brokenvail
Fractal Fanatic
So I am back on the CLR train and thought I would share my story. I have been playing the axe since the ultra days. I have always used FRFR. I am a little unique in that I rarely bring a FRFR speaker with me. Live I often play through headphones or I am supplied a floor wedge (quality and brand vary). The main purpose of my FRFR powered speaker has always been for making patches I then use that speaker when I don't have a supplied wedge or us headphones.
I started with the k12. It worked great but I knew it was not the best. The highs where kinda harsh and there was something about the low end. With all that said my patches translated well to different stages and I got many complements. My main issue was that I suffered ear fatigue when playing it for long periods of time at high levels. It turned out that was pretty much the case any time I used it. The places were always less than ideal sets up which meant playing louder.
I jumped to the RCF. Everyone on the forum said they were flatter sounding and the coaxial design addressed the ear fatigue. I found these assessments to be very accurate. Ear fatigue was gone and things sounded more even. It's sound field was very narrow which I did not think to much about. I hated the handle design and it only has one channel compared to the k's 2 (plus all the extra inputs). I was not crazy at the volume taper since it seems to have be fluid through the full range of travel. I at times I felt like it almost wasn't loud enough if you can believe that. Overall I was happy with it. Eventually the CLR is released and I fought hard to ignore the gas. The RCF did the job and was great. There was all this hype about how the RCF bass was not flat blah blah blah but because I use low but I was barley in that low region. I had a few cases where I needed to use the RCF as a back line set up (I am typically a monitor facing up at me kinda guy) and I was not crazy about the results. I used that as the fuel I needed to try the CLR.
CLR (wedge) arrived and first thing I noticed was the weight. It was heavy. I was not happy about that but oh well right. It was living up to a lot of the hype. It did not fart in the low end (I am not a bass heavy guy any way) it was clear and the dispersion was better than the RCF It was not as loud as I thought. It def had some kick but not what I expected. I checked my gain staging and actually had the input all the way up and it would not tickle the red light. I spoke with Tom and He said maybe your patch volume is low. I ignored it and just used it as needed and only once or twice did the volume become an issue. The weight has really wearing me down over time. I had a 4 space rack that felt a little heavy, a pt pro with a mfc and 3 boss fv500 exp pedals in a mono bag the CLR and I carried two guitars with me at all times. Around the same time I hit some major money issue and had to do something. I ditched the mfc setup, downgraded to a 2u rack bag and sold the CLR. I shed some weight that way and stopped from drowning in the money issue.
I spent a good while with no FRFR solution. I had decided on the mackie DLM12. It was light weight, supposed to be loud and was coaxial. I got it and loved the weight, played it at home and it was no CLR but the tone was around where I expected it to be. I took it to a practice where I was going to have to crank it to be heard and it crumbled. The low end was caving in and distorting. Believe it or not I had to put it on 10 to keep up with the band. I was so mad. I decided instantly I needed a CLR again. I had bought it used so I just assumed it was busted and returned. The seller eventually contacted me to advise that it was not busted and maybe my ii was messed up.
I was on a mission to find a CLR. I got one (cab this time) for a steal. I won't share the price or story behind it but suffice to say you would never score one at that price I did. I got my CLR and it just sat there (remember I don't need it much). We got our FW upgrade with the VU meters and my patches where so low they barley showed up on the meter. I raised my levels to hit the 0 line just before a practice that would need the CLR. I got there, plugged in went to do gain staging and to my shock I had a flickering red light at about 11 o'clock. I got set up, the drummer clicked off and BOOM! Que the evil smile. All the awesome things I recalled about the CLR was there plus it was super loud! I have had a few practices and two gigs with the CLR and in everyone it was killer. I just love this thing. Clarity, dispersion, volume are the three things I would use to describe it. I am resolved to stick with the CLR. for my needs it can get no better.
I'd like to add to this that Tom is awesome. We have spoken many time between my prepurchased period of my first CLR through some questions after I received my second one (which was used). He has always answered my questions and tried to help me in any way he can.
I started with the k12. It worked great but I knew it was not the best. The highs where kinda harsh and there was something about the low end. With all that said my patches translated well to different stages and I got many complements. My main issue was that I suffered ear fatigue when playing it for long periods of time at high levels. It turned out that was pretty much the case any time I used it. The places were always less than ideal sets up which meant playing louder.
I jumped to the RCF. Everyone on the forum said they were flatter sounding and the coaxial design addressed the ear fatigue. I found these assessments to be very accurate. Ear fatigue was gone and things sounded more even. It's sound field was very narrow which I did not think to much about. I hated the handle design and it only has one channel compared to the k's 2 (plus all the extra inputs). I was not crazy at the volume taper since it seems to have be fluid through the full range of travel. I at times I felt like it almost wasn't loud enough if you can believe that. Overall I was happy with it. Eventually the CLR is released and I fought hard to ignore the gas. The RCF did the job and was great. There was all this hype about how the RCF bass was not flat blah blah blah but because I use low but I was barley in that low region. I had a few cases where I needed to use the RCF as a back line set up (I am typically a monitor facing up at me kinda guy) and I was not crazy about the results. I used that as the fuel I needed to try the CLR.
CLR (wedge) arrived and first thing I noticed was the weight. It was heavy. I was not happy about that but oh well right. It was living up to a lot of the hype. It did not fart in the low end (I am not a bass heavy guy any way) it was clear and the dispersion was better than the RCF It was not as loud as I thought. It def had some kick but not what I expected. I checked my gain staging and actually had the input all the way up and it would not tickle the red light. I spoke with Tom and He said maybe your patch volume is low. I ignored it and just used it as needed and only once or twice did the volume become an issue. The weight has really wearing me down over time. I had a 4 space rack that felt a little heavy, a pt pro with a mfc and 3 boss fv500 exp pedals in a mono bag the CLR and I carried two guitars with me at all times. Around the same time I hit some major money issue and had to do something. I ditched the mfc setup, downgraded to a 2u rack bag and sold the CLR. I shed some weight that way and stopped from drowning in the money issue.
I spent a good while with no FRFR solution. I had decided on the mackie DLM12. It was light weight, supposed to be loud and was coaxial. I got it and loved the weight, played it at home and it was no CLR but the tone was around where I expected it to be. I took it to a practice where I was going to have to crank it to be heard and it crumbled. The low end was caving in and distorting. Believe it or not I had to put it on 10 to keep up with the band. I was so mad. I decided instantly I needed a CLR again. I had bought it used so I just assumed it was busted and returned. The seller eventually contacted me to advise that it was not busted and maybe my ii was messed up.
I was on a mission to find a CLR. I got one (cab this time) for a steal. I won't share the price or story behind it but suffice to say you would never score one at that price I did. I got my CLR and it just sat there (remember I don't need it much). We got our FW upgrade with the VU meters and my patches where so low they barley showed up on the meter. I raised my levels to hit the 0 line just before a practice that would need the CLR. I got there, plugged in went to do gain staging and to my shock I had a flickering red light at about 11 o'clock. I got set up, the drummer clicked off and BOOM! Que the evil smile. All the awesome things I recalled about the CLR was there plus it was super loud! I have had a few practices and two gigs with the CLR and in everyone it was killer. I just love this thing. Clarity, dispersion, volume are the three things I would use to describe it. I am resolved to stick with the CLR. for my needs it can get no better.
I'd like to add to this that Tom is awesome. We have spoken many time between my prepurchased period of my first CLR through some questions after I received my second one (which was used). He has always answered my questions and tried to help me in any way he can.
