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Baer Amplification Megathread!

#521
tombowlus said:
Another fun story from last night, I used the WalkAbout and both ML-112's at band practice with my AC/DC cover band. The guitar players both play Marshall stacks, and they like to let 'em rip (even at practice - yes, hearing protection is in order!), and our drummer hits very hard. I had the WalkAbout's Gain just a tad more than noon and the Master around 1 o'clock, and I tell ya, I was keeping up just fine. Those cabs really make the most of the WalkAbout's output section, and I think I could probably gig that rig at any of the venues I play. The tone was also great, of course. :bassist: :bassist: :bassist: :cool:
Click to expand...

Tom,

I'm curious as a point of reference if you could compare these to the GK NEO 112 II's that I have?

Rob
 
#522
tombowlus said:
Another fun story from last night, I used the WalkAbout and both ML-112's at band practice with my AC/DC cover band. The guitar players both play Marshall stacks, and they like to let 'em rip (even at practice - yes, hearing protection is in order!), and our drummer hits very hard. I had the WalkAbout's Gain just a tad more than noon and the Master around 1 o'clock, and I tell ya, I was keeping up just fine. Those cabs really make the most of the WalkAbout's output section, and I think I could probably gig that rig at any of the venues I play. The tone was also great, of course. :bassist: :bassist: :bassist: :cool:
Click to expand...

AC/DC tribute band and you only had the gain at noon? :rollno:
 
#527
NOLA Bass said:
Tom,

I'm curious as a point of reference if you could compare these to the GK NEO 112 II's that I have?

Rob
Click to expand...

Okay, I just did this comparison. Interestingly, these cabs are almost exactly the same size (though the GK's are lighter). There are certainly some similarities between the two stacks (I compared two of each cab, stacked vertically, with the WalkAbout and a couple of different basses). The ML-112's had more upper midrange presence, and the GK's had more low mid fullness, and some definite growl going on in the lower mids. The GK's were, much like the AE212, bigger and wider down low, and the Baer cabs were again more tight and controlled. In this comparison, the Baer stack was definitely the smoother of the two, and the highs from the ML-112's seemed to be more clear and smooth. The GK's had more string noise and other potentially "non-musical" content up high, which is not so surprising, considering that their tweeters probably extend a good bit higher. As far as musical content is concerned, though, those mids on the Baers cover it all, for sure.

In summary, the GK's were more full down low and through the low-mids, and had some inherent growl in the lower to middle mids. The Baers were more focused and tight down low, more present in the upper mids, more clear higher up, and smoother overall from top to bottom.

Hope this helps. :cool:
 
#528
tombowlus said:
Okay, I just did this comparison. Interestingly, these cabs are almost exactly the same size (though the GK's are lighter). There are certainly some similarities between the two stacks (I compared two of each cab, stacked vertically, with the WalkAbout and a couple of different basses). The ML-112's had more upper midrange presence, and the GK's had more low mid fullness, and some definite growl going on in the lower mids. The GK's were, much like the AE212, bigger and wider down low, and the Baer cabs were again more tight and controlled. In this comparison, the Baer stack was definitely the smoother of the two, and the highs from the ML-112's seemed to be more clear and smooth. The GK's had more string noise and other potentially "non-musical" content up high, which is not so surprising, considering that their tweeters probably extend a good bit higher. As far as musical content is concerned, though, those mids on the Baers cover it all, for sure.

In summary, the GK's were more full down low and through the low-mids, and had some inherent growl in the lower to middle mids. The Baers were more focused and tight down low, more present in the upper mids, more clear higher up, and smoother overall from top to bottom.

Hope this helps. :cool:
Click to expand...

Thanks Tom, it sure does!!
 
#529
tombowlus said:
I had a little time to try the ML-112's with some tube heads last night before I packed them up to head off to band practice (that's another story...).

First up, I used my Pignose B-100v to drive both ML-112's. Man, this was a great, great matchup! The Baer cabs really help get the most out of the 100w Pignose, and the cabs sounded tight, clean, and loud right up to where the B-100v ran out of steam (which was pretty loud!). The B-100v is a relatively bright-n-tight amp, but with the bass cranked all the way (BTW, it's EQ does not seem overly power), it sounded pretty well balanced with the Baers.

Next, I grabbed my Traynor YBA-200. This head is also on the bright-n-tight side (for a tube head), though with a bit more growl/snarl than the Pignose. It wasn't much louder than the B-100v, but I didn't really spend much time trying to dial it in just right (the YBA-200 can take a little twiddling to get the ideal setup with a given instrument and cab(s)). Again, the ML-112's gave me no complaints and sounded great.

Finally, I tried the Reeves C225, which is one of my favorite all-tube heads. The C225 has stadium-rock lows, somewhat scooped mids, and beautiful, glassy highs with it's stock KT88's. Mine is loaded (and biased for) KT120's, which does bump up the power a bit, but more noticeably smooths out the dip in the mids a good bit. The lows and highs are still phenomenal - even more so, actually. Even with the massive lows that the Reeves can put out, the cones on the ML-112's seemed very controlled and not at all inclined to jump out of their baskets (behavior which I definitely have seen with some ported enclosures). Once again, I call it a good match. The Reeves just sounds great with any cab(s) that can handle it.

