I received my Modena 60 from Elmwood about three weeks ago. I've been on the high-gain channel switcher hunt for a couple years now, and this is my latest.
The Specs:
4 x 12AX7 (V1,V2,V3 are TAD 12AX7C, also known as the 7025 "Silver Specials", which recently went back into production. V4 is a Sovtek 12AX7A)
2 x TAD EL34B-STR
2 channels, each with a separate tone stack:
Clean channel has volume, treble, mid, bass controls plus footswitchable boost with boost volume and gain knobs.
Drive channel has volume, gain, treble, mid and bass controls plus footswitchable boost with a gain knob.
There are two footswitchable master volumes, which can optionally be linked to the boost so that switching on Master 1 will also turn the boost on. The setup is a little unusual: Master 1 is set to the loudest level you wish to play at (solo level), then Master 2 can be set to be any level lower than or equal to Master 1 (cranking Master 2 makes it the same as Master 1). It's different than any other amp I've played, but is no problem once you get used to it.
The power section has Fat and Edge controls, which are pretty much like the depth and presence controls on other amps (although Elmwood says that Edge has a higher corner frequency than the usual presence control).
There's an effects loop with adjustable blend.
There are two 8 ohm and two 4 ohm speaker outs. There is no 16 ohm output (you can use two 16 ohm loads in the 8 ohm jacks, but can't use a single 16 ohm load).
The head is in a really nice looking red stained birch cab. The fingerjointing isn't exactly perfect (some small gaps), but otherwise looks solid. I'm a little worried about the nice wood getting all banged up, but I have a Studio Slips case on the way which should help. The head is around 45 lbs and on the small side - it just barely hangs over the sides of my Z-Best cab when the cab is vertical. Small and (relatively) light are important points for me.
Inside, the amp is done on a good quality PCB and build quality generally looks good. The tube sockets are on the PCB, which is a bit disappointing, but they have installed standoffs on the chassis to provide additional reinforcement around the sockets.
The Sound
Clean channel:
I'm not really a connoiseur of clean tones, so diehard clean guys might want to take this with a grain of salt... I think it's one of the better clean channels I've heard on a channel switcher. It's in the Plexi clean realm, although the mids are less pronounced, kinda scooped like a Fender. There's a little bit of everything in these cleans: a little bounce, a little grit, a little sparkle. As you increase the channel volume, you get warm, soft overdrive. There's a good amount of headroom for a 50 watt amp if you keep the channel volume around 10:00 or 11:00.
The boost on the clean channel has its own volume and gain controls. This changes the channel's sound considerably. When I dial up a nice clean sound then kick in the boost, I get a warm sustainy sound that's very nice for the neck pickup blues thing. The boost gain is added on top of the channel volume setting, so you can get more than enough gain to get Marshall-style crunch if you don't mind having a somewhat dirty clean sound. The boost seems to add mids, but the mids aren't as pronounced as a Marshall.
Dirty channel:
The dirty channel on this amp is quite interesting and flexible. The gain is tight, with just a little give to it's feel. It's responsive to picking strength and cleans up well with the guitar's volume (well for a channel switcher, at least). The gain control is usable throughout its range, going from dirty to crunchy to grindy to sustainy as you turn it up.
The tone controls are powerful and interactive. This is a tweaker's amp for sure. The mid control alone can drastically change the sound of the amp. It's almost too powerful - for me the usable range is about 12:00 (really scooped) to 3:00 (lotsa mids). In that range a tiny change in the mid control makes quite a large difference in tone. The bass and treble controls aren't quite as drastic, but they don't just affect tone, they affect the "texture" of the distortion, and they interact quite a bit with themselves and the mid control. On the power amp side, the fat and edge controls are crucial to getting the low and high end just right.
The boost on this channel does pretty much what you'd expect. I was a bit surprised to find that the boost mode was actually brighter than the normal mode. I would've expected it (and preferred it) to be a little darker and smoother for leads. Careful setting of the controls (edge control in particular) and a tube swap have alleviated the problem.
I have noticed that the amp is very sensitive to the pickup you use. If you want aggressiveness and bite, you need a higher output pickup like a JB. Lower output pickups give you a warmer, smoother sound. I feel that this amp could go from jazz to metal and do anything in between as long as you had the right guitar and cab plugged into it.
The tubes shipped with the amp are really quite good, but that didn't stop me from experimenting. I did a couple swaps that gave me a little improvement. Currently I'm using:
V1: TAD 12AX7C (stock) - nothing sounded better than the stock tube in this position!
V2: RFT ECC83 - The TAD was a close second, and I preferred the TAD's midrange, but the RFT holds together a lot better in higher gain settings, most notably boost mode. (this tube is used only in the dirty channel)
V3: Early 90's Chinese 12AX7 (grey plate) - this tube added some gain to the boost mode of the clean channel and made the amp sound a bit bigger.
V4: Sovtek 12AX7A (stock) - Yes, really. This is still the best sounding tube in the PI position. The guys at Elmwood say that they use this tube to warm up the overall sound of the amp. I still can't believe it, so I'll probably keep trying others.
As you can tell, this amp has become a favorite of mine. Great tone and versatility in one package. I'm always looking for the next cool amp, but this is definitely the one to beat. No other amp has gotten this close to my ideal. Sure, there are things I'd like to see changed: add a 16 ohm speaker output, external bias adjustment and measurement, maybe even another tone stack. But really, that's all fairly minor so I won't complain too loudly.
