Vintage Synth Explorer Forums

Hey Everybody,
I play keyboards in a band and I've run into a problem. Right now I am running my three keyboards (Roland Juno D, Moog Little Phatty, and Yamaha Piano) and drum samples from my Laptop through an old Peavey PA head and then using that to power two extension cabs a 15 and a tweeter and two 12's and a tweeter. My problem is bringing two cabs is a pain in the butt not to mention my stack looks like garbage.

I play in a six piece band and we are starting to tour more and play bigger shows so the other guys have all upgraded their setups. Needless to say my pile of gear is becoming an eye sore next to all of the vox, orange, and ampeg gear on stage.

I need a cabinet that can handle a big range from high leads to the deep bass of the piano and drum samples. I was thinking something with 2 10's a 15 and a horn would do the trick but I wanted to get some feedback first.

I don't have a ton of money so something under 500 would be great but I'm open to anything.

Jordan

For a bit more you could get a Barbetta Sona 41c, all in one, quite powerful and nice and light. Only mono though, don't know if that's an issue for you.

You could also look at a second-hand Roland KC-500 or 550, or second-hand Motion Sound KP-200S' will be getting a bit cheaper soon when the KP-500SN hits the streets and people go to upgrade. I've heard lots of really good reports about them.

The problem is besides the motion sound I don't think any of those options could compete with three guitars, bass, and drums. I don't really need a combo amp i just need a cabinet that is decently priced. For some reason nobody makes a keyboard amp or cab that competes with guitar or bass gear. I've found that a bass cab with a full range of low to high end speakers is my best bet. I just need help finding a good deal. Do any of you tour or play live shows with a full band? If so what set up do you use? I used to go the old mixer and Direct box to the sound guy route but a combination of venues with no speakers and headaches with broken mixers led me to make the best decision of my musical career which was switching over to an amp and speaker stack.

The Barbetta and the Rolands are louder than the Motion Sound.

Peaveys aren't the best sounding amps, I know cause I've got a KB-300. Notice I didn't recommend one to you? I think you should get rid of the Peavey, adding another cab might make things easier to carry and look a little better but it won't make anything louder or sound (much) better.

If you're playing bigger shows then the venues should have better PAs and foldback, so you should at least be DIing you stuff for the FOH mix. Having your own amps on stage is fine for stage monitoring but you don't want to try to fill the room with it.

If your bandmates are cranking everything up super loud on stage so you can't hear anything then you should tell them to turn it down. Amps need to be loud enough to be heard over the drums but no louder. Get them to put their amps up, either tilted back or on crates, so that they're pointed at their ears. You can't hear through your knees so there's no point having your amps blasting away at them.

My band has done a lot of touring and we always DI everything and monitor through the wedges, but we're playing decent venues with good PAs and we don't have any amps on stage at all.

I also mix quite a lot of bands, of those the ones with keys usually get DI'd for the FOH mix. Those who use amps on stage to monitor in a full band use a variety of amps; a couple have the Behringer Keyboard amp which is c**p, a few use guitar amps which works well for some sounds but is pretty much all mids. Quite a few use bass amps, the Hartke one that tilts back is pretty good, but that's probably because it's sending the sound straight to your ears.

Managing stage levels is an important thing, really big acts don't all have their amps cranked up as louds as they can go. I know guitarists love turning everything up more and more but if you want to get anywhere your bandmates will have to learn to turn down on stage and let your engineer control what the audience is hearing.

Oh yeah, and if you want to ignore everything I've told you then check out the Yamaha Club series PA cabinets. The S215V looks impressive and goes for just over $500. I find 15 inch drivers aren't punchy enough for me though, I'd rather have a pair of 10s or 12s.

The amp is just an old PA with a bunch of channels with their own 3 band EQ as well as a mater EQ. I use this PA head because I need four channels and it's the only thing I've found to run four independent channels with separate EQ's. The head shouldn't be a problem unless I end up needing more wattage (I'm not positive but I think it has 200 watts) I just want something like this



2 10's a 15 and a horn any leads on a good deal would be awesome. I have to admit a lot has to do with the look but the range also plays a huge role.