
August 28, 2008 by unknown~ · Leave a Comment
I own a custom-made Ibanez S540R guitar that I bought secondhand. I purchased the guitar because I liked its tone, which was warmer and had more character than other Ibanez guitars. Read moreVYPYR - Peavey VYPYR Earns Respect in the Guitar World!
August 26, 2008 by unknown~ · Leave a Comment
Since 1965, Peavey has built a reputation for making awesome guitar amplifiers, and they continue to evolve under the guidance of the company’s founder, Hartley Peavey. Their reputation has been solidified with a series of amazing amps, such as the 6505, JSX Joe Satriani signature amp, the Valve Kings, Triple XXX, the Classic series, the Windsor, and others. In the non-tube amp category, their patented TransTube technology is almost indistinguishable from real tube-driven amps, setting the standard for performance, tone, and affordability. And now, with their VYPYR series of amps, Peavey finds themselves at the forefront of the modeling amp race as well.
THE LINEUP
The VYPYR series is made up of six different combo amps, ranging from 15, 30, 75 to 100-watt models that make use of a digital front end with TransTube paired with a TransTube solid state power section. They also have both 60- and 120-watt models that pair digital front ends with tube driven power sections. All of the VYPYR series draw on Peavey’s years of amp-building skill by utilizing the most advanced processing of any digital amp, even including real analog distortion generated by their amazing TransTube circuitry, which is the only solid state amp that can re-create all of the eight events that create distortion in a tube amp. The result is awesome tone and great response from both versions of the VYPYR. The rich, digital effects are complemented by the analog distortion, which frees up processing power, creating a more organic sound experience.
Every VYPYR amp comes loaded with a 266MHz Dual Core SHARC processor that gives the series the most processing power of any modeling amp on the market. What does that mean to you? More realistic sound, a greater range of diversity, the ability to handle more effects at one time (up to five at once) and a greater range of control over the effects parameters.
FIREPOWER
The VYPYR has 24 different amp models, including both clean and distortion channels for 12 classic amplifiers, including British and American amps, and a few of Peavey’s most popular tube driven amps. One of the cool features of the VYPYR is that some of the original amps were single-channel amps (without distortion), and for the first time ever, the VYPYR gives you the option for distortion or, in some cases, a ‘boost’ channel, to give you that ‘up to 11′ option.
As for effects, the VYPYR offers 11 rack and 11 pedal effects (with the exception of the VYPYR 15, which leaves out the pedal section), all of which can be stored as presets and are fully editable. The amps give you 12 preset slots, which are arranged in 3 banks of four presets. With the addition of the Sanpera II footswitch, the number is increased from 12 to 400 storable presets (again with the exception of the VYPYR 15), which lets you use up to five effects at once and also includes a looping function, which would be a worthwhile investment for any effects-prone rocker needing a ready-for-stage solution to the boring amp problem.
GREAT! HOW DO THEY PERFORM?
During a test run, the VYPYR 30 (the next to smallest in the series) had plenty of bite. It seemed to be suitable for most gigs. When the amp is switched on the control panel lights up, making it suitable for low-light situations. When you plug in, the LED lights switch over to ‘operation’ mode. The multifunction knobs are labeled, making it fairly easy to get the hang of without having to read the manual (who does that, anyway?). The lights are arranged to tell you which amp models and effects are active, which channel is being used on the models, green indicating a clean channel and red is for rocking hard.
The amp delivered a realistic sound and feel, thanks to the models and their algorithms in conjunction with the TransTube technology. The 75 and 100 VYPYR series also feature a Power Sponge attenuator built-in, so you can get massive tone at lower volume (so you won’t bother your parents – much). The analog distortion also allows you to dial in pre- and post-gain, just like the other amps on the market.
The TransTube technology captures the sag effect of a tube power section wonderfully, as it responds to your picking style. For those of you who are tube purists, the VYPYR Tube 60 and the Tube 120 will help feed your ego with their real 6L6 tubes.
MORE DETAILS, PLEASE!
You want features? How about this: studio-quality USB interface (to get those tracks directly into your computer) on everything but the 15 and 30 models, MIDI in/out, a built-in chromatic tuner, MP3/CD/Aux input, pro-quality headphone out, tap tempo button, a master know that goes beyond 11 (untested…use with caution).
