Another guy switching from tube amp to AXE FX

berdri

New Member
Hello everyone.

I just wanted to share my story here about the axe fx, and then now how much of you just use the axe fx on his own : amp, effect, cab etc ...

I was a die-hard valve amplifier kind of guitar player, I've build some marshall plexi-like head, it sounded amazing, but I felt a lack of something ... versatility !

Marshall's plexis sounds REALLY great but I find it difficult to shape as the sound you like : when you want a pure lead tone with delay reverb... it become very hard to have a crystal clear tone... Furthermore, at that time , I knew for sure that the crancked plexi sound was only achievable by playing with that kind of head amplifier, for me it was the pure and unique behavior of a marhsall amp.

But I met the Axe Fx on time, I was on the street, she looked at me and then I knew that I felt in love, and after one restaurant (MFC-101 Mk3), 3 Dom perignon champagne (3 EV-1 Pedal) and one Ferrari testarossa (Matrix Gt1600FX) then I knew it was the kind of relationship lasting a life.

I sold my valve amplifier, those masterpieces of sounds and tone. For comparison, when I received my Axe FX, I directly tested the marhsall plexi sound and tweaked the setting to get them cranked with a "hot bias" on the KT66 in order to match the tone of my real life head I've build back in the day. And I didn't notice any differences at all, the feeling is here and the sounds is even better that the real thing because you can change everything inside (dynamic, EQ, Input capacitor, tubes etc...). By a simple click, you can have everything you could ever imagine with any amp, effects and so on.

For information, my gear is an AXE FX II XL+ running through a Matrix GT1600FX in stereo mode loading two marshall 4x12 cabinets (16Ohm) : one with WGS Invader and the other with Celestion G12T75.

It is SOOOO loud, I play in my bedroom and I can easily be louder than my JTM45 running on those same cabinets. And now with the AXE I got the lead and clean tone I always dreamed about. This is so good, the feeling is so intense, the sound is so pure, and the Axe FX's character change depending on the guitar you plugged in (Fender with single coil, a sustainer, a humbucker, an Ibanez, a Gibson ...).

Guys, it is just fantastic what you can do with this when you take the time to understand the unit, so : GO TO HELL TUBE AMPLIFIER !

Thanks you Fractal Audio System for making those amazing piece of gear and inspiring the musicans all around the world.

So, what is your opinion guys and girls, did you sold every amplfifer you had ? Did you keep your AXE FX II instead of buying the III ? Let me know, I'll be happy to discuss about this beautiful subject.

Théo
 
Well, that seems a bit drastic. I'm not intending to sell any of my tube gear, and they will serve perfectly well as a second rig, for home practice and for recording.

That said, they are heavy and require a separate cabinet that I would prefer not to carry, as most shows require me to have a monitor for acoustic instruments anyway. A digital rig allows me to run everything through one or two monitors and not carry the cabinet, head, loadbox, and mixer. It also gives me a sense of what's going to FOH. No concerns over bad micing, lack of balance between instruments, etc.
 
Back
Top Bottom