Mikeyboyeee
Well-known member
What style of music do you primarily play?
I finally figured out why I can't get along with a Mesa Recto
- Thread starter MadAsAHatter
- Start date
I’m not a fan either. Flubby bass, very thin sounding top end and brutally overpriced, at least in Europe. Muddy for rhythm and thin for leads 
Even Petrucci hadn’t good lead tone live when used Roadkings.
I don’t remember if I heard good sounding recto live… Usually it is muddy mess or shrill bee hive if soundman cut their bass in mix. They work for recording with other mid heavy amps like jcm800 or Engl’s for example.
Mesa V30 is a must for rectos. I liked old halfback with chromeface triple ised by local Faith no more tribute band, but it was one of exceptions I liked recto live.
Even Petrucci hadn’t good lead tone live when used Roadkings.I don’t remember if I heard good sounding recto live… Usually it is muddy mess or shrill bee hive if soundman cut their bass in mix. They work for recording with other mid heavy amps like jcm800 or Engl’s for example.
Mesa V30 is a must for rectos. I liked old halfback with chromeface triple ised by local Faith no more tribute band, but it was one of exceptions I liked recto live.
Most people that dislike Recto's are the one's that can't dial them in correctly. I also think some people want them to be something they are not. The super tight riffing and single note triplet type shit is not really Recto material, that's why guys like Petrucci and the guys from Lamb of God use Mark series amps. The Recto has a huge wall of sound that is impossible to duplicate and very much its own thing. Some of my favorite bands growing up used Rectos and their live tone is anything but muddy and shrill.
skoora
Well-known member
Problem with where the recto low end resides is it’s difficult to capture with mics. Marshall thump can be captured with simple mic techniques but that massive recto boom you hear in the room rarely translates to playback, especially when you notice you don’t have a midrange either…lol. Can easily end up with a sizzly wash of a sound. But….put an EQ in the loop and a whole world opens up to you with those amps. They’re an amp where their appeal in the room doesn’t often translate to a great sound on “tape” without a bit of help.
An easy example is the difference in Metallica’s tone in the 90’s when they switched to recto’s from using Mark’s and the Triaxis. Sound got noticeably slower in the low end tracking and the sharpness in the mids (even scooped with Marks) and top end was softer and spongier. It fit with their music at the time but the OG material really suffered live.
An easy example is the difference in Metallica’s tone in the 90’s when they switched to recto’s from using Mark’s and the Triaxis. Sound got noticeably slower in the low end tracking and the sharpness in the mids (even scooped with Marks) and top end was softer and spongier. It fit with their music at the time but the OG material really suffered live.
JackBootedThug
MURDERATOR
I'm a diehard mesa fanboi. couple tricks I've learned over the years are-1)boost it....2) treble zero and adjust presence for treble....works to improve toanz for singles, duals, triples, and roadkings that I've owned...tverb also. 2 and 3 channels. to me it completely changes the dynamics of them.
JackBootedThug
MURDERATOR
you killed it...
Haha DEFINITELY not my playing. That’s the original tracks from ola. Point is though, great playing trumps everything. Quality source material, and you can make a recto do that no problem without a boost.
N
Nigel
Guest
Ty Tabor of King's X on Dogman tour is one such case.
Ive owned a couple different rectifiers both 2 and 3 channel, not the mulitwatt or Badlander. For me they were always fizzy in the top end and loose, tubby low end with a dark overtone that for me I couldn’t dial out. The recorded tones some people get are in my opinion amazing and sound crazy good. I never figured them out.
JackBootedThug
MURDERATOR
put everything at noon and start tweaking.....works 90% of the time 60% of the time....
