Mesa Mk III - Am i crazy if..

[bubbastain]

I really like the tone in that video. I spent about 10 minutes with a Mark III combo recently and thought it was just awful. God damn it was awful. Maybe i'll go back and try your setting and bring my eq pedal.

Bring a cab too, in general I am not a fan of Mesa mark series combos, to me they sound much better through a closed back 212 or 412 cab.

Yeah, I agree. I'll hook it up to a cab and even bring an OD pedal. It has an EV speaker I believe.

 

[JohnSykes]

I've always got my rhythm sound from the Lead channel, because there's a dedicated Lead+EQ button on the footswitch (I use the EQ for heavy rhythm sounds).

I usually use R2 on a low gain setting but a fuzz pedal for fuzzy sounds, rather than rhythm crunch or lead tones.

I've been thinking about running the Lead channel with a low Gain setting and boosting it with a pedal, but I have reservations about it.

I wonder if instead, it's worth using R2 with the boost pedal, as a proper Rhythm channel? And then switch to the actual Lead channel for leads?
Sounds silly for me to question that I know....


But speaking about the internal graphic EQ, one day I set up a heavy rhythm crunch sound with the Lead channel, WITHOUT the EQ, and it was damn near just want I wanted! It sounded great, really full and powerful. After that I just tried to use the EQ to fine tune things, but then after a bit got carried away with trying to scoop mids while boosting other mids at the same time. It pretty much brought me back to square one.

Lol yeah, the GEQ does that. With the classic V shape (maybe half mids) it sounds massive. Lead drive at 8 and you have "Still of the night" tone.

This with the LP Standard (with PAFs), still have to try with the Custom (Dirty Fingers in the bridge..).

 

[petejt]

Lol yeah, the GEQ does that. With the classic V shape (maybe half mids) it sounds massive. Lead drive at 8 and you have "Still of the night" tone.

This with the LP Standard (with PAFs), still have to try with the Custom (Dirty Fingers in the bridge..).

I've changed my settings now. I dropped the 2.2kHz slider thinking it would make it too dark and soggy (no crunch), but surprisingly it is still very crunchy, but has a lot of chug in the lower mids and bass. And it cleans up better too when I roll down the guitar's volume control.


Lead Gain: 7
Pull Fat: Pulled
Lead Treble: 9
Lead Bass: 2
Lead Middle: 9
Lead Drive: 6
Lead Presence: 9
Pull Shift: Pulled
Lead Master: 2
Output: 3
Harmonics/Mid-gain: Mid Gain
Power: Triode, Full Power

80Hz: Top line
240Hz: Just under the top line
750Hz: Centre line
2.2kHz: Bottom line
6.6kHz: Top 1/3rd

 

[tripstan]

I really like the tone in that video. I spent about 10 minutes with a Mark III combo recently and thought it was just awful. God damn it was awful. Maybe i'll go back and try your setting and bring my eq pedal.

Bring a cab too, in general I am not a fan of Mesa mark series combos, to me they sound much better through a closed back 212 or 412 cab.

I agree combos sound like ass, cleans and very slight break up can sound good but OD/distortion tones are thin and dissapointing.. I thought mine was a bunk MK III until I tried in with a stand alone cab. Don't judge the Mark series on the combo sound. Try it in a closed back 2x12 or 4x12. WoW!

 

[sjk]

Lol yeah, the GEQ does that. With the classic V shape (maybe half mids) it sounds massive. Lead drive at 8 and you have "Still of the night" tone.

This with the LP Standard (with PAFs), still have to try with the Custom (Dirty Fingers in the bridge..).

I've changed my settings now. I dropped the 2.2kHz slider thinking it would make it too dark and soggy (no crunch), but surprisingly it is still very crunchy, but has a lot of chug in the lower mids and bass. And it cleans up better too when I roll down the guitar's volume control.


Lead Gain: 7
Pull Fat: Pulled
Lead Treble: 9
Lead Bass: 2
Lead Middle: 9
Lead Drive: 6
Lead Presence: 9
Pull Shift: Pulled
Lead Master: 2
Output: 3
Harmonics/Mid-gain: Mid Gain
Power: Triode, Full Power

80Hz: Top line
240Hz: Just under the top line
750Hz: Centre line
2.2kHz: Bottom line
6.6kHz: Top 1/3rd

Wow what stripe mark III do you have, No way I could set the presence that high...on my blue stripe I set it between 1 and 2 and 3 would be the absolute max for my cabs. Any setting higher than this would make your ears bleed from extreme harsh high end. I've heard Mesa can do a mod on it to make it more useable throughout the range.
Edit; I see now that you have a Mark IV as I noticed you put a setting for Harmonic/Mid gain switch. I've had Mark IV's as well and a treble setting of 9 and presence of 9 that's pretty shrill on the two I've had.

 

[reverymike]

A little off topic, but what's the going price these days for a Mark 3?

 

[Valtyr]

A little off topic, but what's the going price these days for a Mark 3?

I got my blue stripe head earlier this year for $799. It's in fantastic condition, the only sign of it's age is the white logo has yellowed over time.