Biggy B, welcome to TB.
There are two recent posts re: the Bag End at the end of this thread here. Not saying those posts are the be all and end all. But I have a lot of respect for robgrow's and Adrian’s input and advice.
FWIW, I kind of went through the same thing w/ an older Series I Contra. Loved the sound. But my gigs were just too loud. Picked up a Wizzy iAMP 200 C combo from EA. Really liked it. So much so that I later bought a Focus 2R and an EA Wizzy M-line.
All the points calivox made re: bass, pickup, string choice, and room ring true to me. IME also at play are the environmental variables (like bars w/ lots of crowd noise for one), and your bandmates. I did a gig recently with a real tasty drummer, piano, and vibes. They were all much older guys who have been playing for a long, long time. Barely needed an amp. The Contra would have been perfect, hi-fi, ambient, more than enough oomph.
I would like to pair my Focus and my mic with a Series III AI extension cab some time soon. Now that I do a wider variety of gigs, some of them much more genteel than in the past, I bet it would work quite well. Just not for the louder stuff.
