Randall out Marshall In

[zepplin490]

I have been a wicked MTS guy ive probably gone through 25-30 different with the max at one time was 12... I have always loved Jaded Faith Mods modules and have been a devotee of all things mts including buying more amps to keep your spare modules in, Compulsively trying and flipping a shitload of modules without giving them the proper time for EQing.. MTS should be classified as a schedule 1 controlled substance, cuz once you hear some modules it just sucks you in.....
Then along came a search for JCM 2000 TSL's which i had always been a little curious about, Next I find myself on this forum and I see the "cult like fanaticism" that ls exhibited here and I got toally sucked in and I posted a "my first marshall" and after probably 10 posts on there LandShark PM'd me with a 2006 TSL 100 offer that i could not refuse and the rest is pretty much history, I got the TSL and did some preliminary tweaking and fell in love with the amp immediately... and now after one of my guitar geek buddies and I went through knob by knob for 2 hours we achieved "GRAIL TONE" on both the lead and crunch channels.
so i decided that the best idea was to dig myself out of this huge amount of gear and make sacrifices. So first i sold off all but 6 of My MTS modules and I am in the process of selling my rm100 Head and my RM50 combo. Im keeping an RM50 Head basically to work as a poweramp for my Rm4 preamp... so ill have 6 tones that although the TSL is extremely versitile it cannot do. So for the most part I am 75% out of MTS and since i got the TSL the only time that the RM4 ever gets played is when im giving guitar lessons and just need a basic tone for my students to play through when they are at my house...
anyways goodbye randall for now and hello Marshall
-mp-

 

[rlord1974]

I got bored of modular after 2 or 3 years as well. I can't tell you how many modules I bought/sold/had custom made. Thousands of dollars. Oddly, I always used the same 2 to 4 modules live. When I came to that realization, I dumped it all. It was quite liberating, in fact. Not that the modular gear doesn't sound good, because it does. It had just run its course with me.

 

[zepplin490]

Yeah all of the Marshall modules were just absolutely destroyed by the TSL even the best module that i thought really nailed some great marshall tones was on it way out of town along with 2 others and then I sold 3 more and im down to my final 4 at the moment but i do plan on getting a Jaded Faith Vybe Deluxe which is basically a replica of what stevie ray vaughan recorded with a Vibroverb, and im going to get a Jaded Faith Silverado which is a silver jubilee model, after those 2 purchases ill have both slots of my RM50H/Rm4 poweramp will be filled and that will be it unless something drastically changes. But there are some neat new things going on with MTS both Jaded Faith Mods and Salvation Mods have both created new presence/density boards that are supposed to drastically improve the overall sound, JF's is called the foglifter and the salvation model is called the M.D.A which stands for move da air. nice little piece of ebonics from central europe in the naming of the salvo boards...
Im staying with marshall for maybe the rest of my life.. if the nasty crap and all of the friggin DSL "propaganda have been proven totally false to me... ive played DSL's New DSL's JCM2K dsls and i cant stand only having one EQ for your cleans/crunch and lead I mean how are people this dumb..IF i eq'd my lead and my clean channel exactly the same one of them would sound like shit. The DSL fan boi's on the marshall clinic are constantly saying "its got 2 channels and 2 modes per channel so its a 4 channel amp" Wrong youve got a single channel amp with a gain boost and a couple of non footswitchable extra voicings.. Ive got 3 regular channels and if you want to subscribe to the notion that more buttons equals more channels if that is true then ive got....5 channels along with a built in boost by jumpering the loops so does that mean I have 10 channels!??? Its madness but it seems as though the TSL users on the marshall forum are not as outspoken as the DSL and YJM guys.. Anytime someone comes on and asks about an amp the DSL guys jump in there immediatly and start preaching the DSL gospel and the other half that posts are people who believe that everyone should have a $2500 very hard to find YJM head..
anyways I was thinking of posting this Diatribe on the marshall forum but they would probably be at my door with pitchforks and torches
-mp-

 

[rlord1974]

I wouldn't care so much about what people are saying about the TSL on this or any other forum. Ignore the "group think" mentality; if the TSL works for you, then it works for you.

Don't listen to the hype - be it positive or negative. There are so many "parrots" online regurgitating the same old tired bullshit that they are actually CLUELESS about.