The longer i own my rev F and hear it mic’d up in a track next to other amps that are often more expensive or the “flavor of the month” so to speak ( cough cough omega, cough), the more I get convinced it is simply the greatest high gain amp ever built…. I’ve got 13 of the best high gain amps ever built in my studio right now ( not all mine) from Friedman to Diezel, 2 KSR’s, omega, all kinds of shit… the recto often just smokes them all in a track. Im
Constantly blown away at how dynamic and punchy it is compared to other amps I own. For instance on one part of a track where it’s just bass and drums and the guitar comes in on the drop, the recto is just on another level for punch and weight. But what’s interesting is that it isn’t as compressed sounding as the other amps, it sounds more alive and almost dances around in a way, constantly sounding interesting and interesting. It’s not like it just dies out after the initial transient, it continues to bounce around and stay dynamic and interesting for the entire section. While, the driftwood for instance, sounds amazing absolutely, but after the initial hit it’s just kinda…. There. Hard to explain. the recto just has more going on dynamically for this track anyways. I’m going to put up some clips later of some tracks we did, and the recto just smokes in a mix with its low end punch and it’s focus. I love that thing, no doubt about it.
Constantly blown away at how dynamic and punchy it is compared to other amps I own. For instance on one part of a track where it’s just bass and drums and the guitar comes in on the drop, the recto is just on another level for punch and weight. But what’s interesting is that it isn’t as compressed sounding as the other amps, it sounds more alive and almost dances around in a way, constantly sounding interesting and interesting. It’s not like it just dies out after the initial transient, it continues to bounce around and stay dynamic and interesting for the entire section. While, the driftwood for instance, sounds amazing absolutely, but after the initial hit it’s just kinda…. There. Hard to explain. the recto just has more going on dynamically for this track anyways. I’m going to put up some clips later of some tracks we did, and the recto just smokes in a mix with its low end punch and it’s focus. I love that thing, no doubt about it.
hellzington
Well-known member
This. The controls on (at least the old) Rectos don't operate like Marshalls. At all. The whole "turn everything to 7" or "Bass 4, Mid 6, Treble 6" thing doesn't work on a Recto at all. You have to completely forget what your eyeballs are telling you and dial them in completely by ear.
My suggestion?
If you've got an old Rev C through Rev G:
- Set the Orange channel to Clean (you can do this with a switch on the back)
- Set the Red to Vintage using the channel cloning feature (again, switch on the back)
- The reason you want to do this is because then the Orange channel's Presence control works on the Red channel as a VNFB knob.
- Set both Presence controls to zero
- Switch to the Red channel
- Set your Bass to 9:00, your Mids to 2:00, your Treble to zero, and the Gain to 1:00
- Turn the presence on the Red channel up until you start to get treble cut. Then stop.
- Turn up the Presence control on the Orange channel up until you get the right amount of cut, response, and overall presence
- Adjust the gain to taste
This is why people struggle with them.
JackBootedThug
MURDERATOR
preach it brother.....
braintheory
Well-known member
Agreed, I’ve got myself a Rev D Dual and Rev F/C mod triple and the D is in my top 5 high gain amps along with my IIC+ HRG, Naylor, Purpleface, and Rev 1 Uberschall, and ‘97 Blueface top 6 haha. I was honestly disappointed with the Omega Obsidian I’ve tried multiple times now. That stuff you’re talking about with it being more alive and the notes evolving as they ring is imo just something you usually only get with older amps like that rather than recent made ones. That’s part of why I complain about most recent amps sounding flat/filtered/like the from concentrate vs fresh squeezed oj. For liveliness and notes evolving as they ring, I still to this day haven’t heard anything that wasn’t light years behind that one ‘70’s Dumble I got to try. Not a metal amp obviously, but was an experience to say the least
TheGreatGreen
Well-known member
Plugging straight into a Recto and dialing in high gain always makes for a flubby, wooly sound. Absolutely. This is because there is a TON of low end from the guitar that is not filtered away at all, unlike most other high gain amps.
A Recto is basically like a Mark series amp with all the EQ knobs locked on 10, and it also has only 3 GEQ sliders in the form of the Recto’s TMB knobs. No low frequency filtering. Think about how bad Marks sound with the TMB knobs all on 10. That’s what a Recto is doing.
