What amp did the Axe-Fx III make you discover and fall in love with?

Those are my go-to Mesa mixes as well.

The IIC++ is probably my favorite Mark series model at the moment, so I feel you there.

As far as the HBE 2018 C45 goes, I have a few subtle tweaks you can play with. First, I set the Gain Enhancer to 1. It doesn’t need much, but that little bit helps the feel IMO. Next, Friedman amps can be a little muddy in the low mids, so I like using the Output Graphic EQ and cutting about 1 dB of 250 Hz. You can go deeper, but I find that minimal cuts or boosts give you a more natural result.

When the EQ feels good, I’ll tweak the gain. Depending on the guitar, I lower the input drive or drop the input trim to about .7 or .8. to clean up the distortion texture a tad.

Lastly, some guys hate top end air and some guys love it. If you like air and aren’t getting it with the Friedman models, go to the preamp page and bring up the preamp high cut. I like it anywhere from 10k-16k if I’m going for a Marshall JCM 2000 DSL 100 thing.

Well I guess I'm having fun with the Friedman tonight. Your Bogner mix 01 provided good results with it. But my favorite so far with the Friedman's have been a mix of your G20M 57 and 121 for that amp. I can't remember which ones by memory though.

BYW, you forgot the most important part! Which IR/s you liked most with the Friedman! 😊
 
Love is a many splendored thing and so is the AX3. This honeymoon is going to last quite a while, oh yeah. Today I fell in love with the IIC++ . Played a little too loud over some jam tracks but I really didn't care. Felt really strong, like that dude who says, "I have the powerrrr"! I just need to get over this giddy feeling, tame some of the high end and work this sound because it's in my head and I don't want to get rid of it.
 
I truly could get lost in every model in this unit (and believe me, I have!)
being a marshally type guy, I have found myself using the cleaner fenders, ac models, and getting some beautiful sounds out of them. Learning to make some nice, airy ,long floating delay sounds with them and it is amazing.
That being said however, I have truly fallen in love with the Cornford! Just a straight off the unit preset, the crunch to it and the overall feel to it is absolutely amazing to me!! I find that I could just use that tone for hours.
Well, back to more exploration, have so much more to try!
 
I’ve been playing with the High Gain 1 scene for the Plexi 50 watt preset, using my ‘57 Les Paul goldtop reissue and staying on the neck pickup. Should be a lot of distorted woofiness, right? Well, dial the volume on the guitar WAY back to between 2-3 and all of a sudden it is clean and sweet. Zero woof. Now I understand how Duane Allman and Dickey Betts were getting those clear tones from their neck pickups whe they played rhythm parts on the Fillmore album. I used to try it with my tube amps and I‘d just got mud. So frustrating... but not anymore! Jazz chords, finger picking, light runs; all of these sound fantastic. Mind blown again.
 
Skullcrusher, 2c++, jp2C+, and Friedman BE models really got me with the Axe Fx III. I don't use IRs because I play through a traditional cab: a Mesa slanted recto cab with celestion century vintage speakers.
 
So far I’m loving the following but as everyone has said there is so much to love and play with and I have had only had the Axe III since Christmas...
5150’s
Blues Jr
Plexi’s
5F1 Tweed
5F8 Tweed
59 Bassguy
OD100

Also, I’m loving the new Flangers and can’t wait to hear the new Phases...
 
I'm still mostly into Marshall and Mesa tones, but AxeFx had some nice Fender amp tones that I was playing around with. A few years ago, an old friend of mine gave me his Fender American Strat to keep. It had vintage everything. I was never much of a vintage player. I first ran it into the various Fractal Fender-like amps. They sounded really good with the vintage pickups, really nice. Then I got a bug to get another amp. I picked up a Blankenship Fatboy Jr. combo amp, which sounds glorious. It is kind of like a '57 Princeton Tweed, but sounds more buttery. I use it as a practice amp. Just plug right in, and it sounds heavenly.

Wouldn't have it if I hadn't gotten the Fender bug from Fractal.
 
I'm a mid-gain guy mainly playing Strats.
My go-to amps are:
Suhr Badgers
Matchless
Trainwrecks
Marshalls.
Having said that, I think I have patches made up for most amps except the super hi-gain amps.
The choices are simply astounding.
 
All the Diezels. I’ve never played through one before and always had a different interpretation of them from recordings. I thought they were much more mid-focused than the sounds I pulled out of them in the III. I figured when I started to make my own rhythm sound, it would be a mix of a Mesa and a Marshall, but the first one I made was just a Diezel, pretty much covering exactly what I thought would require two amps to pull off.
 
JP2C with a Strat??? Interesting...
I have two Andersons with the TD3+ tele bridge pickup that is like a hotter broadcaster, which are glorious with the JP2C. I'd like to try that Mojotone quietcoil broadcaster pickup too.
Of course a MusicMan JP-15 is also recommended :D
 
For me, it was the Friedmans. Didn't have a III, but I did have an AX8 for about 16 months. Ended up selling it to put the money towards the FM3, and ended up buying a Friedman JJ Jr. I'll still end up with an FM3 at some point.
 
I’ve got a few off the top of my head:
  • Orange Rockerverb (Citrus RV50): I always thought I hated Orange’s amps. I mean, I guess I still hate the Terror series, but I had the impression that they were untamable, unmusical, hostile walls of fuzz that I couldn’t tame for the life of me even if I wanted to. But this one’s got something special going on in the gain structure - I can’t put my finger on it, but it feels really rich playing power chords and extensions in a unique way. I wish the low end was tighter, because palm mutes are reeeal flubby to me even with a TS on there, but this is one of those amps that make me want to write music around it. It also nails that At the Drive-In / The Mars Volta controlled chaos thing really well.
  • Peavey 5150 Block Letter (PVH 6160 Block) and EVH 5150 III (5153): This was probably the biggest surprise for me - I didn’t expect to like these at all. But it was love at first note - seriously, I watched Leon Todd’s 5 Minute Tones for the 5150, and as soon as he hit the first chord on stock settings it immediately grabbed me. “Wtf, how does this sound so good at stock settings??” So, I went to try for myself, and it just sounded incredible to me with my PRS CE 24 Semi-Hollow. I thought it’d feel like a fizzy mess, or too one trick pony, but this has something special about the break-up like the Rockerverb, but with much better articulation, tightness, and sizzle. Like, I can play complex chords with high gain and it’s somehow still intelligible - what?? This has become kind of a holy grail rhythm tone for me - it’s just so rich and it cuts through the mix so well. I can’t choose a favorite between these two 5150 versions! I think I change my mind on which one speaks to me more every other day.
  • Soldano SLO-100 (Solo 100 Lead): Holy hell, what magic sauce did they load this one up with?? o_O To me, it’s got the best parts of a Recto mashed up with some of my favorite Marshall tones, and the feel is possibly the best of any amps I’ve tried - I wish I could describe it. I didn’t know this amp existed before diving into the Axe-Fx world, but I am dying to write a song or cover where I can wail on this thing.
I haven’t played around with the clean amp models enough yet, but I will when I get to a song that calls for them. The Bogner Shiva sounds really promising, and I can feel the Twin Reverb calling to me.
 
The Cali Leggy is pretty much spot on to my old VL100 Legacy 1/2 stack, and the Dr. Z amp has really grown on me as well.
 
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