okay so a friend of mine is wanting a new amp after he gets a new guitar (an Ibanez RGA-7) and he really wants a Mesa. also, he plays mainly metal so an amp to suit that would be great. i dont know much about Mesa, and i've looked a little on their site, but some input would be great.

any suggestions?

-Jake

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"I don't care how good you are, how fast you are. You ain't good enough no lessin' you got the soul." -Hubert Sumlin

You said he plays metal; What kind of metal (heavy, death, black death, goth, lite/hair, shiny, liquid)?

Also, what is his budget?

What kind of wattage does he want?

Is this for recording or performing or both?

How many members of his band? What kinds of amps do they play through?

Does he have a girlfriend? If so, is she good looking? If so, do you have any pictures of her? Oh, wait, I'm getting off subject...

Anyway, we need more info before we can share our knowledge.

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My brother had a Mesa I would say it was pretty awesome since some one thought it was worth stealing. It had great tone lots of crunch. Forgot what tubes it had but it was a small 50 watt combo amp that could knock doors off. a Mesa is definatley one of those amps that come to mind when you mentioned Metal. others are Randall and of course Marshal. Im not sure how a Fender amp can handle metal. No offense but when I hear fender amps I think of a more mature sound. Blues, jazz, more defined hard rock and alternative. But I could be wrong. I'm sure there are metal players in here that use Fender amps.
Your friend might want to find a amp with versitility. I used to play Metal when I lived in Austin. I was jamming with a Metal Band and the little MESA I borrowed from my brother fit in quite well (I was the Rythym Guitaist). I played mostly full step down and drop C on a les paul copy. But as I grew my musical interest and tastes changed a bit. Dont get me wrong I love me some death metal but its nothing I want to play around my 2 year old. I hope this does help a little.

The Mesa Dual Rectifier Is a good amp for metal but it's pricey as already mentioned.With that price though you get a great metal sound and bullet proof reliability.A lot of younger metal players in my area are using Crate amps but I'm not familiar with them other than people saying that their quality and reliability has taken a hit in the past few years but apparently they're good and crunchy for metal tones.

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Check out Blackstar. They seem to have picked up a few metal artists that really like their products.

Egnater Armageddon.

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Theres only one do it all metal amp. The JCM800 2203KK. More gain than than a bag of gain'y things. Built in noise gate, which is about the only one I've heard that I'm anywhere near happy with. The only thing it doesn't do is clean. The low end on it is utterly gargantuan, without sacrificing any mids or getting that horrible fizzy new metal drive sound. One channel in one amp dedicated to destroying eardrums and making you think the apocalypse is well underway.

It eats triple and dual rectifiers for breakfast then goes looking for toast and tea.

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No no and no

Like Nik said the KK2203 is the ultimate metal amp and Kerry King stipulated when they were designing the amp that he wanted it to be within reach of regular musicians and not uber expensive like a lot of signature amps.I think the MSRP is around $1,200 which is pretty good for cranium splitting Wattage.

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'65 Strat,65 Mustang,65 Jaguar,4 more Strats,3 vintage Vox guitars,5 Vox amps,'69 Bassman with a '68 2-15 Bassman cab,36 guitars total-15asst'd amps total,2 vintage '60s Hammond organs & a myriad of effects-with a few rare vintage ones.

Marshall = Metal!!!!

I can tell you this. I used to have a Mesa Dual Rectifier and as much as I loved it I hated it as well. It's actually a pain in the butt to use as a Metal amp depending on what kind of Metal he wants to play. Definitely don't go with a Lonestar or one of the extremely optional models. If you're gonna go Mesa for Metal it should be one of the simpler 2-channel models.

Here's why:

Mesa amps split pretty much every preamp tube in half for each function of a channel. One tube can be used for channel-3 1st stage gain as well as a reverb return or loop send or whatever other function the amp may have. Sound confusing? It is. And it's a pain in the butt to tailor a sound around the 3-channel optional models.