What you have to understand is that because there’s basically no low end filtering going into the distortion stages, this means YOU get to filter away that bass with a pedal and shape the sound EXACTLY how you want it.
Recto plugged straight in and dialed for super high gain = flubby, awful.
Recto with bass cut at the amp’s input to your taste and possibly boosted a bit = tight and thick, possibly one of the best high gain sounds you can get out of ANY high gain amp. Lots of people use overdrive pedals with Rectos. I’m here to tell you that a pedal’s additional distortion stage doesn’t matter. What matters is the way that overdrive cuts bass. It’s that specific aspect that makes ALL the difference with Rectos.
Here's some examples created by reamping a direct guitar line into the rig:
Note: All three clips use the same amp, same cab/mic setup, and the amp's knobs were not touched at all while these three clips were made. The only thing that changed was the EQ shaping in front of the amp.
2020 Mesa Dual Recto Multi Watt, Orange Modern channel, straight in, no input EQ, no boost:
2020 Mesa Dual Recto Multi Watt, Orange Modern channel, bass cut with a Boss GE-7 in front:
2020 Mesa Dual Recto Multi Watt, Orange Modern channel, bass cut with a Boss GE-7 in front, GE-7's output level boosted by about +12db:
To me those clips don't even sound like they came from the same amp. All it took was a simple input bass cut and overall input boost. Also, I’m not saying the last clip is the ideal Recto tone, but the clip should at least illustrate how powerful these kinds of adjustments can be.
Haha, this doesn’t count!
Everything you touch sounds fuckin brutal as hell either way lol.
A Recto is basically like a Mark series amp with all the EQ knobs locked on 10, and it also has only 3 GEQ sliders in the form of the Recto’s TMB knobs. No low frequency filtering. Think about how bad Marks sound with the TMB knobs all on 10. That’s what a Recto is doing.
What you have to understand is that because there’s basically no low end filtering going into the distortion stages, this means YOU get to filter away that bass with a pedal and shape the sound EXACTLY how you want it.
Recto plugged straight in and dialed for super high gain = flubby, awful.
Recto with bass cut at the amp’s input to your taste and possibly boosted a bit = tight and thick, possibly one of the best high gain sounds you can get out of ANY high gain amp. Lots of people use overdrive pedals with Rectos. I’m here to tell you that a pedal’s additional distortion stage doesn’t matter. What matters is the way that overdrive cuts bass. It’s that specific aspect that makes ALL the difference with Rectos.
Here's some examples created by reamping a direct guitar line into the rig:
Note: All three clips use the same amp, same cab/mic setup, and the amp's knobs were not touched at all while these three clips were made. The only thing that changed was the EQ shaping in front of the amp.
2020 Mesa Dual Recto Multi Watt, Orange Modern channel, straight in, no input EQ, no boost:
2020 Mesa Dual Recto Multi Watt, Orange Modern channel, bass cut with a Boss GE-7 in front:
2020 Mesa Dual Recto Multi Watt, Orange Modern channel, bass cut with a Boss GE-7 in front, GE-7's output level boosted by about +12db:
To me those clips don't even sound like they came from the same amp. All it took was a simple input bass cut and overall input boost. Also, I’m not saying the last clip is the ideal Recto tone, but the clip should at least illustrate how powerful these kinds of adjustments can be.
Haha, this doesn’t count!
Everything you touch sounds fuckin brutal as hell either way lol.
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Dude exactly this. Older Marshalls do this, none of the newer high gain amps do this. It’s very hard to explain without being in the room to show you what I’m talking about, but it is much more alive. Yes high gain is compressed and blah blah, but it’s not the same. Newer high gain amps definitely have more going on and are very… interesting sounding for lack of a better term. Like the Herbert is very complex sounding and it’s amazing don’t get me wrong. But the older amps just have a lot less going on with them, which makes them more dynamic in a track. I was pretty blown away when comparing, and that was a huge thing that stuck out.