Peavey knows what you expect: a quality amplifier that can wake the dead. And with the VYPYR Series, Peavey delivers, building on their traditional strengths with high-octane processing power and an excellent interface. The Peavey VYPYR Series rocks. Hard. http://peavey.com - Discuss the Peavey VYPYR at GEAR-MONKEY.COM
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John Lennon Revolution Casino Electric Guitar Review
August 26, 2008 by unknown~ · Leave a Comment
Used in the latter part of his career with the Beatles (most notably on the Revolver sessions) and for much of his solo work, Lennon’s Casino was a highly personalized instrument that reflected much his maverick spirit. Purchased by Lennon in 1965, the hollowbody originally had a sunburst finish and a pickguard. By 1968, however, in the search for a more resonant sound, Lennon had stripped the finish and removed the pickguard, leaving only the natural, instantly recognizable guitar that he is so often associated with. In order to reproduce the instrument as perfectly as possible, representatives form the Epiphone company paid a visit to the legendary instrument a the late Beatle’s New York apartment, where it had been stored, virtually untouched, since his death. Precise measurements of the guitar were taken and tests performed on it, and the findings returned to Epiphone’s Nashville factory.
The results of all this research is the “Revolution” Casino, and eerily “alive” guitar that features a hollow, laminated maple body and top, mahogany neck, two Alnico V P-90 single-coil pickups and a no-nonsense control layout featuring a three-way pickup selector and two volume and two tone pots. As on Lennon’s guitar, the top-mounted screw and spacer for the pickguard are still in place, and there is even an unfilled
screw hole on the bottom side of the guitar where the pickguard would have anchored. The natural satin finish feels refreshingly woody, and the 22-fret neck plays like butter. However, guitarists who like to engage in upper-register wailing should be warned that, like all Casinos and Gibson ES-330s, this guitar’s neck joint is at the 14th fret, making it difficult to play comfortably anywhere about the 17th fret.
The combination of P-90s and hollowbody construction has always yielded great results, and this guitar is no exception. The Casino has an organic, almost spongy tone that imparts clean chords with a bell-like roundness, while distorted tones are throaty and rude. The guitar’s rich harmonic content makes virtually any amp sound like it’s running in some sort of Vox-like Class A configuration, and through and old Vox the “Revolution” Casino would certainly sound, well—one can only imagine.
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Peavey VYPYR The Amp That Could and Does
August 25, 2008 by unknown~ · Leave a Comment
After much hoopla Peavey has finally released the VYPYR Series amplifier. Appearing so the Peavey is aiming towards Line 6 Spider, Roland Cube and Marshall MG consumers as their targeted audience. The amp comes in 15-watt, 30-watt, 75-watt and 100-watt versions. Peavey also released 60-watt and 120-watt versions that feature tube power sections.
Like most Peavey amps, the VYPYR are set at an affordable price. The 75-watt combo (loaded with a 12 inch speaker) is $299. Best Buy had the VYPYR 75-watt combo listed at $209 on their web site. People were able to get Guitar Center to price match, talk about a kick-ass deal! Best Buy has since increased the price to $299 (maybe $209 was wholesale cost or a pricing error).
What makes the VYPYR unique is that it uses analog modeling, featuring Peavey’s TransTube technology. Peavey did a respectable job in the past with their TransTube amps.
The VYPYR’s 32-bit processor drives the 24 built in amp models (clean and distorted channels from 12 popular amplifiers). There are 11 preamp classic stompbox effects that you can engage, in addition to the 11 post-amp effects. All this ground breaking technology is operated by the 32-bit, floating-point SHARC processor.
Reviews are above favorable for the Peavey VYPYR. It’s reported that the VYPYR does a fantastic job of emulating the Peavey amps like the 6505, JSX and XXX. The VYPYR has 12 different amp models. Each model
has a clean and distorted version for a total of 24 models, including one Marshall model and the Krank Krankenstein.
So what’s not too like about the VYPYR? Though there is an external speaker output-jack, the built in speaker stays active. I don’t think there are any stereo capabilities. There is a serious lack of connection options. Peavey should have looked into the Behringer V-ampire to learn a thing or two about configuration options. The Behinger VAMP has 15 rear panel connectors that allows you to connect and configure the amp for just about any possible application from studio to live. The Behringer has midi in/out, 125 patch locations, a windows based editor to tweak the hell out of settings, pre and post stereo effects loops, S/PDIF output. All of these features would have been appreciated on the VYPYR.
Overall this seems to be a promising modeling amp, perhaps since the original Vox Valvetronix series.
Anyone who has some hands on experience with the PEAVEY VYPYR, please come over to GEAR-MONKEY.COM and share your opinion.
