Splawn vs Cornford.

[hal9000]

Hi guys,
Cheers for all the comments and input, really appreciate it, so much info on here it's great.

My main guitar is my 1979 Custom fitted with BKP Cold Sweats, really nice pups and my other is my 1990 Custom with Gibson pups, not sure what as I ain't had them out yet, but they are nice, have a certain 'growl' about them. I use this guitar second set as I get less solos and it's great for rhythm and chunking away and nice neck pup too for Is This Love.
My Marshall is a bog standard 1960A with GT75's and I have a 2x12 with V30's, both are real bright, the Cornford I have a chance of has a V30 - 4x12 with it, they are supposed to be a good match.

I did like V30's in Cornford 4x12 than any other cab but that's not saying much on my part since I hate V30's with a passion. It's a taste thing ofcourse...

I swapped my V30's with 2xG12T75's and 2x2xG12C's. Result is ridiculously good for my taste

But yeah Cornford cabs kick ass. I've never understood how Cornford can justify the extra dough for their cabs until I bought mine from Kurt.

As GRK pointed out with my former Soldano Avenger, you can dial it in to sound very close to a Cornford. Perhaps the Soldano Avenger might be a good amp to audition BGG?

 

[BGG]

Well I got the MK50 yesterday to play with guys

First impressions are as everyone else said, very organic and warm sounding, oodles of tone, punch and definition, it's a real MAN's amp and VERY unforgiving.

Struggled to get any dirt out of it at first, I had the Masters up and was playing with the volume, discovered you need the Volume right up then bring the Masters up ..... DOH !!!
Cleans up nicely backing off on the guitar volume controls, kick in the Overdrive and you get fat, crunchy, ballsy rhythm, kick in Master 2 for a volume jump and more sweetness. In fact both Master 1 and 2 are superb for lead, very nice .... really expressionate when you dig in and back off .... nice.

Very LOUD too as folk pointed out, may try and gig it at the weekend if I can get my chops together hahahahaha.

Running it through a Cornford 4x12 with V30's and it's real punchy with plenty of beef.

I'll give an update if I gig it but already it seems to suit me more than the Splawn

 

[Chubtone]

As most of you guys know I am a Splawn dealer and a Quick Rod owner so take this with a grain of salt. The teacher at my store (JMR, check him out on myspace, he's sick) has a Cornford MK50 and I have played it a few times at the store here. I really dug it both times. He let me borrow it for a weekend and when I put it in my home studio for a whirl I wasn't as blown away as I thought I was going to be. It is more organic than the Splawn, but my vintage Marshalls and Mojave Peacemaker were more organic than the Cornford. And my Quick Rod was much meaner and more fire breathing than the Cornford. The amp was kind of a tweener for me. Not as authentic of a classic Marshall tone as the real thing and not anywhere near as pissed off sounding as my Quick Rod. It did both very well but did neither better to my ears. The whole subjective thing.

I was resigned to the fact that I was going to NEED to buy a Cornford and just wanted to put it through its paces in my studio. I was relieved on Monday when I gave it back to JMR that while I really dug that amp, I no longer NEEDED to buy one. YMMV

 

[BGG]

Yeah I agree that the Quickrod is meaner and has more fire but it just lacks something for me, it's a bit fizzy at times and the lead/solo sound always seems thin.
What was missing for me is there in the MK50 although it's way harder to play.

As for vintage Marshalls ...... you lucky git !!

 

[Capulin Overdrive]

As most of you guys know I am a Splawn dealer and a Quick Rod owner so take this with a grain of salt. The teacher at my store (JMR, check him out on myspace, he's sick) has a Cornford MK50 and I have played it a few times at the store here. I really dug it both times. He let me borrow it for a weekend and when I put it in my home studio for a whirl I wasn't as blown away as I thought I was going to be. It is more organic than the Splawn, but my vintage Marshalls and Mojave Peacemaker were more organic than the Cornford. And my Quick Rod was much meaner and more fire breathing than the Cornford. The amp was kind of a tweener for me. Not as authentic of a classic Marshall tone as the real thing and not anywhere near as pissed off sounding as my Quick Rod. It did both very well but did neither better to my ears. The whole subjective thing.

I was resigned to the fact that I was going to NEED to buy a Cornford and just wanted to put it through its paces in my studio. I was relieved on Monday when I gave it back to JMR that while I really dug that amp, I no longer NEEDED to buy one. YMMV

if the Cornford MK50 you played was loaded with 5881's i could see the honeymoon being over pretty quickly with it. KT-66's will make the amp way better for those with a Marshall Jones. the 2 channel version lets you switch between 6l6 or EL-34, they should probably start doing that with the single channel ones.

 

[jcj]

Yeah I agree that the Quickrod is meaner and has more fire but it just lacks something for me, it's a bit fizzy at times and the lead/solo sound always seems thin.
What was missing for me is there in the MK50 although it's way harder to play.

As for vintage Marshalls ...... you lucky git !!

Never tried a fizzy Splawn.....the only downside imo, is that they are almost unusable at less than stage volumes. The only amp I've ever had my hands on that was louder, was a Wizard Metal.

 

[BGG]

Well the amp arrived on Wednesday while I was at work so didn't get it until late evening I was off Thursday so managed to have a little play with it whilst all the neighbors were at work, sounded great but hard to tell at low volume.
Anyway, took it to the gig tonight even though I was a bit nervous about using it, not having had much noodling time on it.
Needn't have worried as it performed perfectly, awesome in fact.

I play in a Whitesnake covers band SLIP OF THE TONGUE (as some of you know, check out my siggy) so usually have three main sounds, clean for the ballads, crunch/dirty rhythm and a lead boost .... all of these I previously got my running a Splawn Quickrod and a Marshall 1960A 4x12. I also use the new Line 6 M13 pedalboard for various delays, chorus patches, volume swells etc etc and I play two Les Paul Customs. A 1979 with BKP Cold Sweat pickups and a 1990 with bog standard Gibbo pups, I also use an early 70's Ibanez twin neck for open tunings and slide work.

Anyway, recently I have felt that the Splawn is a bit fizzy (as stated earlier) ... and lost it's bark a wee bit, also it has always sounded thin when the 'solo' boost is engaged. The clean channel is pointless too as it is muddy and the volume is set around three times higher than the rhythm channel to be heard. It's just been retubed and it still lacks something ?? ............. so my Cornford GAS started hahaha.

Back to the gig ......
What I found unusual was that the rhythm sound was amazing without the overdrive switched on, started to play some lead and by christ it sounded lovely, gritty but warm and woody, plenty of sustain .... just beautiful. Engaged the overdrive and it was still great but mmmm .... ??? ... maybe not as nice, not sure yet. I played most of the gig with the overdrive on ....... for safety hahaha .... took it off when playing slide and the MK50 sounded huge, no overdrive and volume on guitar rolled off for clean and my mates and sound guy said it was the best clean sound I'd ever had.
The V30's sounded nice and fat and punchy, just simply sounded awesome all night so pleased with this rig, I LOVE IT !!!

Can't wait for tonight gig, gonna get there a bit earlier and tweak some more, see if i need that overdrive on at all ; )

Cheers ...


Ains