Guitar Gear Forum

I just ordered a BlackStar HT1 for a practice-ultra portable amp. I have a Vox AC4TV but to get any gain you have to crank it. I have a Mesa Trem-o-Verb half stack and many other great heads but none are thing's I'd want to bring over some ones house (expensive/old/heavy.) So I'm looking for something portable for lugging around that can still get-jam with a drummer loud. Prefer a 112 combo, or a head and COMPACT 212 cab. Want medium to high gain-honestly if PRS amps weren't so expensive I'd have them build me a MDT 112 combo lol.

My grab and go 1x12 combo is my Mesa Studio .22+.
Swapped 12AT7s into V2 and V3 to get darn near clean out of it at high volume. If ya don't need clean, fill 'er up with 12AX7s.
Little sucker gets LOUD and weighs about 35 pounds.

The new DSL40 is supposed be pretty great. Personally, I would go with a JCA22RC.

Mesa DC-5 gets my vote. Extremely versatile.

For this type of application I'd go solid state, to be honest. Something like a Peavey Bandit or a good SS Randall or Marshall would be more than enough for home jams and stuff.....

Old Peavey solid state combos. Light, cheap, sound bad-ass if tweaked right and loud as BALLS clean to mean. I've got a sixty-five watt red-line Studio Pro transtube that'll keep up with drums and bass and it's only sixty-five watts. They don't sound like thousand dollar amps, but they're very toneful.

Dig a bit and grab one for a hundred spot or less. Especially if you don't plan on using it on constant rotation, no need to throw huge wads of cash at it.

My first amp was a '83 Peavey Backstage Plus that was 35 watts and a 10 inch speaker. It could *almost* keep up with a drummer but just fell short and I remember wanting the next step up the Bandit 65 watt and 12 inch speaker for band jamming.

Orange Micro Terror...absolutely insane for 149!

My Peavey Bravo is my grab and go amp. The Blue Marvel speak sucks ass, but the amp sounds good enough it works just fine. Takes pedals like a champ too.

Gives you a good R&R or 80s metal sound even at manageable volumes. I haven't run it with live drums yet, just v-drums, but I'm fairly certain it'd have the balls to hold up just fine for practice.

esizer wrote:Orange Micro Terror...absolutely insane for 149!

This is a good suggestion. Or maybe a Dark Terror.

Freyette Memphis 30 - definitely loud enough to keep up with a drummer. Maybe that's too much amp for your purposes, though.

Laney Cub12R head.

The old Laney AOR Pro Tubes in combo form

Definitely Peavey combo, or, I have a Tech 21 Trademark 60 that sounds GREAT, and keeps up with bands no problem. It's the longest tenured amp I've ever owned.

How do the 70's / 80's Peavey Classics compare to the 90's-up Classics?

Ive NEVER played a Peavey Classic I didnt like. Stock speakers suck, but with some good speakers & a couple pedals, youre golden