 

[Kapo_Polenton]

I have been a wicked MTS guy ive probably gone through 25-30 different with the max at one time was 12... I have always loved Jaded Faith Mods modules and have been a devotee of all things mts including buying more amps to keep your spare modules in, Compulsively trying and flipping a shitload of modules without giving them the proper time for EQing.. MTS should be classified as a schedule 1 controlled substance, cuz once you hear some modules it just sucks you in.....
Then along came a search for JCM 2000 TSL's which i had always been a little curious about, Next I find myself on this forum and I see the "cult like fanaticism" that ls exhibited here and I got toally sucked in and I posted a "my first marshall" and after probably 10 posts on there LandShark PM'd me with a 2006 TSL 100 offer that i could not refuse and the rest is pretty much history, I got the TSL and did some preliminary tweaking and fell in love with the amp immediately... and now after one of my guitar geek buddies and I went through knob by knob for 2 hours we achieved "GRAIL TONE" on both the lead and crunch channels.
so i decided that the best idea was to dig myself out of this huge amount of gear and make sacrifices. So first i sold off all but 6 of My MTS modules and I am in the process of selling my rm100 Head and my RM50 combo. Im keeping an RM50 Head basically to work as a poweramp for my Rm4 preamp... so ill have 6 tones that although the TSL is extremely versitile it cannot do. So for the most part I am 75% out of MTS and since i got the TSL the only time that the RM4 ever gets played is when im giving guitar lessons and just need a basic tone for my students to play through when they are at my house...
anyways goodbye randall for now and hello Marshall
-mp-

I think I asked you this question on the MTS forum but you answered it here.. all good, thanks for that. The problem with MTS is that people seem to get deep into it having to own 3-4 diff MTS platforms and 20 modules... I'm down to 3 modules and just picked up a KH-2 (rebranded brown) simply because i wanted to try it. For the most part though, MTS sounds good and gets close enough to the real deal but sometimes you realize that you are dialing everything in the same way anyway so why not get the amp you really wanted with the dedicated power section that matches the preamp. I could be happy with my brahma and LB100 on it's own. Essentially a really good Plexi/JMP.

 

[zepplin490]

Yup and now there are 5 messages from people who claim that I diddnt achieve the "Grail Tone" and have challenged me to prove it with clips... NP with that except ive got a really shitty cell phone that records horribly, a Tascam hand held recorder that for some reason will only record 11 seconds at a time and now im waiting on some mic's to hook up to my eleven rack and prove these bastards wrong!
-mp-

 

[steve_k]

My tone is not grail. But, it satisfies me and the panties fall. That's all that counts.

 

[rlord1974]

Yup and now there are 5 messages from people who claim that I diddnt achieve the "Grail Tone" and have challenged me to prove it with clips... NP with that except ive got a really shitty cell phone that records horribly, a Tascam hand held recorder that for some reason will only record 11 seconds at a time and now im waiting on some mic's to hook up to my eleven rack and prove these bastards wrong!
-mp-

Why do you care what the bastards think? Don't waste a minute of your time trying to "prove them wrong". You could produce a clip that sounds like angels singing down from the clouds, and they'll still tell you your "grail tone" sounds like a toilet being flushed.

 

[zepplin490]

Yup and now there are 5 messages from people who claim that I diddnt achieve the "Grail Tone" and have challenged me to prove it with clips... NP with that except ive got a really shitty cell phone that records horribly, a Tascam hand held recorder that for some reason will only record 11 seconds at a time and now im waiting on some mic's to hook up to my eleven rack and prove these bastards wrong!
-mp-

Why do you care what the bastards think? Don't waste a minute of your time trying to "prove them wrong". You could produce a clip that sounds like angels singing down from the clouds, and they'll still tell you your "grail tone" sounds like a toilet being flushed.

Your probably right dude.. Back when i still had my marshall based 59rr MTS Module I was tempted to make a clip of that and post it on there and see if i tricked em... that would have been great due to the bashing and bullshit that I had to put up with as soon as i mentioned that i also have randall mts amps, once i figure out protools a little better I just might send them a clip and if they dont like it then they are not fans of tube cookin massive beastly gain!
-mp-

 

[stephen sawall]

My tone changes all the time ... but it usually is the same sound actually that I end up using no matter what gear I use. It is more about what I want to hear & what works for me - than what gear I am using.

Great that you found gear that works for you ...
The only thing that matters is what you think.... your taste & needs might be very different than everyone else.

 

[zepplin490]

Yea and its not just my taste my fellow guitar geek buddy was over here on saturday and we alternated with one of us playing and one of use tweaking switching every now and then and our finally consensus was exactly the same we both absolutely love the settings so i wrote them down and haven't changed them a bit except for a little bass tweak on the lead channel... After helping me Saturday the next time i talked with him was sunday evening and he had listed all of his guitar gear His Line 6 HD150 head and cab and a smaller 75 watt Line 6 practice amp both coming with their footswitches and he had listed all of his gigantic pedal and effects processor collection and put the prices so low that it wound all sell fast he already had a line on 2 TSL's on craigslist both for $700.. This isnt the first time this has happened, a couple years ago i came into his bands practice space to try out for a lead guitarist part and he came over after we had played a few songs and i showed him all the amp modeling and the effects loop and after a couple weeks he sells me his rm100 and rm50c and 6 modules (5 that worked) for a ridiculous price.. He sold me the randall Warhead cab for $100 (the vintage 30 loaded cab) i payed him another $100 for the rm50 and then I traded him my line 6 and the floorboard for the RM100.. both looked like shit were not working properly so i called up the only randall tech in the state and told him about the issues and away went both amps and 5 of the modules.. and about 2 weeks later he had cleaned em up and they worked great.. and once i got into Modded MTS he realized how dumb it was to sell both amps and 6 modules for $200 and $400 worth of Line 6 Gear! and now he's doing it again chasing my gear vapor trails and I really dont mind cuz then he will be as happy as i am with my TSL...but its just a little funny..
-mp-

 

[stephen sawall]

This is assuming there is a "grail" sound ..... for me it is a JMP crunch most days. On other days it might be a Fender Deluxe or a Vox AC30, etc.