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John Lennon Epiphone EJ-160E Guitar Review
August 25, 2008 by unknown~ · Leave a Comment
John Lennon’s songwriting was so visionary, his cultural impact so deep, that his guitar playing is often overlooked. But lest we forget, it was with six-string in hand that Lennon changed the face of rock and roll. While he wasn’t the world’s flashiest guitarist, he was one of its most tasteful, tuneful and sometimes even terrifying practitioners.
Two of the instruments immortalized by Lennon in his work with the Beatles and his subsequent solo career were his Gibson J-160E acoustic electric and his stripped Epiphone Casino. With the full cooperation of Lennon’s widow, Yoko Ono, Epiphone issued a series of limited-edition John Lennon Signature models based on these two guitars. While these instruments may be collector’s items aimed primarily at the Lennon enthusiast, they are also reasonably priced, functional instruments, perfect for any working-class hero.
JOHN LENNON EJ-160E
Patterned after the Gibson J-160E acoustic-electric that were perennial Beatles workhorses, the signature model EJ-160E features an advanced Jumbo, sloped-shoulder body shape, solid spruce top, mahogany back and sides, a chunky solid mahogany neck and solid rosewood fingerboard and bridge. The impeccable fretboard is adorned with handsome “split parallelogram” inlays that are common on many Gibsons and Epiphones. The EJ-160E’s neck has the fat, rounded feel of many late-Fifties era Gibson electrics. A mini humbucking pickup is seated discreetly between the end of the guitar’s fretboard and the sound hole, while volume and tone controls are located on the guitar’s lower bout, as they would be on a standard electric guitar.Played acoustically, the EJ-160E has a meaty, midrangey tone that’s perfect for bold rock strumming and bluesy fingerpicking. Players who enjoy the crystalline high-end ping controlled low end of many “boutique” acoustics may find this guitar lacking subtlety or definition, but if you’re looking for that meaty, woody acoustic tone that gives so many Fab Four tracks their characteristic punch and warmth, this guitar is an ideal choice. Perhaps because of the hefty girth of the neck, which is big enough to have it own very lively resonance, this guitar has a responsive rumble that lets the player feel the energy of every not, and playing it rivals the satisfying, bone-tickling experience of getting it on with a high-ticket Gibson J-200.
Plugged through a blackface Fender Super Reverb, this instrument delivers a full yet clear sound that is only enhanced by the tone-fattening proximity of the pickup to the neck. And while the tone and volume controls don’t have that versatility of the graphic equalizer and feedback-notch-filter layouts found on many more “modern” electric acoustics, the controls are intuitive, effective and easy to grab on the fly.
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Jenson P10R Speaker Review
If one of your guitar-playing buddies walks up to you and says, “I’ve got the blues,” it could mean one of three things: he just found out his girlfriend’s nick-name is “Back Door Bertha,” he’s a drug pusher or he just had some Jensen P10R speakers installed in his amp. Known as the “blue cap,” “blue bell” or “blue frame,” the original Jensen P10R is considered the ultimate guitar speaker by many tone connoisseurs, and with good reason.
Paul Reed Smith McCARTY Rosewood Review
August 22, 2008 by unknown~ · Leave a Comment
Old Les Pauls never die—they’re just reincarnated as brand-new Paul Reed Smith McCartys. The PRS McCarty was designed with—and christened in honor of—Ted McCarty, the former Gibson president and electric guitar innovator responsible for such timeless and ubiquitous designs as the Les Paul, the Flying V and Explorer, Gibson’s family of semi-hollowbodies and pretty much everything the company introduced during the Fifties and Sixties.
In a nod to its namesake, the PRS McCarty derives its features and performance characteristics from the earliest solid-body Gibsons and updates them with contemporary touches. Like the Les Paul, the McCarty has a mahogany body with maple top and a glued-on mahogany neck with rosewood fretboard. The tuners are identical to those of a Les Paul Standard, and, like the earliest Gibson solidbodies, the McCarty employs and aluminum stoptail bridge with compensated grooves for better intonation. The McCarty’s vintage-style electronics center on two PAF-like humbuckers, with volume and tone controls, a three-way toggle switch and—a coil-tap circuit activated by the tone pot.
