Pub gig at 10 watts - awesome.

Hello from England.
The Mark V never ceases to amaze me.
Saturday night pub gig to an audience of 70+ drunks. Vocal only FOH and just two 1x12 monitors. Barely enough room for the drum kit and keys on the ' allocated space ' so backline amps sat on
hastily assembled beer-crate mounts. Took the head and one half-back Boogie with EV 1X12.
Somehow the pedalboard was left in the lockup and I was faced with doing the set ( classic rock etc ) with just my trusty 76 Goldtop Deluxe and a lead.
All channels plumbed to 10 watt variac, judicious use of the reverb at different levels through the footswitch with attendant boost switch engaged when required. EQ'd at the individual channel controls and graphic only engaged at Channel 3 Mk 1V mode.
Channel 2 was used as my 'clean' voicing in Edge mode with very low gain and very high volume.
This freed up the Tweed on Fat to be my go to sound for the crunchy sound that that the Tweed does in spades.
Honestly people the sound was terrific with the overall output pushed a long way above what I would typically use in 45/90 watt couplings.
It was initially daunting to be so 'naked' without my accustomed 'fairydust' of effectorama but it was ultimately a totally refreshing experience and I would wholeheartedly recommend that everyone has a go at just relying on the amplifier and just as impotantly the voltones on the guitar and be awestruck at what this amplifier can do totally on the fly on the gig - and yes by heaven it was plenty loud enough !

Took my 90's 7 unit effects rack and sold them.

Bought my V with a single od and delay pedal and never looked back.

Liberating i tell you, when you're not stomping through 10's of patches during the course of a gig and all the nonsense of gain staging and the voodoo malfunctions..

**** it...Vol and Tone controls my best friends now!!

With a small house and a 20 month old, I don't often get the time on the Mark V it deserves; however, a couple days ago I was at Guitar Center checking out guitars and happened to plug into an Egnater Tweaker. As a single-channel, 15w amp, I was blown away with this thing. So much so that I've seriously considered picking one up, until... yesterday I plugged the Mark V into the Mesa Widebody 1x12 (C90) with 10w Variac setting... WOW!!!

In the short period of time I had with it I was able to coax countless tones from the amp and the LP Std 2008. I was wondering how it would hold up in a band environment and it's great to see your post this morning. I often play through modeling racks and software for volume reasons and quickly forget how spectacular the Mark V truly is.

Hello from England again.
I know I can't be the first person to get the most amazing set of tones on the gig from a global 10 watt variac setting across all channels but I would endorse it wholeheartedly and recommend that you try it. I have always preferred the tips and tricks in a live setting on this Board rather than the slightly more esoteric (but nonetheless interesting) discussions on valve swapouts and cabinet pairings for bedroom use. The Mark series is for me the ultimate gigging amp and the Mark V the apogee of the range. I will now seriosly consider the 10 watt variac setting on all gigs and use it coupled with wedge-monitors as my personal foldback system and leave it to the FOH Engineer to do his bit.I can only reiterate that there is volume aplenty and you can really push the beast in this live scenario.
Cheers. ave.

ave said:

Hello from England again.
I know I can't be the first person to get the most amazing set of tones on the gig from a global 10 watt variac setting across all channels but I would endorse it wholeheartedly and recommend that you try it. I have always preferred the tips and tricks in a live setting on this Board rather than the slightly more esoteric (but nonetheless interesting) discussions on valve swapouts and cabinet pairings for bedroom use. The Mark series is for me the ultimate gigging amp and the Mark V the apogee of the range. I will now seriosly consider the 10 watt variac setting on all gigs and use it coupled with wedge-monitors as my personal foldback system and leave it to the FOH Engineer to do his bit.I can only reiterate that there is volume aplenty and you can really push the beast in this live scenario.
Cheers. ave.

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Shhhhhhhhhhh!!! (You'll start a low-wattage revolution) :roll:

:lol:

We only mic vocals and drums, so I get what you're saying. Pushing a MkXXX at low wattage is a beautiful thing and I'm glad someone else recognizes it. Congrats on your cool revelation. 8)

After reading this thread, I used 10 watt mode for a gig in an auditorium. I didn't use variac, i may next time. There were only three on of us playing. i was playing along side a miked acoustic and a female singer. i only used the clean channel for what we were doing and it wasn't as punchy. It sounded great. I also play in a full rock band in which i usually use 90 watts across the board. Our next gig I may experiment with the wattage's.
Thanks for the tip.

Mark

Hey, the only thing i can say its that at first i used almost and exclusively the 10 W mode and as i said in some other posts, its awesome, i found in all channels nothing but good sound, and that was because i used to lived on an apartment back then , when i just got the amp, then i tested with the band at 45 and 90W, its kinda different, and also i kinda just explored for months the same modes, tweed, mark I, and Mark iic, and mostly tweed and mark I, some months ago i started exploring other modes, funny thing is to this date like 2 years later i have not explore the mark IV mode that much, but going back to subject, 10W mode is a beast its very dinamic with Edge, crunch, mark I (when i use telecaster its gloriuous) and the cleans are great tweed for me its the best since its the more dinamic too, i can say at full and variac its great, but try variac, 10W, and mark I mode with some telecaster that thing its just awesome, in home i use that, no pedals not even the footswitch and no efects loop engage, and im the kind of guy that use live 10 diferent pedals, but for me at home i rather this.

this amp its just great!

