Well, shit man, amp part prices are wayyy up from the last time i checked. It is actually much much cheaper to buy an amp already built these days.

So... that is what i did.

I won't receive it until after xmas, but i my searching unearthed a blemished(but working fine) 50w JCA soldano copy for like $320 shipped on MF. Nice PCB innit, channel switching circuitry, and a little room in the chassis for Super Bonus Round games should i care to get into them.

The cheapest i could get a decent unassembled JCM800 kit was like $800+, but that is also with no cabinet or other random bits i would need for a finished head. $300 for all the bits in a working box seems like a steal.

If i don't like how it sounds when i get it, i will just tear it apart and rebuild it in my image. I already know a couple of things that i am pretty sure i want to do to it.

I am fairly excited for this new toy. They won't ship it until after the 25th though.

Is that why you got rid of the Splawn, over-volumeness? I don't remember you talking about dumping it.

There were a couple of reasons. The feel was super dry and it was from a year that they made them lower gain and lower compression. It was also, yes, super fucking loud. And at the time all I was playing was slamz. So I sold it and got my 5150, which rules.

But man, did it ever fucking nail that eighties tone.

I also sold my Splawn 4x12 this summer. Somehow it only sounded good with my Splawn. Through everything else, well, the Emi Governor speaker sounds 'okay', like a poor man's V30, while the Man O War speaker just sounds whack. Super fizzy scooped, which sounded cool in a ridiculous way with my 5150 but just cheap with my Laney.

I can't decide if I like my 5153 or my Roadster more. I really want my Roadster for chunk rhythms/groove leads and the 5153 for everything else. I am really close to running both with a midi switcher but I feel like a dick doing that for pop punk. So .... both at the same time? Tom DeLonge ran a Rectifier and a Marshall something, why can't I?

Well, as far as I'm concerned, there are two rules of punk: 1) there are no rules; and 2) anyone can do whatever, fuck you if you don't like it.

In short, it's the rock-and-roll spirit, distilled. Therefore, run two amps if you want to. I suppose most people would just use a pedal, but hey, if that's what works, that's what works. Do your own thing, whatever that thing may be. Besides, unless you're playing basements to an audience of interminably dull tossers who would boo you off the improvised stage for having the temerity to bring something that says Mesa on it, because that costs money, no one's gonna care. I'd be more concerned with lugging the damn thing and sorting out the cab situation than anything.

My late-'90s-guitar-mag memory wants to say Mr. Delonge's other amp was a 900 Dual Reverb, but I could be wrong.

Pretty sure it was a 900 as well.

Ultimately I just don't want to lug it all around. I like the 5153 a lot. It doesn't hold up to the Mesa for my sort of sounds, but I just like the sound of it. Also it is easier to move around and costs considerably less, so I wouldn't be out so much if it gets stolen. I do hate the shared volume on channels 1 and 2, I am having issues getting them to match in volume, so I basically just end up using channels 1 and 3. I kind of want to mod the volume knob to a concentric knob so channels 1 & 2 can have independent master volumes. Maybe do the same for the Gain knob so I can have clean cleans, crunchy crunch and channel 3 is just silly high gain (I seriously run the Gain as low as possible, and it is plenty. I also use EMG 81/85s so that doesn't hurt).

Which reminds me, I think I need to lose the actives on my Tele. They came stock, and I do like the tightness, but I think a med-high gain passive bucker is probably better for my sound. I will probably order a set through my tech and have him do it for me, whenver the fuck he gets back from tour with BTBAM.

Plus I made the 5153 look so fucking cool (giant pic):

Turns out Voodoo does mods for that amp to add concentric gain and volume knobs, so it IS possible.

But they charge $300 ...

I did find the schematic, I wonder if I can figure out how to add the concentric pots and let my buddy mod it for me. Any ideas chris?

Schematic (the notes are for a "volume balancing" mod that I might try if I can't figure out the concentric pots):

So the concentric pots look like they might be a bit of a bitch. Still an option but I'd probably let Voodoo do it.

But the two mods on the right of the schematic, changing R104 and C58, evidently lower the volume of channel 2 to the same level as channel 1, effectively matching the volumes without fucking with the tone stack. The one on the left attenuates the signal on ch2 and passes more signal on ch1, but that fucks with the tone more so I don’t think I would try that one unless the one on the right doesn’t work. Also removing C16 and C30 brings ch3 back in gain closer to ch2 (but not all the way), making the gain knob more usable (which would be great to turn it past literally the lowest possible setting.)


I think ideally I will send it off to voodoo for the concentric knob mod, then try the ch3 gain mod on my own.