Congratulations on finding a sound & gear that works for you.....

 

[zepplin490]

I think the real "Grail Tone" lies in 2 spots #1 Lead channel devastating #2 Crunch channel playing any kind of non super high gain hard rock and older metal..
the Crunch channel can be tamed though and can do some warm, chunky smooth OD, But the lead channel is what it is and that a brutal,tight massive low ended high gain heaven!
-mp-

 

[FUZZboat]

MTS is a money pit

while MTS is good - it will never (do to inherent design issues) be "Great"

IMHO MTS is only good for the modders and bruce egnater

 

[Jdguitar]

MTS is a money pit

while MTS is good - it will never (do to inherent design issues) be "Great"

IMHO MTS is only good for the modders and bruce egnater

My MTS is great. It's funny that when other guitarists check it out, they can't believe the tones I'm getting out of a 3 channel head.

 

[crankyrayhanky]

I had 3 different Marshall's from that time period before my MTS experience
lo volumes were weak, but play it loud & it was great! Problem is, they were all in the repair shop more than not- transformer issues that common on those models. Thus, my dump. If I could get one with an upgraded tranny I'd jump back in

 

[R45VT]

Yup and now there are 5 messages from people who claim that I diddnt achieve the "Grail Tone" and have challenged me to prove it with clips... NP with that except ive got a really shitty cell phone that records horribly, a Tascam hand held recorder that for some reason will only record 11 seconds at a time and now im waiting on some mic's to hook up to my eleven rack and prove these bastards wrong!
-mp-

Everyone has a different grail tone. Who cares, don't waste your time recording it.

Tastes evolve and change over time.

 

[zepplin490]

Yes MTS is a money pit big time, Its a money pit that I actually loved for over 2 years but now that ive found a tone that i love (which I was able to do with a fwe module) I will never get back into mts the way i was.. It was bad for a while I was buying new MTS heads and combos seemingly just to store my modules in. I have my 4 best modules left and im gonna have 2 spare slots which will be filled with a Vybe Deluxe and a Silverado. Yes the mods quality is totally up to the modder, it seems lately though that Rob and Anthony have both really stepped up their games which bodes well for those who are still tone chasing but its just not for me anymore i could have bought all of classic and modern amps i was chasing through MTS with the cash that I spent on modules. Anyone getting into MTS now is in the glory days as the new mods and the foglifter/MDA are really changing the game but things are always getting more expensive as the latest round of mods are coming in at $25-$50 more than the previous generation. Good Luck anyone doing the MTS thing, Just find your tone and then stop if you can...
-mp-

 

[Mattfig]

Glad you are digging the TSL! It's all about the tone YOU want...Sounds like you've found it...

I'll add that you are wise to keep some MTS around....The beam is fixed upon you and Ray now...There is no escape...

I am obviously an MTS guy....I seriously considered leaving not that long ago too....I was finding mods sounding too much alike and other brand amps sounding more powerful and rich...But now, I've gone all in again...My collection of 14 modules all get used regularly but it was not cheap as I once hoped...The Salvation MDA board has changed the game for me...It adds back what is missing....And there's more to come on that front!!
MTS as a product line is dead and modders are the benefactors for sure...Gary is right there...But as a studio guy, MTS is a better option for me than Kemper or Axe at the moment as I can't get away from tubes just yet...It's not a cheap endeavor but it saves valuable space and makes it easy to travel with many tones...I don't go after every new mod anymore...That helps a lot on cost...

In the end, we all love guitars, amps and tones...I just dig talking about it with you guys....Everyone's journey is different and it's fun to read how wild these journeys can be...

11 second clips are acceptable BTW!!!

 

[zepplin490]

Tue True mr figg. Mts is a much better option than Kemper or axeII because its real tube signal all the way though and for the price of say an axe II you could have 7 or 8 great modules! I am going to do the "Foglifter" on my remaining rm50 and call it good after I get those last two modules that i just cant seem to get out of my head. Maybe its the Tractor beam pulling me back in... and usualy the tractor beam wins but oh well If the time comes when I want some more tones to play with than the 6 i plan to keep around, Ill probably ditch the RM50 and jump on another RM4 or maybe even go dually with an M4... but with the tone im getting out of the TSL i dont think the tractor bean will pull me fully back in.. maybe it will take an arm and possibly a leg but hopefully not all of me

Good to hear from you mr. Figg, the evil genius who applied the tractor beam in the beginning and pulled me totally into mts a couple of years ago!
-mp-