There are very few amps that can cover as much ground as a Mark V. I love amps that I can plug a giutar into and never worry about any pedals, noise gates, boosts, etc.

Hi, Steve from Peterbro Uk Mesa mark v 10 watt setting at gig wow........
Well Mark I reakon my Mesa Mark V is only chucking out 30 watts on 90 setting mode. Everything in the amp works switches, knobs, channels etc great tone but this thing should belt it out and it doesn't. I've had a TC Flashback delay in the fx loop with send level 50% (centre dent) To squeeze more juice out of this sucker, at a gig I pulled out the Flashback and cranked the fx send knob on FULL gave me another 20db which helped but about as loud as a decent AC30. Mark V was in 90 watt mode all channels, master vol at 4 o clock. I use it through a mesa rec 2x12 but i prefer the Marshall small 4x12 cab for better spread 8ohms. I bought Mark V 10 months ago s/h head £1700 w flightcase. I've had it repaired once having blown preamp valve and had all 4 6L6 valves replaced. All I can say is that my other Mesa single Rec 50 is 3 times louder than my Mesa Mark V. The best idea I have is to run it down to Coda Music Stevenage and compare it with one of there's (AB) and then I guess on to repair to a good amp repair man I know in Milton Keynes. Has anyone else had this problem, I'd love to try out any ideas you guys have but I think I have just about exhausted everything I can think of. Happy gigging folks.

Hi Steve, I have a Mark V head that I run through two 1 x 12 bogner cabinets. Both cabs has a 16 ohm vintage 30. I also use a TC Electronics Nova Delay with the send at 50%. I use 90 watts across all channels: Clean, Crunch, Mark IV. I can not turn up more than 11 o 'clock on my master or I am too loud in a 5 piece hard rock band.

Thanks for that Mark much appreciated. I've had stacks of decent valve amps in the past EVH 5150 100 head, Marshall 100s, Hughes & Ketner etc and I was beginning to think all these Mark Vs were quiet and couldn't understand why no one else has had this problem. I have also hard bypassed efx loop although never gigged it this way, still didn't give me the oomph I would have expected from such a hot amp.
Earlier this evening I stacked the Single Rec 50watt on top of Mark V to ab both amps through Marshall 4x12. I simply cranked the volume, brought up the guitar volume while muting the strings ( you get the drift ) and I noticed a huge vol loss with mark v cranked max compared to rec 50 although it was beginning to feedback as expected. I play in a 5 piece rock covers band (guitar, keys drums, bass, vocal) and although the drummer is not that loud I really would have expected my giggling volume to be around 9 - 10 o clock max like you said. You have given me hope and I will persevere to try to get this solved. Hopefully it will all be worth it in the end. Thanks Mark.... Steve.

stevegit said:

Thanks for that Mark much appreciated. I've had stacks of decent valve amps in the past EVH 5150 100 head, Marshall 100s, Hughes & Ketner etc and I was beginning to think all these Mark Vs were quiet and couldn't understand why no one else has had this problem. I have also hard bypassed efx loop although never gigged it this way, still didn't give me the oomph I would have expected from such a hot amp.
Earlier this evening I stacked the Single Rec 50watt on top of Mark V to ab both amps through Marshall 4x12. I simply cranked the volume, brought up the guitar volume while muting the strings ( you get the drift ) and I noticed a huge vol loss with mark v cranked max compared to rec 50 although it was beginning to feedback as expected. I play in a 5 piece rock covers band (guitar, keys drums, bass, vocal) and although the drummer is not that loud I really would have expected my giggling volume to be around 9 - 10 o clock max like you said. You have given me hope and I will persevere to try to get this solved. Hopefully it will all be worth it in the end. Thanks Mark.... Steve.

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Steve, sounds like something is wrong with your amp.

Try different tubes.

I'm with the others. I have a Mark V and a couple Dual Rectifiers and the Mark will hold it's own.

I'm leaning towards a preamp tube. If I crank the FX send knob I get a harsh, thin and trebly fizz.

Authorized Boogie is the dude you get on the phone if you call Mesa with a problem. He hangs out here sometimes and helps people resolve issues. Answer him straight and he'll sort you out.

Hi screamingdaisy and friends,

You said,
I'm leaning towards a preamp tube. If I crank the FX send knob I get a harsh, thin and trebly fizz.

That is so helpful to me, makes perfect sense cos I can crank the fx knob to full with nothing in the loop
and i get more volume so seems a preamp valve somewhere is weak.
No one around here has a MKV just Marshalls and Dual Recs, I can go to a store 70 miles away, they have the MKv combo
I have the head so I can try these things out to compare. I do know an amp tech who does repairs for Jeff Beck, Brian May
he will probably know straight away but its best I guess to compare my MKV with the combo in the shop then trek on another
100 miles to the guitar amp repair man. A bloody faff but hopefully this will be the final fix.
I'll keep you guys up to date and again many thanks for all your kind advice.
Steve
Peterborough UK