The Specs:
4 x 12AX7 (V1,V2,V3 are TAD 12AX7C, also known as the 7025 "Silver Specials", which recently went back into production. V4 is a Sovtek 12AX7A)
2 x TAD EL34B-STR
2 channels, each with a separate tone stack:
Clean channel has volume, treble, mid, bass controls plus footswitchable boost with boost volume and gain knobs.
Drive channel has volume, gain, treble, mid and bass controls plus footswitchable boost with a gain knob.
There are two footswitchable master volumes, which can optionally be linked to the boost so that switching on Master 1 will also turn the boost on. The setup is a little unusual: Master 1 is set to the loudest level you wish to play at (solo level), then Master 2 can be set to be any level lower than or equal to Master 1 (cranking Master 2 makes it the same as Master 1). It's different than any other amp I've played, but is no problem once you get used to it.
The power section has Fat and Edge controls, which are pretty much like the depth and presence controls on other amps (although Elmwood says that Edge has a higher corner frequency than the usual presence control).
There's an effects loop with adjustable blend.
There are two 8 ohm and two 4 ohm speaker outs. There is no 16 ohm output (you can use two 16 ohm loads in the 8 ohm jacks, but can't use a single 16 ohm load).
The head is in a really nice looking red stained birch cab. The fingerjointing isn't exactly perfect (some small gaps), but otherwise looks solid. I'm a little worried about the nice wood getting all banged up, but I have a Studio Slips case on the way which should help. The head is around 45 lbs and on the small side - it just barely hangs over the sides of my Z-Best cab when the cab is vertical. Small and (relatively) light are important points for me.
Inside, the amp is done on a good quality PCB and build quality generally looks good. The tube sockets are on the PCB, which is a bit disappointing, but they have installed standoffs on the chassis to provide additional reinforcement around the sockets.
The Sound
Clean channel:
I'm not really a connoiseur of clean tones, so diehard clean guys might want to take this with a grain of salt... I think it's one of the better clean channels I've heard on a channel switcher. It's in the Plexi clean realm, although the mids are less pronounced, kinda scooped like a Fender. There's a little bit of everything in these cleans: a little bounce, a little grit, a little sparkle. As you increase the channel volume, you get warm, soft overdrive. There's a good amount of headroom for a 50 watt amp if you keep the channel volume around 10:00 or 11:00.
The boost on the clean channel has its own volume and gain controls. This changes the channel's sound considerably. When I dial up a nice clean sound then kick in the boost, I get a warm sustainy sound that's very nice for the neck pickup blues thing. The boost gain is added on top of the channel volume setting, so you can get more than enough gain to get Marshall-style crunch if you don't mind having a somewhat dirty clean sound. The boost seems to add mids, but the mids aren't as pronounced as a Marshall.
Dirty channel:
The dirty channel on this amp is quite interesting and flexible. The gain is tight, with just a little give to it's feel. It's responsive to picking strength and cleans up well with the guitar's volume (well for a channel switcher, at least). The gain control is usable throughout its range, going from dirty to crunchy to grindy to sustainy as you turn it up.
The tone controls are powerful and interactive. This is a tweaker's amp for sure. The mid control alone can drastically change the sound of the amp. It's almost too powerful - for me the usable range is about 12:00 (really scooped) to 3:00 (lotsa mids). In that range a tiny change in the mid control makes quite a large difference in tone. The bass and treble controls aren't quite as drastic, but they don't just affect tone, they affect the "texture" of the distortion, and they interact quite a bit with themselves and the mid control. On the power amp side, the fat and edge controls are crucial to getting the low and high end just right.
The boost on this channel does pretty much what you'd expect. I was a bit surprised to find that the boost mode was actually brighter than the normal mode. I would've expected it (and preferred it) to be a little darker and smoother for leads. Careful setting of the controls (edge control in particular) and a tube swap have alleviated the problem.
I have noticed that the amp is very sensitive to the pickup you use. If you want aggressiveness and bite, you need a higher output pickup like a JB. Lower output pickups give you a warmer, smoother sound. I feel that this amp could go from jazz to metal and do anything in between as long as you had the right guitar and cab plugged into it.
The tubes shipped with the amp are really quite good, but that didn't stop me from experimenting. I did a couple swaps that gave me a little improvement. Currently I'm using:
V1: TAD 12AX7C (stock) - nothing sounded better than the stock tube in this position!
V2: RFT ECC83 - The TAD was a close second, and I preferred the TAD's midrange, but the RFT holds together a lot better in higher gain settings, most notably boost mode. (this tube is used only in the dirty channel)
V3: Early 90's Chinese 12AX7 (grey plate) - this tube added some gain to the boost mode of the clean channel and made the amp sound a bit bigger.
V4: Sovtek 12AX7A (stock) - Yes, really. This is still the best sounding tube in the PI position. The guys at Elmwood say that they use this tube to warm up the overall sound of the amp. I still can't believe it, so I'll probably keep trying others.
As you can tell, this amp has become a favorite of mine. Great tone and versatility in one package. I'm always looking for the next cool amp, but this is definitely the one to beat. No other amp has gotten this close to my ideal. Sure, there are things I'd like to see changed: add a 16 ohm speaker output, external bias adjustment and measurement, maybe even another tone stack. But really, that's all fairly minor so I won't complain too loudly.
