What a long strange trip it's been ! NAD

[Tonray's Ghost]

I've been acquiring and disposing / swapping gear in and out like nobody's business lately. Here is an update of my current and hopefully final lineup.

Started with a Roland Jazz Chorus 22. Acquired a Boss ME-90. Both units fine for what they are but don't believe anyone when they tell you the JC is a pristine clean pedal platform. The Jazz Chorus is a clean amp but had its own character which is different than say a clean amp used for a pedalboard. I would say it's ideal use would be for a standalone chorus effect or as a shoegaze ambient platform. Enough said.. loved it for it's chorus but not for much else.

Boss ME-90: unless you are going direct, have a Boss Katana or an FRFR speaker, don't buy it. Boss has designed it so it uses IRs to sound great direct, and also has special EQ to sound good going into a Katana power amp in but the EQs they provide when you want to use any other guitar amp suck straight out and cannot get a decent eq as Boss in their wisdom seemingly tried to build a jack of all trades no IR switch but mastered none but the Katana profile.

So..off went the JC 22, off went the ME-90 (both were bought used so didn't end up losing much in resale at all. )

New:

Amp: Laney lf60 112. Very well built snazzy looking 13 inch SS combo with 2 channels. Clean channel kind of meh but drive channel really good . I leave it at 60 watt mode with gain on 8 and volume @ 2 or 3 for a great edge of breakup tone..

To supplement that, found a sale on the NUX MG-30 , $50 discount new, and I have to say, far easier and better sounding than the Valeton GP-200 I had earlier. Great job by NUX.

The final piece is my first into recording and in decades of having USB audio interface amps I not once used it to record except as a test to see if it worked. Just hate playing with a PC when a guitar is in my hands. At an Audio shop in Bangkok getting rid of old stock discontinued products, found an ancient Zoom R8 mixer /recorder. Missing an SD card but everything else was in the box and it works and is pretty easy to use, was quite well revered in it's heyday and hundreds of YouTube vids on it. Add in to that a discount dynamic mic and I'm almost all set for a mini recording studio in the living room.

This will allow me to record direct and also mic the amps and compare. As soon as I do some book learnin' in these matters will definitely be posting up some demos.

For now ..some pics

[tlarson58]

Hooray for a NAD! I hope that this will be the tone you've been searching for.

I had a fostex recorder much like the zoom in the picture. Man, I used that thing all of the time for both band and home recordings. It wouldn't quit - and I bought it used! Have fun with that yours. Don't be afraid to RTFM.

What is the Laney voiced like (or does it have its own vibe)?

I'm having a problem with the cat climbing on my shoulders this afternoon. One second...

I'm back (with a scratch). 'Can't wait for the first recording.

[Tonray's Ghost]

Hooray for a NAD! I hope that this will be the tone you've been searching for.

I had a fostex recorder much like the zoom in the picture. Man, I used that thing all of the time for both band and home recordings. It wouldn't quit - and I bought it used! Have fun with that yours. Don't be afraid to RTFM.

What is the Laney voiced like (or does it have its own vibe)?

I'm having a problem with the cat climbing on my shoulders this afternoon. One second...

I'm back (with a scratch). 'Can't wait for the first recording.

Thanks, the Laney is definitely voiced on the British side of things, the kicker is with the bright switch and built in boost options, it kind of sounds like a cross between an AC30 and a Marshall. But definitely on the more vintage tone side of things...not a metal or Chugging amp but more of a blues, classic rock voice. Yeah...the recorder mixer is pretty neat...I scoured every shop in Bangkok looking for one and eventually found it on a dusty back shelf of an audio shop right in my local mall, discontinued product line, at least 10 years old, still plastic on the screen, obviously opened and tested at one point and missing the SD card but otherwise essentially new at about 50% discount from original price. I would have bought the successor, which is the Zoom R12 but the R12 is more of a digital touch screen interface rather than faders and most importantly, it didn't have the built in condenser dual mics that the R8 had, great for quick acoustic guitar takes without settting anything up.

[tonebender]

Congrats on the new amp. It sounds like you have finally found your holy grail tone!! Yeah right!!! I found mine at least a dozen times. LOL. I like Laney products but I know nothing about recording gear, especially if it is digital or software driven.

[Tonray's Ghost]

Congrats on the new amp. It sounds like you have finally found your holy grail tone!! Yeah right!!! I found mine at least a dozen times. LOL. I like Laney products but I know nothing about recording gear, especially if it is digital or software driven.

As far as recording gear, I'm with you on that. This is an old school mixer / recorder / sampler (has some drum pads to create your own beat which you then can save to one of 8 tracks). The only digital part is that it saves to SD card and eventually you can actually use it as a USB interface should you want to control a DAW like Reaper from the manual sliders on the unit...I just love the idea of not having to use the laptop/PC duing any recording, just set your input, arm your track, adjust levels and record. Later you can use SD card to load recordings onto PC for post work. That is what I was after. I play lots of original stuff (and some clearly derivative stuff I have stolen too) but really wanted a reasonable way to record for posterity, maybe someone will find the songs when I'm gone and enjoy them, "hey I never even knew he could play those guitars on the wall...I thought they were just for decoration"....ha ha ha ha.

PS: You know once you alterted me to that UK made Laney 5 watt tube amp, I spent weeks trying to locate one in Bangkok, but it seems they were only available here when they briefly switched production to China a few years back. Laney uses Yamaha as a distributor here in SE Asia and once the amps went back to UK production, apparently the tariffs were too high to justify selling them here. I thought I had located some old stock but turned out to be a mirage and the shop sent me a Reverb link and offered to 'import' one for me....at a ridiculous cost. So the new SS Laney is the alternative...pretty nice for a little not too expensive combo with a 12 inch, 5 year warranty too.

[tonebender]

I still have the UK Laney on my radar but I am happy with my amp situation. I have a Peavey C30 I keep in the rehearsal studio, a Gibson Goldtone that I gig with and a Ken Luker boutique tube head with a closed back Orange can with a V30 and an open back cab with a V30 that I use on special occasions. I have all the bases covered. I have a Fender SCXD that I use around the house mostly but I do gig with it from time to time. I still have one Ampeg, a J20 which is very much a boutique handwired amp despite being made in Vietnam. Still it is a far cry from back in the day when I had 25 tube amps, Vox, Marshall, Fender, Traynor, Univox, Laney, George Dennis, Ampeg, Peavey and several other brands.

[toomanycats]

Your sense of enthusiasm coming through on this thread makes me happy. It's a wonderful feeling when you have something to say artistically, you have the enthusiasm to see it through, and you have the technical and material means to make it happen.

I am reminded how extraordinary it is to live in a time when somebody like you (or like myself for that matter), has the ability to record, produce, distribute, and promote their own music to the world. In times past this would have required a huge outlay of money for studio time, a record deal for distribution, and professional management for promotion.

Those stand alone DAWs like the Zoom R8 are fantastic. In the 80s I did a lot of recording with a 4-track Fostex cassette machine. What a struggle that was with bouncing tracks down endlessly, the sound degradation, and draconian post production options. My first stand alone DAW was a BOSS-BR1180, which is not dissimilar to the Zoom R8. With both units you've got the storage capacity of digital, multiple available tracks, non-destructive editing, plus the tactile feel of the sliders and knobs. In a way, it's really the sweet spot.