ORANGE BASS TERROR: The Review!

[Valerus]

UPDATE:

TPB is currently out of stock on the Terror Bass heads

You can still order them and get the epic discount, but you'll have to wait like me

 

[tony_clifton]

Sorry man, my cab came in this afternoon but I screwed up the soundclips . Somehow I'm more of a band-player, I just sound embarrassing if I record myself .
Next attempts on soundclips tomorrow as it is about 11 pm over here right now.

First impression: great purchases (both cab and amp).
I upgraded from a Line 6 Studio 110, which I used for a couple of years until I blew it at rehearsal. But you don't have to be a gearhead to hear the difference.


Short review:

First thing I noticed is the fan; it's pretty noisy. The amp stays room-temp cool when you are playing at bedroom-level, so some kind of variable fan speed thingy would have been nice.
During playing it's not disturbing imo, especially not when jamming along to a cd.


But the tone, it's ballsy! Nowhere clean like the Eden Traveler model on my Line 6 combo, but I LOVE it.
I have to say, in my opinion the amp sounds better playing along with a cd or in a band than pure on it's own, because of this.
I don't think you can get a lot of sounds out of this thing, (only clean and variable degrees of dirtyness), but what it does it does very well.

Another thing I love is the EQ: if you turn those controls down you don't have any sound. I get the feeling you have more control about your tone this way. As you might know, noon is 0, turning it down cuts the frequencies, turning it up boosts them.
At this point I turned bass down 3 marks on the dial. Plenty of bass in there.

I played a few measures of Hysteria with the gain cranked, and to me cranking the gain sounds pretty close to stomping on a big muff. This is very relative however, to me it's close, but it's not really fuzzy so most of you won't agree.
But I'm not the nail-the-sound kind of guy. Alternatives will do for me .

My conclusion;
Great amp for band usage, not that great for bedroom use. It's way too loud (both dials at their minimum, no cranked preamp sounds at bedroom volume).
However, if it's likely you are gonna join a band (rock/blues) and want to have one portable amp you might consider this one.
Plug 'n Play - bassists are gonna like this one. I don't like too much messing around with amps etc., so it's perfect for me.

My rig (for both home and gigging):
Invalid Link Removed

Fender Classic 50's P -> Orange TB -> Aguilar GS112 (clips: -> SM57 via XLR to mini jack -> Garageband)

 

[propel]

Awesome compact rig tony_clifton and thanks for the little review, it's always fun to able to read more about what you're GASing over. I CAN'T wait to give the TB a try with my rickenbacker and unleash all sorts of dirty growly goodness

 

[tifftunes]

BY THE WAY!!!!

If you want the Terror Bass, go over to http://theperfectbass.com
Then find the Orange section, and add the Terror Bass to your cart.
then in the promotional code section put in: "Closeout"

I just saved $130 on it. $730 instead of $860. Wonderful

I was ready to bite the bullet and tried this yesterday... I guess there's either a new promotional code, or the discount is over... I wasn't able to get the $130 off... and didn't buy it yet... I'll call 'em Monday and see if I can get a deal... Or wait... Almost got the isobaric 2x12 as well. It too was discounted before the 1st of Jan... Can't really afford that cab though. May try to build my own...

Anyone have one, and can measure the port for me? I'd love to get general dimensions as well...

 

[Osobass]

I stumbled upon a few of these TB heads today at musicgearguys in Denver. Is it just me, or do I hear an octave effect in the normal sound from this head? I played it with a '77 P bass through an EBS 4x10. It was way loud. I couldn't get the volume above 3. I found that I could start getting distortion with the gain at 6 if I dug in. With the gain at 10 I couldn't play softly enough to avoid distortion. I wouldn't call the sound smooth by any means. It sounds pretty agressive.

 

[Jim C]

When you say aggresive do you mean distorted, mid punch, or just very rich sounding.
I have considered this cutie but it would also have to be able to do the loud / clean thing too.

 

[Osobass]

More mid punch. You can keep it clean with a low gain level and still generate massive volume with the SS power amp side. My description "aggressive" (spelling aside) was to describe the subtle synthesized octave that I think I am hearing from the TB. I'm still interested to see if anyone else hears this besides me. I could be all wet.

 

[Jim C]

Thanks Oso; I was afraid of that!

A local shop once had a Vox AC 15 that absolutely generated a distorted octave above the original pitch; we assumed it was a tube; it was so cool that nobody dared to investigate and the amp sold for a premium price as a result (with no guarantee it would continue)

 

[propel]

I'm seriously considering buying this next month but have to pay a 50$ deposit to get the shop to have one come in. Would love some clippies first, just in case it turns out to not be my cup of tea. Thanks in advance.

