[Harp-L] The Weso-ME 18 Amp

["Hal Iwan" <haliwan@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello and happy holidays to all

Now that I've had a chance to play around with this harp amp I thought I'd share some findings though ones mileage may vary.

While at SPAH I had a chance to blow through a Masco ME 18 head that was modded for harp by Dale Laslie and tested by Mike Wesolowski. Dale is the electrical guru at Megatone Amps. At SPAH this Masco head was hooked up to a speaker cabinet with 2 tenderized Eminence speakers, a 12" Governor and a 10" Rajin Cajun. At about 30 watts this setup really moves some air as said by a harp player sitting in a chair several feet away. But one thing that amazed me was while I was playing with the knobs I stumbled across a setting that super resembled the sound of Li'l Walters ROCKER. That's about as dirty as I'd want to sound. It really captures the 50s sound and I've hunted for this sound for years as I really like that era of blues alot!! Another benefit  after having learned how to dial in the edge of feedback is it really doesn't seem to matter what mic I use. From an R-7 or 99-131 crystal or black label CRs/CMs to EV 638(really nice imo) to a Shure sm 57 down to a Japanese Aiwa dynamic element and even an Audix Fireball sounds good to me.. You can't miss. It's an easy way to change the sound but all are warm sounding but bold. 
In addition to beefy trannies, this chromed beauty has an impedance switch and a pad control that acts as a tone and feedback eliminator. The impedance switch is a higher or lower gain switch.
You want clean ..... the tone and volume knobs are push/pull knobs. In for dirt and out for a cleaner sounds. Don't forget the impedance switch. It can be used in either position and seems to me is a strong player in the wide tonal spectrum available. The PAD Control is basically a feedback eliminator and seems to do its job quite well. A well thought out setup that is currently in a tweed cabinet around the size of a 2 x 10" Fender Custom Vibrolux Reverb.

Dale was very helpful and answered several questions after SPAH and his delivery dates were very accurate. The chassis and "tenderized" speakers came in separate cartons/days and both were well packed. Mike Wesolowski and Dale seem to make a good tandem.

Hal   happy Masco amp owner. 
I believe there are others on this list that would like the sounds availble through this setup.