The McCarty Rosewood has all the above features, but with one very important distinction: its set-neck design uses a single slap of solid rosewood instead of mahogany. According to PRS, rosewood’s tonal character maintains mahogany’s midrange whomp, while enhancing lows and highs and adding a rich sustain. Carved in a comfortably wide, fat and club like profile similar to many McCarty-era Gibson solidbodies, the rosewood neck is oil finished and features a large heal that extends to the 16th fret, adding rigidity and resonance. Its 22-fret fretboard is a separate slap of rosewood with a subtly curved 10-inch radius, jumbo fretwire with appreciably steep bevels, a graphite nut and PRS’s signature abalone bird inlays. The neck’s scale is a common 25 inches, with longer fret spacing than a vintage Gibson, which allows for better intonation. The McCarty’s classic Goldtop finish is beautiful and speaks for the guitar’s distinguished pedigree.
The McCarty Rosewood was almost perfectly in tune right out of its case, rigged with a set of .009s and factory-set, middle-of-the-road action, somewhere between low and medium string high. I prefer action somewhere between low and downright buzzing, not unlike Jimmy Page (coincidentally, a McCarty owner himself), and with a slight tweak of the tailpiece studs, the McCarty was ready for business.
A Marshall reissue Bluesbreaker and an early Seventies 50-watt half-stack were used for the “blast” test. The tonal difference between rosewood and mahogany necks (as compared to a reference ’93 Les Paul Standard) are subtle; nonetheless, the McCarty presented the guitar’s frequency range quite evenly. With its bridge pickup selected, the McCarty yielded chords of warmth and clarity, with a hint of the top-end and midrange wallop familiar to a Gibson solidbody. With its front pickup selected, the McCarty Rosewood delivered a lingering Santana-like sustain, while an expectedly jangly rhythm tone was summoned by using both pickups.
Engaging the coil-tap circuit made the humbuckers respond like single-coil pickups. In this mode, the McCarty revealed a brighter, twangier tone: plenty of bite on the bridge pickup setting and a plucky, out-of-phase tone with both pickups engaged. Diversity is definitely the McCarty’s strong suit, a terrific combination of mahogany mids and Fullerton-esque toppiness in a guitar that could be a workhorse for any player comfortable with a fixed-bridge design.
The End Line
The McCarty Rosewood, like all PRS guitars, is a high-end guitar worth skipping some meals for. In fact, if I could own any PRS, this would be it. The McCarty Rosewood offers a superb combination of contemporary features and the classic craftsmanship for which PRS is known.
**(Pictured is a PRS Rosewod Limited)
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Zakk Wylde Zakkology – Call of the Wylde
August 21, 2008 by unknown~ · Leave a Comment
Digging through some old-old achieves, I found some interesting tid-bits on the 1990’s Zakk Wylde. He talks about his first bulls-eye Gibson, Lee Jackson amplifier and where it took his music back in the 90’s. Read more
Over $115k of Orange Guitar Amplifiers stolen
August 20, 2008 by unknown~ · Leave a Comment
Gear-Vault just Recieved an Urgent Press Release
Over £60,000 / $115.000 of Orange Guitar Amplifiers stolen
One of the world’s most famous British amplifier brands, Orange Amps, has just announced a major theft of a container load of amplifiers from its Borehamwood premises. Used by some of the biggest stars such as Madonna, Led Zeppelin Prince and Kaiser Chiefs, the robbers targeted this prestigious brand to carry out a daring raid on Saturday 16th August.
The one hundred forty one Orange Tiny Terror Combo guitar amps, which have a combined value of over £60,000 ($115,000 USD), were part of the first shipment of the much anticipated amps into the UK. The product was launched at the Frankfurt music exhibition earlier this year, on the back of the award winning acclaimed Tiny Terror amp which has sold over 30,000 units and proven to be one of the most in-demand amps in the world.
The combination amp and speaker has a value of £439 ($817.00 USD) each and was stolen from a temperature controlled, sealed forty foot container. The robbers couldn’t break the locks so they attempted to use an acetylene welder and then angle grinders to cut through the quarter inch locking steel plates.
As this was part of the first delivery into the UK, only 121 units had been shipped into music shops, so this is still a highly sought after amp with very limited availability. Orange recently won the Queens Award for Enterprise - International Trade.
The Police have launched a major investigation and informed all relevant port and home authorities. Orange Amplifiers are putting up a reward of £5000 for information that will lead to a successful conviction and recovery of these amplifiers. If you have any information please contact the local Police force on 0845-3300222, quoting Crime Number J1/08/3588. The company have the serial numbers of all the products stolen which is available on it’s website at http://www.orangeamps.com/
info@omec.com
http://www.orangeamps.com/
Tel ; +44 208 905 2828
Fax ; +44 208 905 2868Gear-Vault Classifieds is an eBay alternative. Come sell your used guitars and amps with us, for FREE!
