South Africa & Marshall Amps

ThomasN · 2013-06-17T15:47:27+00:00

Ive recently joined the site to ask some advice from the members here as well as perhaps gleam some assistance. After many years, Ive decided to begin playing guitar again ? My father was a Luthier, and I was born into a musical family, playing guitar from an early age, and later jumping from band to band. I havent played in many years, but do have an acceptable foundation of knowledge insofar as instruments and other gear goes. I am awaiting delivery of my Nashville "Princess" this week. She's a 2001 Desert Burst Les Paul Studio, from when the necks still involved Rosewood, and she's had some time to mature in the interim ? I played a vast array of amps in the past, everything from Roland's, Fender's, Vox, Laney's etc... and am still a huge Marshall fan. The last one I played years ago, was one of the first Valve State's released, and quite honestly, it was my only let down out of them all. I have no interest in solid state or hybrids, only proper valve's. Ive scoured the net for the past 3-4 week's trying to find a reliable supplier in this country, and every attempt thus far has been a let down. Either people dont answer their phone's (even to the ad posted in the classifieds here) or they dont answer to email's, or they do, and claim they advise against people using the brand????, or dont sell it at all? Is this a common occurrence here? Ive been out of it so long, Im really interested to hear if this is commonplace now? It kinda feel's like Im trying to hunt down the holy grail or something. Ive even gone so far as to look at importing a head myself, and trying to get a tech to do the 120 - 220 transformer conversion here... but if its so hard to just find a dealer here, its going to be worse trying to find a reliable tech to open up the head ☹ So if anyone knows of someone wanting to perhaps sell, please feel free to let me know, Id really appreciate the hookup. Ideally Im after an old plexi eg.1959SLP or similar. Not really a JCM800 (Tone is too bright and tinny imho). As well as a nice vintage 4x12 cab. OR Ive heard good things about the new MA series? Anyone tried one of these? MA50H or MA100H. Durban has nowhere to actually go and test any of the gear so deciding tone, based on power means squat to me right now for this model unfortunately. Any help would be appreciated.

Norman86

Congrats ?
May she bring you many years of awesome tone!

shaunf

They still had the YJM about 3 weeks ago when I was last there. Musta got sold. Never tried the Kerry King head. Would be keen to hear a review of it.

Had my eye on that cab you got. Enjoy the new amp!

AlanRatcliffe

Congrats! Enjoy... ?

Sean

Eish ? you weren't kidding about winding up your neighbours... that'll do it ?

Congrats, looks fantastic 8)

Tokai-SA

ThomasN wrote

Thanks to help from Shaun in this thread, I paid Coastal a visit earlier on this morning,

Sorry, reply #2 was mine, I'll take credit for this sale. ? ? ?

ThomasN

Tokai SA wrote
ThomasN wrote

Thanks to help from Shaun in this thread, I paid Coastal a visit earlier on this morning,
Sorry, reply #2 was mine, I'll take credit for this sale. ? ? ?

? ?

My LP hasnt arrived yet, so I tested it with a Tokai they had in the store.
After about 1 minute I was eyeing out the guitar as well, trying to do the math of what the totals would be ?

shaunf

Tokai SA wrote
ThomasN wrote

Thanks to help from Shaun in this thread, I paid Coastal a visit earlier on this morning,
Sorry, reply #2 was mine, I'll take credit for this sale. ? ? ?

LOL! All yours dude!

Hammeron

ThomasN wrote I may actually still speak to him at a later stage about a custom design. I heard an amzing Fender Tweed vintage amp that had been restored recently. Beautiful clean tone's!

Thanks to help from Shaun in this thread, I paid Coastal a visit earlier on this morning, and got to check out some amazing head and cabs that they have. I didnt find the YJM100 (possibly sold). HOWEVER I did find the Marshall Kerry King signature 2203KK, and a 1960TV cab ?
Lee at Coastal music is the best!

So she has a new home at my place, and my LP will arrive on Tuesday morning hopefully.

Damn it! Oh yea! How much? ?

ThomasN

Lee mentioned that 2 of the heads I looked at were gotten at crazy low prices, and were both marked down from the original markup.
I got a few other small things with this as well, but the total came to 17.7k if I remember correctly :-\

Stoner-Riff

ThomasN wrote I may actually still speak to him at a later stage about a custom design. I heard an amzing Fender Tweed vintage amp that had been restored recently. Beautiful clean tone's!

Thanks to help from Shaun in this thread, I paid Coastal a visit earlier on this morning, and got to check out some amazing head and cabs that they have. I didnt find the YJM100 (possibly sold). HOWEVER I did find the Marshall Kerry King signature 2203KK, and a 1960TV cab ?
Lee at Coastal music is the best!

So she has a new home at my place, and my LP will arrive on Tuesday morning hopefully.

CONGRATZ on the amp . . .

. . . is this amp as bright as i think it is (seeing that it is a hot rodded JCM800 after all) ???

Would love to hear your view on the general tone of this monster.

ThomasN

Possibly one of the most diverse amps Ive had the pleasure of using.
When looking for an amp, I was trying to avoid the overly bright tones of the JCM800, which hurts my ears. When I tried this in the store, I was skeptical because of this, but when I switched in on, I was so surprised at its clear warm tone, with beating low end. It can go pretty bright, if you dial the Presence too high. (past 12 o'clock). But it has a nice warm vintage tube sound, which I really liked.

Given that its the Kerry King signature head, its also expected that when you power up, this thing is all gain from low volume to full, which it isnt. It is able to do low volume just great, with both clean (really clean), to classic JCM vintage tones (when turning up the preamp AND you can remove that screechy tone which I hate), right to so much, if feels like you ears will melt (beast mode). All which can be played at bedroom level, through to concert volume.

The built in noise gate controlled from the beast section is a very good quality, but personally I didnt find much use for it, as I prefer to play this without Beast mode, and like the sensitivity it can deliver. If youre playing really fast thrash type stuff, as well as shredding leads, it would definitely help, with muting out any feedback and horrible noise. Palm muting with the gate is almost unnecessary, if its turned up full.

Ive used quite a few Marshall heads in my years, including the Super Leads and Plexi's, and I can honestly say, this head is by far more powerful. People say with the Plexis, it will deafen you... This head, if dialed beyond 12 o'clock, will make you throw up if youre anywhere close to it.

All I can add is that physically this thing weighs a flippen ton. In the advert for it, when it first came out, Kerry King is holding it over his head... I honestly think they may emptied it guts before asking him to do this... unless he does power lifting in his spare time.

I hope this answers any questions.

At this stage, due to personal reasons, I am selling it for 2k less that what was paid for it. ☹

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