Turning to the Dark Side... [ VHT content ]

[MetallyGuitarded]

So I sold my Triaxis and my 2:Ninety...
As a predominantly bedroom player and occasional live jam guy, at this point anyway, I thought the Triaxis was... overkill ( pun intended ).

So, I shopped around for a combo and kinda fell into a deal on a VHT PittBull 45 w/2x10's. It hasn't arrived yet but I'm pretty sure it'll be bad-***. I searched all over the web and only found 1 negative remark. 1 guy said it was a one-sound amp that had only varying amounts of gain. Everyone else ( dozens and dozens of others ) all praised it like the Lord himself. So, anyone got any comments thay'd like to offer on a PittBull, how to use it and how to coax those 'vox-like' cleans out of it along with some mid/high gain metal? I've been sinking very gradually into the world of pedals. Not Boss/Digitech, but more like AMT, Fulltone, etc. I know what sounds I like, I just gotta figure out what it takes to get them. I've heard that it really doesn't take much aside from the amp itself. Any truth to that?

I hope my Mesa brethren can forgive me for straying from the flock. Maybe some day I'll come back dragging a Roadster behind me. Until then, I can barely stand the waiting for this dog to arrive growling at my door.

 

[jdurso]

So I sold my Triaxis and my 2:Ninety...
As a predominantly bedroom player and occasional live jam guy, at this point anyway, I thought the Triaxis was... overkill ( pun intended ).

So, I shopped around for a combo and kinda fell into a deal on a VHT PittBull 45 w/2x10's. It hasn't arrived yet but I'm pretty sure it'll be bad-***. I searched all over the web and only found 1 negative remark. 1 guy said it was a one-sound amp that had only varying amounts of gain. Everyone else ( dozens and dozens of others ) all praised it like the Lord himself. So, anyone got any comments thay'd like to offer on a PittBull, how to use it and how to coax those 'vox-like' cleans out of it along with some mid/high gain metal? I've been sinking very gradually into the world of pedals. Not Boss/Digitech, but more like AMT, Fulltone, etc. I know what sounds I like, I just gotta figure out what it takes to get them. I've heard that it really doesn't take much aside from the amp itself. Any truth to that?

I hope my Mesa brethren can forgive me for straying from the flock. Maybe some day I'll come back dragging a Roadster behind me. Until then, I can barely stand the waiting for this dog to arrive growling at my door.

hey man nice pickup. i love VHT and hope to one day aquire a cl50 or sig x. as for the pitbull 45 its a great amp but i hope your not expecting "the" pitbull tone out of it. its not a gainiac like the CL or UL lines. still plenty of gain but not the huge, brutal tones you'd get from its big brothers. with all that said, still a killer amp and a tone machine. takes pedals great and a great clean channel. let us know how you like it

 

[MetallyGuitarded]

I kinda got the impression I wasn't going to get super death metal grinding gain out of it and my taste for that stuff has waned considerably over the last few years so I'm sure I'll need a pedal to pull that off. I'm actually looking forward to the medium gain/super clean thing. Since I switched from EMG's to DiMarzios a few months ago I've been wanting more diversity in the music and sounds I play. Everything I've read says the PittBull 45 is that and unfortunately I've got no access to one to play before I buy so I rolled the dice so to speak. I'll let you know how it turns out.

I'm a bit nervous since the Triaxis and 2:Ninety I sold both wound up at their separate destinations DOA/AWOL. Thank god for shipping insurance...

 

[jdurso]

I kinda got the impression I wasn't going to get super death metal grinding gain out of it and my taste for that stuff has waned considerably over the last few years so I'm sure I'll need a pedal to pull that off. I'm actually looking forward to the medium gain/super clean thing. Since I switched from EMG's to DiMarzios a few months ago I've been wanting more diversity in the music and sounds I play. Everything I've read says the PittBull 45 is that and unfortunately I've got no access to one to play before I buy so I rolled the dice so to speak. I'll let you know how it turns out.

I'm a bit nervous since the Triaxis and 2:Ninety I sold both wound up at their separate destinations DOA/AWOL. Thank god for shipping insurance...

witht hat said you should really dig the pitbull. i know a guy i used to jam around with bought a 45 off ebay expecting it to sound similar to the pitbull cl he played at GC and he was disappointed, but he's also a huge death metal fan. i would say the pitbull 45 is to the CL and UL line what the express is to the recto and stiletto line. great rock amps but just a tad shy in the high gain dept. i'll tell you one thing i'd liek to get my hands on is one of those vht sig x's. one of few amps i would consider dumping the roadster for... key word is consider

 

[stompboxfreak72]

I played a VHT X Series at GC last weekend and I must not get it. The clean sound was great but I did not like anything else about it. I am getting old and stuck in my ways I guess......

 

[jdurso]

I played a VHT X Series at GC last weekend and I must not get it. The clean sound was great but I did not like anything else about it. I am getting old and stuck in my ways I guess......

i will say one think... you need a lot of time with them to really explore what it can do. i think its just as involved as the roadtser and road king and we all knwo those are necessarily plug and play. then again some people just dont dig the VHT tone... i find they're either love'em or hate'em amps

 

[thinskin57]

i just saw the guitar world review of the sig-x on my cable system's on demand feature. what a mean sounding amp! TONS of different flavors of distortion. very modern and aggressive sounding. 10 years ago i would have been all over an amp like that. i much prefer the lower wattage stuff these days though.