Separating the two channels' volume control, i don't know exactly how i would go about that myself, as they are actually basically the same channel. You could get tricky and have extra switching added in that would actually switch the pot when the channel switches(actually the only kind of sensible/relatively simple way that i can think of doing it), but yeah, kind of a lot of trouble to go through for that. What does Voodoo charge for it?

Also: my faux soldano is on its way. They ended up shipping it way sooner than they said they would.

$295 for it. The pots alone are pricey so I can't blame them for the cost. Plus yeah, looking at the schematic the Volume control seems to be a real bitch to mod.

I think I am going to send it to Voodoo to handle the concentric pots, then experiment with the ch3 gain stage to tone down the gain a bit (a lot.)

Yarr, i only see 500k concentrics so far, so a 1M might be a special order sort of thingamabob. Depending on how they do the job, $300 is not awful. Though, mainly i think this because i am assuming that in addition to a not-simply-sourced pot, they are putting some sort of relay/switching board in there too, to make it all work, and then an hour or so of labor. Probably about 50 bucks worth of parts max and the rest is just doing-the-work money.

Though, that is also what the amp i just bought cost, so i personally probably wouldn't have it done, but i am relentlessly a cheap bastard.

Even then its cheaper than the larger version which is bigger and 100w. If they made it 50w I'd consider and if they had made this one a proper 3-channel amp I would be happy. Alas perfect world and such. Fact of the matter is I scored the head ~$600 so another $300 is still under cost new with a reputable company doing the mod properly. I am almost tempted to let them go crazy on it to the tune of $540 but they want to voice it for VH tones and well ... fuck VH tones. I like the way the amp sounds but the volume difference in ch1 and ch2 is almost understandable from a design standpoint (basically they made ch2 perfect and dialed it back for ch1, stupid IMO but I can see why.) I simply can't handle it for live use.

Before this evening, I had never played a bass with Rotosound flatwounds. Now I have. They are excellent. That is all.

Whatsit do fer it?

It is here:



And it is pretty great.

Out of the box it is real good. Real loud too. My kitchen is definitely not the best place to run it out.

I will definitely be doing some soldano-y things to it in the future. I don't need to, but i kind of want to just because i haven't done very much amp work in a while. In the cards: the resonance control, and maybe a sweep knob, both to expand on its flexibility for getting maybe some stupid throatier modern/recent metal sounds out of it. The crunch channel is great and marshally cranked out, and the OD channel is just a lovely saturated trouble-making-in-a-box. Covers a lot of marshall-esque grounds, and very nicely fills my need to have something non-Vox and high gain in my life.

I had a jet city a couple of years ago. It was nice. did what it was supposed to do. I had a small combo

Did you have the 20? That one is a bit more hot marshall, has one less gainstage than this one. This one is basically a straight up Soldano Hotrod 50, just made in china.

Based on how much i like this thing even before i mess with its insides, i will totally now be on the lookout for acquiring in the future, one of the JCA20s so i can full on Jose mod it. They sold a pile of them, so when i have a bit more money(i really shouldn't have pulled the trigger on this one, to be honest, even though it was cheap-as-hell) i will start looking for a beat/used one to fuck with.

I am just kind of in a marshall-y flavored place mentally right now, i guess.

Well, for one, the toan is not what I'd expected at all. The Internet seems to tell me- or at least imply- this is what you put on your P-Bass to play White Man Blues™ and that they would be politely described as "vintage"- meaning no top end worth mentioning, dull, thuddy, and the like. (With Steve Harris as an endorser, I suppose I should have been more skeptical of that bit of Forum Wisdom.) They are quite clear and balanced- at least on a Stingray. Secondly, they play very, very smoothly. The feel is very different than a typical roundwound; the surface texture of the string seems to enable more dextrous playing, especially if one is primarily a finger player like myself- though they're easy on the fretting hand as well. Given their texture and the apparent hardness of the material they're made out of, I can see why they have a reputation for a long lifespan, too. Overall, my admittedly limited impressions tell me they are a very good string.

I think I'm gonna have to pick up a set for my own personal use when I buy bass strings next. I have a set of stainless steel DRs kicking around I've been waiting to put on next I track something that's meant to be a proper recording. We'll see how those work out; I've never really settled on a preferred bass string as I change them a lot less. (In part because I generally have a lot more guitars kicking around than basses, in part because they're a bit of an expense for an instrument I rarely gig with.)

IT IS XMAS EVE AND IT IS 69ºF OUTSIDE AND IT IS GLORIOUS.