Sometime in the previous decade when I had just started switching from bass to guitar some friends and I rented a room in midtown NY with a bunch of high end amps in it to mess around. It struck me at the time that it seemed like a pretty decent way to turn people on to the boutique stuff the company that owned the studios was selling. I think I played a Matchless that evening. I guess they move amps on after they've had them awhile, and this older 2x12 Slant 6v popped up on Reverb for a decent price. I got hooked on the Vox Bruno 35 watt amps earlier this year with quad 6v6, and the Carr seemed like it might be a natural upgrade. Plus I'm a native North Carolinian, so the origin was appealing.
It sounds pretty amazing. Reviews about these get hyperbolic, especially regarding the cleans. One pair of output tubes is cathode biased and the other is fixed, so the amp combines the punchy attack and sweetness of the latter with the harmonic resonance of the former. It's a gorgeous tone. When I ran my Mustang through it, the neck pickup sounded almost as rich as my Jazzmaster. I'm still getting used to the directness of it, and I'm having to be much more intentional with picking intensity—the Vox Brunos are straight cathode biased so they're a little spongier. Either pair of output tubes is on tap via a switch, which allows more emphasis on attack or harmonics depending on preference. Dirty it's voiced in the Marshall realm, and has a nice, usable master volume. It's got a pretty chewy texture, and reminds me a good bit of some EF86 amps I've had, though with a different voice. It's pretty gainy, and I know some folks have subbed in different preamps to extend the range of lower gain tones. I may end up doing the same. This is the first amp I've had with an actual dirt channel, so I'm going to have to think about how to work that in to my setup. The clean channel sounds great with a Timmy and a Rat, but I could see using the dirt channel a good bit on this. Both channels have really nice EQ, and the reverb goes from slight to super drippy and lush.
It's also freaking loud. I was hoping that being able to halve the power would help with that some but not so much. I may have to look at attenuators. I can get it just quiet enough so that I don't get mean looks.
I've gotten some annoying flutter noise that I traced to the 12AX7 on the clean channel. I'm pretty certain it was just a tube loosened slightly in shipping, but it may be socket wiring related. I had a similar issue with a Ceriatone last year. Edit: It was a bad preamp tube, which I replaced with EH one the seller helpfully provided. That one was unfortunately also microphonic and generating some pretty intense reverb feedback past 9 o' clock on the reverb knob. Subbed in a JJ. Seems all fixed.
Overall a pretty fun way to get 2017 going.