That being said, it does have some downfalls:
1. It's super loud. I have to use a JHS lil black box to get it to function at a decent sound level. It's only 40 watts, but again, wattage does not equal headroom/volume.
2. While it's small, It's still kind of biggish. I know cab size makes a difference, especially with open back cabinets. But it does happen to take up some space in my trunk. The cab also In my opinion has a bit of flubbyness overall. For bluesy or Americana type stuff its great. I prefer a tighter low end response from a closed back cabinet. Also the speaker is offset in the cab. I can't tell you how many times I had to move the mic on my cab in a live setting as the Soundguy just threw up a mic in the center of the cabinet, no where near the center of the speaker.
I did start to map out the road to mod the amp a bit; change the tone stack, perhaps try to re-structure the gain to be more useful. I was kind of inspired by the Fender Mike Landau HRD. However I was steered away from this avenue, by a buddy of mine who said "there are a lot of great amps out there, you're gonna spend money on something, so find an amp that does what you want, buy it, and sell the HRD, it'll all even out." I kind of agreed with him, the costs of mods could out run me buying a new amp in the long run. I like tinkering and modding, but there's a time where you have to draw the line, and this was it for me. I like this amp, I don't love it. Life's too short for no love. So I started to look around to come up with some solutions
I wanted a low wattage tube amp that interacted with with pedals well. Combo would be cool, one of the many small format heads would also work, as I already have a decent 1x12 Enginater cabinet in my collection. I know it's probably not the best "name" brand amp cabinet, but it does sound good, and is a decent size. Fender, Avatar, Peavey & Mesa/Boogie all make 1x12's that are a bit smaller, and wouldn't break the bank to upgrade to one of them, if i really got brand-itis.
I looked into the Peavey Pirahana, mini head, the 6505 MH, The PRS tremonti MT15, the various Orange micro heads, and they all had plusses and minuses respectively, but nothing that was a super deal breaker overall. I decided to just play it cool, get a lil pile of cash that would cover the most expensive one, and then make my purchase.
Back in 2008, my bass player bought a Fender Blues Jr. She does play guitar, and she used it a bit, but not enough for her to really justify it, and in 2013 she sold it to a friend of mine. I was a bit bummed back then, as the price she sold it for was pretty great, and I would have loved that cute lil amp.
So last month my friend said she was now selling the Blues Jr, and was wondering if I knew of anyone that might want it. I asked around, but no buyers surfaced. Now this ticked off alot of the boxes I had for amp requirements. I had a couple of extra bucks, and I pulled the trigger on it. It sounds fantastic, I am thinking of going down some mods for it, but right now, I'm really happy. It does interact with my pedalboard nicely and seems to be able to hang with my drummer head room wise too!
Meanwhile, my cousin had fallen out of Love with his Boss Katana 50, and for $100 it followed me home. It's solid state, takes pedals well, and has plenty of effects options inside it. It can also hang with a loud drummer, so no worries there.
I still have my ZT lunchbox and matching cabinet, which makes for a great grab and go amp. I could easily do a gig in my MGB with this lil amp. As it has a speaker out it also pairs nicely with my 1x12 cabinet.
Smaller is better is my theme and i'm also still on for doing my mini micro head stereo rig, with the TC Mimiq, So finding an additional matching Enginater 1x12 cabinet would be cool. to do this rig.
Now this means My Fender HRD is kind of redundant, and will be for sale. I see the Version III's going for $500, and I think mine could go for $400, along with the Black box. It would be great for any player that needs to get loud, still be tube, and take pedals well.
What brought all this small package rig formats to my attention was the fact I have a Mini Coupe, with no back seat. The trunk is bigger than the standard Mini to compensate, but it's still tight. As my Mini is getting up there in mileage, I'm looking into new vehicles in the next year or two, I'm hoping I can find something I like that has a slightly bigger trunk, or at least a back seat. All I can say is, if I buy a Miata, I'm really screwed..
