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Looks very interesting, there is a wedge 10 on my list for the future, but more likely when our canuck $ to UK pound will not suck so much...
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01-24-2016 12:37 PM
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Just received my Mambo 10" wedge, second hand but with all the new features and so far I'm impressed. You can get whatever tone you want from this small beast! Only thing I don't like is the Marshall knobs
If i can also get a nice blues overdriven sound I think I'm gonna get rid of all my amps and pedals and stay with the Mambo and just one pedal, this thing has anything I need from bedroom playing to live performance. I also got a 10" cabinet so I can play in stereo
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Hi Franz,
Originally Posted by Franz 1997
is it possible to identify the upgrades/mods (number on parts etc?) ? Do you happen to know when the last mod was made to the "harmonic circuit", the reverb improvements? Just curious, my Mambo was made around August 2014.
Best,
lapideus
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I've been looking through my emails with Jon, to try to pin this down. I know that all the latest improvements were in place by Oct 015; I know that Jon was designing the board with the new 'fender' tonestack in early 015, we swapped some ideas and I did some measurements on my SF Fender amp, so my guess is that it came in early summer - it takes time to get the boards made. Originally Posted by lapideusvir
As far as the reverb and harmonic circuit is concerned, I think the reverb was last improved in 2014 with the dwell control, and I know that Jon has been working continuously on the harmonic circuit for the last 4 years; the last version I tested was in 2014, and that one was OK, but the one I got in October 2015 is much better.
But I suspect he is still working on it, trying to get a 'harmonic' sound that completely copies the sound of a triode valve when it goes into soft clipping just before distortion sets in. He is extremely thorough, and unwilling to settle for " good enough". I don't know why Jon doesn't announce these improvements, but that's the way he prefers it.
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He's also working on improving the reverb according to our e-mail exchanges.. and a fender eq pedal will come soon too. Stay tuned, I'll do my best to promote his great products, he trully deserves it.
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Great. Will talk to Jon. Maybe there is a possibility to "upgrade".
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Aren't there any US dealers that carry the Mambo, yet?
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No, you have to buy it from Jon.
There's a 10" wedge for sale in the forum with the latests specs
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Just saw this thread. I'm going to order one but have a few queries. Portability is my main concern. I don't have a car, in Hong Kong you don't need one. Will the 8" cut it playing with drums? (Thinking jazz trio, quartet) or with a horn. Most legit venues here have some sort of house amp or system, I suppose I could always use a line out of the mambo into whatever is provided for greater coverage.
i just notice that everyone here seems to be posting about the 10" What was the reasoning behind your choice. Finally, are most satisfied with the eminence speaker provided or are other choices advisable and why.
Thx in advance for any info
cheers!Last edited by Jazzism; 02-27-2016 at 10:59 PM.
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I love the 8 and it does cut trough in my experience.
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I agree. I have had all the mambo models, and currently have an 8". It cuts through almost as well as the 10", perhaps because the 8' speaker is as efficient as the 10" in the crucial 200-500HZ area. No problem with drums and horn, although you'd be pushing it with a horn section.
Other speakerscan work in mambo amps, and some users have them, but the eminence betas work very well and are more efficient in the top string fundamental note area than many others, at the expense of high end harmonics .If you want " top end shimmer" , a mambo isn't the best choice.
For the 10" amp, an alternative is the 18sound neo 10NMB, but it has less bass and middle response than the eminence ( but better high end).
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If money and weight are not an issue, the 12 with an EVM12-L, no doubt
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How does it sound with a telecaster??
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the 10" fender version of the tonestack sounds decent with a tele or strat but really needs a bigger enclosure. When I run mine through an open back 1x12 it sounds great. A little pinched, otherwise.
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Hmmm... Lots of options on the market now, compared to 10 years ago. My AER alpha is not quite cutting it on the louder gigs, and I'm thinking of upgrading this year (if ££s allow) to a Compact 60 3. Needs to be an acoustic amp though....
So
AER Compact 60
Henricksen Bud
Mambo Acoustic model (anyone tried this?)
Or some sort of portable PA based solution (probably less portable on public transport though.)
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It's pretty much the industry standard and heavily road tested by thousands of players, so the competition will need to be markedly better sound wise for me to risk getting something else.... Originally Posted by 55bar
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Industry standard - really? I live in London, like you, and don't see many pro players using AERs. Pianists and singers, maybe...Of course if you mean as an acoustic amp, fine, but this thread is about electric arch top amps. Originally Posted by christianm77
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Never understood the compact 60 love for archtops. All midrange, no bass, muddy treble.
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I wouldn't be using my compact 60 with a magnetic pickup archtop. Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
Well maybe I would if I was on foot, but I'd rather use my Princeton for that.
In fact, I rarely play an electric archtop these days.
