Sold my Sunn 300T... a VT Bass success story

johnbegone · #1 01-03-2011, 01:18 PM

After five great years, I put my Sunn 300T up for sale locally on craigslist and it was spoken for within an hour, picked up the next day and out of my life.

During a sentimental moment before the sale I went and re-read a review I once did on Harmony-Central's user reviews where I claimed it was the one amp that I would NEVER sell. I was so smitten.

Technology certainly changes things. I never knew a pedal could sound as convincing as the VT Bass. My new rig is a VT Bass Deluxe (courtesy of this forum) and a Mesa/Boogie M6 Carbine. And while I haven't quite found the "perfect tone" between the combination of pedal + amp, I've been blown away by the direct tone off the VT bass on our last recording project. It was just demos, but my bass sound is sick. Was able to dial in 5 or 6 very different very usable tones for a 6 track demo... awesome.

The Carbine was more or less because it gave me the amount of power I needed and I joined a band with an endorsement deal with them, but it's a nice amp on its own.

Anyway, sad to see the Sunn go, but happy that I don't have to move around that 75lb beast anymore. The main thing that pushed me to switch was the speed of the M6 vs. the 300T. For other projects, the Sunn has been good to go but I'm in a very technical progressive rock band now and I just wasn't linking up with the drummer like I wanted to. After being frustrated with my playing for a few weeks I tried using a Mesa Walkabout head and I was instantly locked in with the band. Night and day in terms of speed.

Anyway, just thought I'd put this together as a reference for anyone in the future looking to make a similar switch. I won't go so far as to say the era of tube bass amps is over but the margin is certainly narrowing.

JimmyM · #2 01-03-2011, 02:37 PM

dang dude, the vt is my favorite bass pedal of all time and even i wouldn't do that! balls move, no doubt. that pedal is extremely tubey so i get it but i just couldn't do it. hope it works out. if not, i guess you can always get another tuber

Din Of Win · #3 01-03-2011, 02:44 PM

I'm with Jimmy

Your back is stoaked, at least.

**Coolhandjjl** · #4 01-03-2011, 02:51 PM

What did you get for the 300T?

bobcruz · #5 01-03-2011, 02:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by johnbegone

...During a sentimental moment before the sale I went and re-read a review I once did on Harmony-Central's user reviews where I claimed it was the one amp that I would NEVER sell....

There's an old saying about "never say never"

...and I can totally relate to your story because there are a couple of pieces of gear in my arsenal I swore would have to be pried out of my cold dead hands, but taste and goals change, and I can't really say that about them now. Good luck, Bob

xjeremiahx · #6 01-03-2011, 02:54 PM

I saw that on CL. I have on myself...was tempted to get another haha. Congrats on the sale & finding your tone again while keeping your back!

derridiandrift · #7 01-03-2011, 02:58 PM

I had an M6 about six months ago. I took it on a trade just to see what it would be like. I tried the same setup you're using... VT into an M6. It didn't do it for me. My issue was the really aggressive upper mids that I could never dial out no matter what I did with the eq. If I could have gotten that under control, I might have kept it as an alternate or backup rig to my SVT-VR. In the end, I sold the M6 to a local guy who is using, you guessed it, a VT into the M6. He's PLEASED as anything with it.

johnbegone · #8 01-03-2011, 07:05 PM

Sold the 300T for $1k, and the guy who bought it seems like a great guy who is unbelievably excited to get one so that makes me feel good.

Reason I felt OK about selling it is that it's not like this amp is something super rare, they still the Bassman 300 so if I want it again in the future I can figure something out.

You're that the Carbine is super aggressive in the upper mids, the mid and treble knobs are generally run allllll the way down on the VT bass which takes care of it for me. As I said, I haven't quite yet found the perfect combo with the Carbine, but it's a work in progress. I haven't had a lot of time with both because about a week after I got that rig we went to record and I was using it direct.

If I was doing a straight up rock project like I had before, I'd probably keep the Sunn to be honest. But for this band, I've found a good combo with a seemingly unlimited numbers of tones from the VT bass that keeps me happy for now!

JimmyM · #9 01-03-2011, 07:09 PM

lots of threads on here about the operation of the vt, btw...with nice pretty graphs and everything. it's not the easiest pedal to get a handle on at first, but it is amazing how much it cops those tones.