 

[MetallyGuitarded]

Well I got the PittBull 45 last week. I Fuc%in love it! The Triaxis + 2:Ninety was supposed to be the end-all amp and maybe I just didn't quite know how to work it ( even after 8 years of tweaking? Not likely ). I was never truly happy with the Triaxis rig. I can't find a shitty setting on this PittBull. I switched from EMG's to DiMarzio partly to try and get what was missing out of the Triaxis/2:ninety rig. Now I couldn't be happier. I haven't cranked this amp at all yet and even though it has a tube starting to go bad ( microphonic ) it's still way more toneful. I've got it set to Class A only now and I know it won't get that low-end thump from a oversized Mesa 4x12 but this amp has plenty of gain for me and enough for even death metal with an overdrive pedal in front of it. It easily gets great thrash tones ( ala Megadeth - Rust in Peace, Annihilator - Never, Neverland, Testament ). I put a overdrive in front of it just to see how much gain it would get and I nearly came in my shorts ( Cannibal Corpse anyone? ). The possibilities are nearly endless. Hooked up to a Sealed 2x12 or 4x12 this thing has to be the shizzle my nizzle. I love the cleans too. They're so bouncy and warm and defined. It's like I didn't even know what a real clean sound was until I plugged into this. I never had no **** like that out of the Triaxis. I can't say I see myself using the reverb much but I can say that I feel no regret about making the switch to this amp from the Triaxis rig. I'll post some pics once I can put my guitar down long enough to take some.

*Thinks to himself - The Pittbul 45 can't do metal?! Whatever...*

 

[jdurso]

Well I got the PittBull 45 last week. I Fuc%in love it! The Triaxis + 2:Ninety was supposed to be the end-all amp and maybe I just didn't quite know how to work it ( even after 8 years of tweaking? Not likely ). I was never truly happy with the Triaxis rig. I can't find a sh!t setting on this PittBull. I switched from EMG's to DiMarzio partly to try and get what was missing out of the Triaxis/2:ninety rig. Now I couldn't be happier. I haven't cranked this amp at all yet and even though it has a tube starting to go bad ( microphonic ) it's still way more toneful. I've got it set to Class A only now and I know it won't get that low-end thump from a oversized Mesa 4x12 but this amp has plenty of gain for me and enough for even death metal with an overdrive pedal in front of it. It easily gets great thrash tones ( ala Megadeth - Rust in Peace, Annihilator - Never, Neverland, Testament ). I put a overdrive in front of it just to see how much gain it would get and I nearly came in my shorts ( Cannibal Corpse anyone? ). The possibilities are nearly endless. Hooked up to a Sealed 2x12 or 4x12 this thing has to be the shizzle my nizzle. I love the cleans too. They're so bouncy and warm and defined. It's like I didn't even know what a real clean sound was until I plugged into this. I never had no sh!t like that out of the Triaxis. I can't say I see myself using the reverb much but I can say that I feel no regret about making the switch to this amp from the Triaxis rig. I'll post some pics once I can put my guitar down long enough to take some.

*Thinks to himself - The Pittbul 45 can't do metal?! Whatever...*

awesome.... im glad it worked out man.

 

[MetallyGuitarded]

I couldn't hardly believe this and you probably won't either. This VHT I bought sounds awesome x 3 but it was making some odd noises. I took it apart, poked around, read some PDFs from VHT.com and it turns out someone had put the wrong kind of tube in the reverb driver. Gahyness! I made an amazing discovery made in the process too. This amp is a 2x12, not a 2x10. Didn't seem heavy enough to be 12's so I never bothered to look but I called VHT about the noise/tube and verified that yeah, it's a 2x12. It's only 2 years old to boot!

I was FUCKIN STUNNED that after I told the guy ( Marcus @ VHT ) I bought it used thru a classified ad he still went all out to get me the answers and info I needed. He's gonna have a tech call me and do some trouble-shooting to see if/what else is wrong. He even gave me the number to their techs so I could have my tech ( presumably Abell Audio ) call VHT to walk them thru whatever needed done to make sure it was fixed right. They rock as much as their amps rock. Man, you don't get service like that from hardly anyone these days. Rock on Chicago!

\ht/ \ht/

 

[nitrous2400]

congrats dude welcome to the club :lol: and yeah marcus is a cool helpful guy he really knows his ampz

anyways best of luck with the amp

 

[MetallyGuitarded]

Just wanted to post, post-honeymoon stage. I love this amp more than ever. It's totally versatile and doesn't have a bad sound in it. If my knobs get bumped ( by my 4 year old ), I can just set 'em all to 12 o'clock and rock on. The fx loop is killer, the channels are perfect. The clean channel is pristine and the drive channel DRIVES. They're very different and with a footswitchable boost on each, even more flexible. I've recently gotten into pedals and holy crap that just multiplied my tones by about 20.

I've come to conclude the following based on my VHT experience:
1. I freakin love this amp
2. I never truly 'loved' the Triaxis
3. Despite the legendary track record of the Triaxis/2:Ninety combo, I never 'got it' if you know what I mean. I was never crazy about the Triaxis.

I'm happy as can be now and I'm sure whomever bought my Triaxis feels the same. Just goes to show you that good stuff doesn't suck just cause you don't like it. Some people just like different things.

 

[boogietone]

Awesome dude! I have a VHT Pittbull 50/ST. It's a 50 watt head with GEQ and reverb. It is the newer version with EL34's though it has KT77's in it right now. It also is not known for the brutal tones of the UL's, CL's and CLX's. But the clean is amazing! Especially with a strat. The GEQ is awesome and the lead channel is killer! Put a pedal in front and high gain heaven. Not quite as saturated as my MKIV but close. The only thing I don't like is the reverb. It is driven by a EF86 preamp tube. I heard there is a mod to change the driver to either a EL84 or a 12AX7. Anyways, I'm thoroughly impressed with VHT. I wonder how closely voiced my 50/ST is to a Pittbull 45?
Congrats on a great amp!