Nice cleans?

[Eric***]

Great thread, this is the education I've been hoping for recently.

I've got a Roland Cube 30x, which has clean - JC - then alternates to the modeling mode. With my Duncan bucker equipped guitars, I have always loved the sounds, and others have often commented how sweet my guitars sound through that amp, when on clean channel....

Recently I went into a luthier here in town, a Yugoslavian dude who builds jazz boxes, custom only. ALL he sells are the Rolands, and he told me it was for that reason. I was pleased to think I had stumbled onto something so well respected. I then began researching the JC120 to understand where it's used.

I also have a little lanilei, which utilize one 12au7 and one 12ax7a, and is intended to emulate a plexi in a package the size of a 6 pak. It hs a clean setting as well, but is hardly the clean I'd become accustomed to with my Roland. This is all helping me too understand where the sounds come from.

Long story short...check the Roland for a clean that is HARDLY flat and
unpleasing......

http://www.dancheguitars.com/
http://www.mahaffayamps.com/little-lanilei-3350lt.htm
http://www.roland.com/products/en/CUBE-30X/

That just clarifies a little. Tung did mention that the Roland is an 'icy clean,' but I guess that doesn't really mean flat -- just not 'warm' and not distorted at all. I wonder, then, how one gets that clean sound on a Roland JC, which is not flat, without any slight tube distortion.

[tunghaichuan***]

That just clarifies a little. Tung did mention that the Roland is an 'icy clean,' but I guess that doesn't really mean flat -- just not 'warm' and not distorted at all. I wonder, then, how one gets that clean sound on a Roland JC, which is not flat, without any slight tube distortion.

Like Hubberjub, said, you turn the master volume all the way up and adjust the preamp volume to your liking. Depending on how the amp is engineered, this may or may not work for you. It can also get very loud.

The Roland JC-120 isn't flat because it is EQ'd as an instrument amplifier, it just happens to have very little harmonic coloration present. It will distort if cranked up all the way, but only slightly. But unlike a stereo, it is engineered for guitar use. Some people like the icy clean sound, some don't but I wouldn't call it a bad sounding amp.

In addition, the JC-120 is a solid state amp, and as such does not distort like a tube amp. Since it has transistors, the amp will stay harmonically clean right up until the point that the output section is pushed too hard, the the transistors will square-wave.

Modelling amps are different in that the distortion is a digital representation of real thing, but many of them are still solid state.

Also you have to take into account speaker coloration. Some Marshall amps used a 100W amp driving four 25w speakers, which produces speaker distortion. Take the same cabinet and put int four EV12L, which can handle 300W each, and you will get no speaker distortion at all.