 

[tombowlus]

Wow, that Terror Bass 1,000-watter is really something!

 

[tony_clifton]

I figured I might spam this one:

Terror Bass review - decent one!

 

[Le Chat Noir]

I figured I might spam this one:

Terror Bass review - decent one!

Olly, you beat me to it! Thanks for the promotion though!!

I bought a Terror Bass a few days ago and I love it! I had to buy it online as nowhere stocks them around here, so as I have cameras and a little home studio I thought I'd try my best at a decent video demo for others in the same situation.

I tried to be as thorough as possible in going through all the tone controls and the sound is recorded with 'proper' mics into a decent DAW, so hopefully this will prove useful to anyone interested in this amp who can't get to a shop to try one!

I tried to keep the same riffs throughout to show the differences between tone settings more effectively.

Full recording chain:

Musicman Stingray bass guitar
Orange Terror Bass head
Ashdown ABM410T, fitted with Eminence Deltalite II 2510 drivers (miced with Shure SM7B)
Ashdown ABM115, fitted with Eminence Kappalite 3015LF driver (miced with Audix D6)
API 3124+ preamp
RME Fireface 800

I'm not a virtuoso bassist by any stretch of the imagination and don't feel the need to show off by slapping, popping and busting out stupidly difficult hooks. I am but a humble rock bassist, and this is a rock amp, not a super-clean slapping machine! If you want clean slap tones, I suggest you look elsewhere!

 

[tony_clifton]

Haha, you are here too

Didn't know that, apologies

 

[Spinal Tapper]

Olly, you beat me to it! Thanks for the promotion though!!

I bought a Terror Bass a few days ago and I love it! I had to buy it online as nowhere stocks them around here, so as I have cameras and a little home studio I thought I'd try my best at a decent video demo for others in the same situation.

I tried to be as thorough as possible in going through all the tone controls and the sound is recorded with 'proper' mics into a decent DAW, so hopefully this will prove useful to anyone interested in this amp who can't get to a shop to try one!

I tried to keep the same riffs throughout to show the differences between tone settings more effectively.

Full recording chain:

Musicman Stingray bass guitar
Orange Terror Bass head
Ashdown ABM410T, fitted with Eminence Deltalite II 2510 drivers (miced with Shure SM7B)
Ashdown ABM115, fitted with Eminence Kappalite 3015LF driver (miced with Audix D6)
API 3124+ preamp
RME Fireface 800

I'm not a virtuoso bassist by any stretch of the imagination and don't feel the need to show off by slapping, popping and busting out stupidly difficult hooks. I am but a humble rock bassist, and this is a rock amp, not a super-clean slapping machine! If you want clean slap tones, I suggest you look elsewhere!

Great review! Very well explained. I'd like to see more of these demos for ANY bass heads out there!

 

[Jim C]

Well done; very nice job.
Sounds like a very aggressive amp.
Does it do a dead clean sound as well with a passive bass?

 

[vin*tone]

...I'm not a virtuoso bassist by any stretch of the imagination and don't feel the need to show off by slapping, popping and busting out stupidly difficult hooks. I am but a humble rock bassist, and this is a rock amp, not a super-clean slapping machine! If you want clean slap tones, I suggest you look elsewhere!

Thanks man. That's exactly what we're after. Too many demos revolve around how fast a player can wank.

Did you have the tone on yr Ray totally open in the recordings?

 

[propel]

Wow, thanks for much for the demo. I know I'm not speaking only for myself when I say that I really appreciate a comprehensive demo of the sort. I'll definitely have one of these come in to my local shop to give it a go myself

 

[Matt Dean]

Man, the "Orange sound" is hard to describe to someone who has not heard it...

Orange amps seem to have a lot of harmonic content (in a good way, IMHO), and they definitely get grittier as you turn them up. The tone is warm, fairly round, but not super polite. It's got some bark. It is possible to get a glorious clean tone, but you have to work the gain stages a bit. They seem far more at home cranking out loud, in your face, slightly fuzzy, punchy, growly, meaty bass tones.

I guess that's it in a nutshell.

Tom.

Tom, how would you compare the Terror to a M-Pulse 600 in terms of tone?

Thanks in advance....

 

[Let It Fall]

TPB has one in stock right now, I seen it in store a few days ago.

 

[joeydavidson]

No pics no Bass Terror!

nearly spat my food out when I read this.