There is also a chance he used the normal channel with some pedal or boost - you can get massive tones this way. Even on its own the normal channel sounds great (a bit too bottom heavy for many situations probably). Have you tried to get a similar tone with the normal channel and boosts/ pedals (treble booster being one of the classics that helps to drop off some of the extra bass)?pdf64 wrote: ↑Mon Feb 22, 2021 12:07 pm I acknowledge I’m a ‘doubting Thomas’ regarding these things, but I recall wandering into an ‘upstairs room in a local pub’ gig over 20 years ago, by a blues rock band that totally altered my approach to guitar tone. The guitarist was using a Strat into a cranked vintage AC30, that sounded jaw droppingly good, ‘out Marshalling the best Marshall tone’ and sat perfectly in the band mix.
After that I gave up with master volume rigs and dusted off my old AC30 (Wodens), but I never quite got that tone; maybe his had Albions?
If you try this on the Top boost channel, the settings where it sounds like a Marshall are also a bit contra-intuitive: at a brilliant volume setting of about 6 or above (depending on guitar), treble should be between 7 and 10 (on max it sounds most like a Marshall with most mids) and bass also almost on max. There is a point on the eq, when backing up from the max setting (on which there is the LEAST bass), there is a sudden jump in bass content - this is the place where you can dial it in and here even a millimetre in adjustments goes a long way. While in this "Marshall" setting the amp still has more clarity than the Marshall - not brighter or ice picky or anything, just more detail and more harmoncis. If you want less of that, you can simply dial back the volume on the guitar, which will reduce the harmonic richness and to compensate you can crank the volume a bit more. This way it really is hard to tell apart from a Marshall, even in a direct comparison (through same cab of course). The marshall will still have more bass and it will be more strident in the upper mids, a bit harsh comparatively.
Sorry, if the EQ behaviour is common knowledge to you - no intention to sound patronizing, this is just what i discovered while playing the amp quite extensively in a direct recording setting (through a reactive load) and being therefore able to easily crank it and judge the tones without the big volume. When playing the amp in a room, i immediately feel the need to move the bass knob to about 5, otherwise too much bass is cut out. But through the reactive load it sounds better with less bass. Everything else can stay unchanged.