Actually I'm sure there'll be a chorus of people telling me that I am wrong, but I really like the sound of my Tele through an AER. Wasn't expecting that.
Anyway, my query would be - is the Mambo acoustic amp good? Has anyone tried it?Last edited by christianm77; 02-28-2016 at 12:36 PM.
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Well it's also about Mambo's and I was just interested to see if anyone had tried the acoustic model really. Originally Posted by Franz 1997
Princeton reverb seems a popular choice in London, and I see a lot of Polytones and Henricksens.
There are quite a few cats playing Compact 60's and Alpha's which archtops though usually for gigs with a singer or where they can't be bothered to drive... Singer's will book you on the strength of owning one, often.
Almost every pro guitarist I know owns one, even if they might be playing something else when they get the opportunity. For example I brought my Fender and my AER to the gig the other night (I was playing my Tele) for the singer haha...
So yeah, industry standard bit of kit.Last edited by christianm77; 02-28-2016 at 12:45 PM.
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Well it's also about Mambo's and I was just interested to see if anyone had tried the acoustic model really. Originally Posted by Franz 1997
There are quite a few cats playing Compact 60's and Alpha's with archtops though, usually for small gigs in town where they can't be bothered to drive, and with singers...
A couple of times when people have booked me they said - 'oh but you don't have an AER do you?' (because I didn't have an AER till a couple of years ago) and then breath a HUGE sigh of relief when I tell them I do. Note that they do not ask 'do you have an acoustic amp?'
So that strongly suggests I have not been booked in the past because I didn't have one. It's a bit like having a car.
Almost every pro guitarist I know owns one, even if they might be playing something else when they get the opportunity. So yeah - industry standard I'd say.Last edited by christianm77; 02-28-2016 at 12:57 PM.
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I haven't tried the mambo acoustic, and don't even know if Jon has sold more than a couple. It's basically the standard mambo amp with either a co-ax speaker ( like the AER) or a tweeter, not sure which. My guess is that if you like the AER sound, you won't like the mambo, and vice versa - the mambo has a lot of midrange weight, a lot of bass, and fat but not 'shimmery' treble, and lots of headroom with 180W.
I know what you mean about the AERs; it's true that singers love them, and I have heard stories from others that AERs are popular with venues because it means you're not going to play loudly ( not with 60W and an 8" co-ax speaker). A lot of pianists use them too, I have noticed - I gigged with a pianist using one on friday, and it sounded OK for piano.
The AER ubiquity might be because a lot of music shops stock AERs in the UK, and so in a sense it's a widely available and visible choice, as opposed to the other amps mentioned which are only available either from a specialist jazz shop such as Mairants, or in the case of Mambo, by direct order. So I agree, it seems to be the " back up amp" of choice, although not the primary amp for most electric players.
Yes, lots of fender PRs and DRs, lots of polytones and hendriksens, and lots of Mesas ( why??) in London...
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Nigel uses a Mesa... who else? Yeah, never got on with things myself. Originally Posted by Franz 1997
For me tone is just one of a large number of considerations, the biggest ones are reliability and practicality. I've had too much gear fail on me on gigs, and no-one has ever had a bad word to say about the reliability of AER.
Also the AER sounds great for fairly bog standard piezo pickups - in that it makes those types of pickups sound as good as they could, and I use bog standard piezo stuff just because it's practical - plug in the guitar, and feedback isn't too much of a worry.
For some things - such as my Macaferri, I'm not actually 100% happy, although I think going for the 60 would solve a lot of the problems which are largely to do with headroom.... I'm open to suggestions here, though (probably better to post an acoustic guitar forum though.)
But I daresay for higher end amplification solutions it could be annoying in some ways. To my ears there's a lot of stuff going on in the preamp - things which may work with your instrument, or may work against it...
Worth knowing about for piano... See they are bloody useful things....
I can't say I've been knocked out by Mambo's when I've heard them. I think I prefer the Fender sound for electric, it's a matter of taste really.
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Might be worth starting a separate thread for acoustic amps, or there might be one already. This is a bit at cross purposes
with the main point of the thread, I think. I can understand why you would prefer fender to the mambo sound, which is more in the polytone tradition.
Now if you'd said Fenders were the industry standard, default archtop amp , I'd have agreed with you..I still love my 70's Princeton.
Have you heard mambos down here? I thought I was the only person using one south of Watford..it's more a northern England amp - unsurprisingly, since they are made near Manchester.
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I've got an old compact 60 too
it works for archtop OK ...
It's not a great sound for me ,
or jim mullen , i heard jim saying its ok too not great but ok sound but crucially its small/light ....
he used the small polytone before that
megabrute is it ? but said it was too heavy !
when i bought my comp 60 many years ago it was the only game in town ....
nowadays i would get a mambo 8 or 10
8 probably now Chris says he uses one these days Chris knows his amps !
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