Orange AD30TC

Arrived today. Looking forward to taking it for a spin layer.

Here is a picture of my current rigs.

Here's the deal. Probably a bit long and off topic, but might as well give you the run down to assess properly. TL;DR - Orange is cool so far, not super versatile, but good.

I'm a terrible guitarist, but I get together with a group of guys about once a month to play some tunes. We all pick a song or two that we're going to play guitar and sing and the others guys fill in on the other instruments. A couple of us play drums well, couple play bass well, couple play guitar well, and we can all fake our way through what we don't do well. That's basically all that I need an amp for. Because I suck, I'm mainly interested in playing easy rhythm riffs with a brownish sound. Not super high gain, no scorching leads, not much clean. Think the first couple Weezer albums, first Foo Fighters album, that kind of deal.

I traded a Rivera Pubster 45 for the 66 Bassman (pictured) with the idea that I could use the Bassman as a bass amp and guitar amp. Maybe with some pedals I could get the guitar tone I was looking for. Not so much. If you crank the Bassman to 9, it sounds fucking tits, it's just too loud to be practicing with and the cleans with pedals for gain don't get me fired up. (Cab for the Bassman is 4ohms to suit the head.)

Then I grabbed the 79 Mesa (pictured). I figured this would get me a better overdrive sound and it's a fairly compact combo, so it would be handy. Yep. Sounds tits. Got that thick, Mesa sound. Really killer sound, although it always sounds like a Mesa. I'm even happy enough with the cleans. The problem for me is that it's difficult to dial in. All the knobs are kind of interactive and trying to get the gain staging where I want it for the clean and dirty channel just doesn't work for me.

Recently, I grabbed this H&K Tubemeister 36. Ton of cool features with the power soak built in, direct (speaker simulated) out for recording, 3 channels, verb, etc. Tons of versatility...except when it comes to ohm load. Damn thing can't run at 4ohms. I picked it up with the intention of using it with my Fender 4ohm cab, no such luck. I've been running it through the 8ohm speaker in the Mesa combo, but I'm trying to downsize my rig, not add to it. And with the money I paid, I don't want to have to buy a cab to go with it too.

Then comes the Orange. I found a good deal on this thing and have had my eye on Orange for a while. I was initially interested in the TH30 because the price is pretty good, but played one in a GC and didn't really feel it. At the time, I also played an OR15 and thought it was pretty killer. The problem with the OR15 is that it's only single channel and doesn't do 4ohms, so I would need to get a cab too. It just doesn't have enough features for what I'm looking for. When the AD30TC came up, I said screw it, let's give it a go. 2 channels, both can get dirty, combo (so I don't need to get another cab), easy to dial in, and the price was right. So far, I've only used it for a couple hours, but it sounds pretty good, even playing at low volume. It sounds like an Orange. Sunday, I'm getting together with the guys and will really get to crank it up and give it a fair assessment. This is the tune that I'll be ripping this weekend...

Good vid. Guy is entertaining. This OR15 video is pretty killer IMO...