Plugging straight into a Recto and dialing in high gain always makes for a flubby, wooly sound. Absolutely. This is because there is a TON of low end from the guitar that is not filtered away at all, unlike most other high gain amps.
A Recto is basically like a Mark series amp with all the EQ knobs locked on 10, and it also has only 3 GEQ sliders in the form of the Recto’s TMB knobs. No low energy filtering. Think about how bad Marks sound with the TMB knobs all on 10. That’s what a Recto is doing.
What you have to understand is that because there’s basically no low end filtering going into the distortion stages, this means YOU get to filter away that bass with a pedal and shape the sound EXACTLY how you want it.
Recto plugged straight in = flubby, awful.
Recto with bass cut at the amp’s input to your taste and possibly boosted a bit = tight and thick, possibly one of the best high gain sounds you can get out of ANY high gain amp.
Lots of people use overdrive pedals with Rectos. I’m here to tell you that the pedal’s additional distortion stage doesn’t matter. What matters is the way that overdrive cuts bass. It’s that specific aspect that makes ALL the difference with Rectos.
Haha, this doesn’t count!
This is a good way to think about it … think about how blues and country guys love using overdrives in front of a clean amp for different character etc. this is exactly the same thing you are doing with the recto. Your shaping the input section of the amp and how you want your guitars eq curve to hit the amp essentially. Also the peppers dirty tree is still the best pedal for the recto out there
panhead
Well-known member
I have aquired a good collection of marshalls over the last 40 years, 79 being the newest. My greatest regret is selling a 66 PA 100watter that I had Ken Fischer mod for me in 86. No it wasnt a trainwreck mod but possibly the holy grail of all marshalls, I sold it in 93 for $3500 which was crazy money then. Should have kept it.
hellzington
Well-known member
Plugging straight into a Recto and dialing in high gain always makes for a flubby, wooly sound. Absolutely. This is because there is a TON of low end from the guitar that is not filtered away at all, unlike most other high gain amps.
A Recto is basically like a Mark series amp with all the EQ knobs locked on 10, and it also has only 3 GEQ sliders in the form of the Recto’s TMB knobs. No low energy filtering. Think about how bad Marks sound with the TMB knobs all on 10. That’s what a Recto is doing.
What you have to understand is that because there’s basically no low end filtering going into the distortion stages, this means YOU get to filter away that bass with a pedal and shape the sound EXACTLY how you want it.
Recto plugged straight in = flubby, awful.
Recto with bass cut at the amp’s input to your taste and possibly boosted a bit = tight and thick, possibly one of the best high gain sounds you can get out of ANY high gain amp.
Lots of people use overdrive pedals with Rectos. I’m here to tell you that the pedal’s additional distortion stage doesn’t matter. What matters is the way that overdrive cuts bass. It’s that specific aspect that makes ALL the difference with Rectos.
Here's some examples created by reamping a direct guitar line into the rig:
2020 Mesa Dual Recto Multi Watt, Orange Modern channel, straight in:
2020 Mesa Dual Recto Multi Watt, Orange Modern channel, bass cut with a Boss GE-7 in front:
MEDIA=soundcloud]greatgreen-1/2-mesa-recto-with-boss-ge-7-org-modern
2020 Mesa Dual Recto Multi Watt, Orange Modern channel, bass cut with a Boss GE-7 in front, GE-7's Output boosted to about 12db:
To me those clips don't even sound like they came from the same amp.
Haha, this doesn’t count!
Partially agree. You can absolutely get great sounds out of a Recto plugged straight in. With the way I described setting up my Recto Rev F above, I don't need any boosts. Maybe with a Rev G or something, you might. That said, I am 100% aware that boosting a Recto is one of the "THE SOUND" sounds from this amp. It's absolutely an awesome way to use your Recto. But I don't agree that "Recto plugged straight in = flubby, awful." That's only true if you don't know what you're doing and don't know how to set it up (or maybe if you have a Rev G or 3-channel 2000's Recto).