2014 Music Man 212 HD 130 combo

Very Good condition, 7/10, Made in Italy, price brand new was 16950SEK (about 1700USD), date on the back is 11/2014, the knobs have been replaced with chrome metal knobs with painted blue dots, otherwise original condition, more info:

What a nice surprise on the 2014 Frankfurt Music Fair:

Music Man amps are coming back. DV MARK (dvmark.it) displayed reissues of those silver-black Music Man amps that were popular in the seventies and eighties. Clapton played Music Man amps, Albert Lee played them, and of course Mark Knopfler. He used 130 watts combos on the Communiqué and Making Movies tours. The complete Music Man amp line was discontinued in the early eighties.

Here are some first impressions on the 212 HD 130 combo:

The reissue looks similar but not identical to the original. They all have of course the black tolex cover and the silver front grill, also the familiar Music Man logo on the front. The logo is the inverted silver on black version of the late Music Man amps (after 1980) instead of the original black on silver logo on Marks amps. It is also a bit smaller., This is a 2014 reissue of the original from the 70s-80s. Has the sound and power of the original at about half the weight! Originals are 80+ pounds, this one is 42 lbs. These were produced by Music Man in partnership with Mark Bass in Italy.

It has four EL34 power tubes and one 12AX7 for phase inverter. Front end is solid state. Leo Fender wanted these to be the Twin Reverb killer, and at 130 tube watts, it is. This is a loud, clean amp that takes pedals beautifully. Has Reverb, Vibrato, Tuki Cover. The reason this amp is half the weight of the original is due to a Toroidial output transformer and two Neo 12 speakers. These speakers are rated at 150 watts each. This amp will get very loud and melt your drummers pesky cymbals, but if you try to dime it the speakers will struggle a bit. This is a common challenge with Neo speakers. They sound great at realistic stage volumes and beyond.