That being said, the only Mesa I would recommend for Metal would be a 2-channel Dual Rectifier. The reason for that is the 2-channel models are basically a straight chain in their gain stages. V1-2-3-4-5 = Gain stage 1-2-3 effects loop, Phase inverter, done. Why does that matter?

Reason #2. Mesa amps are extremely transparent to tube types and changes. The bottom line is, they fart sounds with modern tubes. Muddy, ugly, but powerful. Think early Korn. Today's Metal doesn't employ that kind of thing as much. To drop modern preamp tubes in a DR will have you pulling your hair out as far as "how to I clean this amp up a bit" or "how can I get some searing highs" like Metal these days use.. To believe that you can simply change to a different brand of power tube is a common fallacy.

In fact, the only way you can truly do it is by using expensive NOS (new old stock) preamp tubes. The older 60's and 70's RCA, Sylvania, GE, Mullard etc.. It's getting harder and harder to run across them for any reasonable price unless you feel like gambling on ebay that you won't end up with tubes with problems. Other than that, be ready to spend $40-$50 PER preamp tube (X's 5). Do the math, and it isn't pretty.

With a 3-channel model, it's a very hard task to do. Most of the times you can't mix it up with even the different NOS brands to mod the eq's of each channel separately. Because one tube might be gain stage 1 channel-2, and gain stage 2 channel-3 (for example). If you put a tube in that pumps high frequencies into Gain stage 1 channel-2, guess what, your channel-3 is also affected and will come out screaming as well.

There was a time years ago when I used to be an adviser here in Vegas as to how to tailor a Mesa to do what you want it to, to musicians and studios around here. In the late 90's- mid 2000's they were EVERYWHERE.. And people were frustrated with them. I even used to sell the NOS tubes to them and do a hands-on overhaul of tubes and educate them as to how it worked.

I ran across many Mesa users who used to swear up and down that there was a pedal to get around any problem you might have in tailoring the sounds of them. Only to have them eventually contact me 4-5-6 pedals later.

Most Mesa models are about as usable for Metal as a Fender amp. And the ones that are, require a LOT of attention. They are expensive and complicated amps and really not for a beginning guitarist. They can be ruined rather easily by not understanding how to use them. My advice would actually be to go with something else. Not so much because a Mesa isn't good for Metal, or can't be used for it. I loved mine once I understood how to work it. But more because getting a new one will be blissful for about 6-months before you start figuring out that it all of the sudden sounds like a muddy mess, and fixing that is a complicated matter.

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oh man you HAD to throw that in there didnt you?
you already made me by one egnator amp already.
dont do it again, not now anyways that im in line
for a MesaBoogie Express 5/50, which would be
a killer amp for the op's buddy to try out.
im in love with the 5/50. MSRP is fine with me for
this lovely amp. its my goal this yr and a marshall
as well. i already have more guitars than i know
what to do with. i need to catch up on my amp
collection. there are 2 or 3 vintage amps im keeping
an eye out for too. get it while its here type of thing.
however, that amp you just mentioned is amazing.
only egnator could come up with that offering for sure.

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63supro
"The good thing is in a club situation, most of the patrons are trashed and really can't tell the difference."

Peavey 6505+ one of the higher gain amps amps out there. And great sound too.

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yes, I totally agree with every one here! It depends on what kind of metal. My friend got a Jet City 333 amp forgot what model, I think there newer amps but we got some really wicked tones out of it. It got some good Slash, Metallica, type metal. If you want to still consider that metal.

What about the Line 6 and Jet City amps?

You know what, Now that you mentioned it Line 6 has a head I tried out, I forget what series it is, but it was all tube, and had metal songs as presets! its had tons of preset songs that sounded really good! too.
Like I mentioned above I think Jet City is a fairly new company,I forget what model my buddy got it was a 20 watt head and a 112 cab, that thing could get blade slicing tone. He was cutting out heavier jams that sounded reall nice the only down side is it was only one channel.