The big surprise for me was not that the ML-112's did so well with tube power (I thought they would do great), but rather just how good that Pignose sounded driving those cabs. Mine is the combo version, but I had the head out of the combo while I worked on the enclosure a little bit (just addressing the lack of TLC from a previous owner). I could see the head version (B-100vh) with two ML-112's being a great little rig!

I'll try some more tube heads later, but that's all I had time for last night.
Click to expand...

Hi Tom

Thanks so very much for taking the time out to make these comparisons. It is as I feared.

Sounds like this cab would pair well with my Ashdown LB30 and EBS T90 (when it arrives), I just wish there was a way to make it work with my VBA400 :bassist: ......

Apart from buying 2 ML112's of course!!

*Sigh so much gear, so little time

Oh BTW Tom, did you push the pignose or others into overdrive territory at all?

Thanks again

Mike
 
#530
Fab Savage said:
Hi Tom

Thanks so very much for taking the time out to make these comparisons. It is as I feared.

Sounds like this cab would pair well with my Ashdown LB30 and EBS T90 (when it arrives), I just wish there was a way to make it work with my VBA400 :bassist: ......

Apart from buying 2 ML112's of course!!

*Sigh so much gear, so little time

Oh BTW Tom, did you push the pignose or others into overdrive territory at all?

Thanks again

Mike
Click to expand...

I have a Little Bastard in for review, so I'll give that a try, too.

Yes, I did push some overdrive, and it sounded great.

And yes, if I were to stack the cabs horizontally, instead of vertically, I'd get more low end fill. I tried to keep the cabs stacked in a similar configuration (when I did ML-112's versus AE212 and versus Neo112's). Either way, though, even in vertical configuration, I am more than happy with the low end I am getting from the ML-112's. :bassist: :bassist: :bassist: :cool:
 
#533
tombowlus said:
Another fun story from last night, I used the WalkAbout and both ML-112's at band practice with my AC/DC cover band. The guitar players both play Marshall stacks, and they like to let 'em rip (even at practice - yes, hearing protection is in order!), and our drummer hits very hard. I had the WalkAbout's Gain just a tad more than noon and the Master around 1 o'clock, and I tell ya, I was keeping up just fine. Those cabs really make the most of the WalkAbout's output section, and I think I could probably gig that rig at any of the venues I play. The tone was also great, of course. :bassist: :bassist: :bassist: :cool:
Click to expand...

I hope to have a similar experience in a few weeks ;) Just put an NOS Brimar in the V1 of my WA.
 
#538
tombowlus said:
I just did a practice last night with the two ML-112's getting pushed my an Orange Terror Bass 500. That was fun! :bassist: :bassist: :bassist: :cool:

The bass was my old Acoustic Black Widow, and this combination was really nice.
Click to expand...

I ended up gigging this same rig last weekend. I even used the Black Widow, along with my '74 P-bass and my (alder/rosewood) Nordy vJ5. This was a pretty rough room, with a lower ceiling and concrete floors where the band was set up, but then opening into a higher ceiling and carpeted area. This is where most of the people were seated/dancing, so my goal was to get the best sound out by the audience. We succeeded in this regard, but man, it was spotty on stage. Some spots were boomy as all get out, and some had no bass at all. Still, this was not the rig's fault, and it worked well. I never had either gain knob on the Orange past 9 o'clock, either! :eek:

Sorry for the crappy cell phone pics...

IMAG0447.jpg


IMAG0448.jpg
 
#539
monsterthompson said:
I would guess the EQ is different. The midrange-bump of the cab has been noted before. It caused me to re-EQ when I tried. It also got me to rethink how I EQ overall.
Click to expand...

Part of this is due to the fact that many cabs have a dip in the upper mids and a good majority of amps out there have dramatic EQ curve built into their "flat" settings. For years we have got used to dealing with these factors when using our amps eq's. If I remember right, you were using a Mesa M6 which has a pronounced upper end boost built in. With that amp, I'm not surprised you needed to come at your eq from a different angle with the ML112. Pair the ML's with an amp that have a flat, or near flat preamp (like the LMII, for example) and it's a totally different experience.
 
#540
R Baer said:
Part of this is due to the fact that many cabs have a dip in the upper mids and a good majority of amps out there have dramatic EQ curve built into their "flat" settings. For years we have got used to dealing with these factors when using our amps eq's. If I remember right, you were using a Mesa M6 which has a pronounced upper end boost built in. With that amp, I'm not surprised you needed to come at your eq from a different angle with the ML112. Pair the ML's with an amp that have a flat, or near flat preamp (like the LMII, for example) and it's a totally different experience.
Click to expand...

This has been my experience for sure. I owned the Mesa M9 for about a year - great amp but definitely 'voiced'. There's an ML112 with my name on it on a Fedex truck as I type - looking forward to hearing it with my Crest CA9...
 

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