whitemtntn Thanks whitemtntn! That would depend on what type of music I'm playing. If I'm playing Americana type, I like the Cortez, If I'm playing classic rock/hard rock, the Crema. For my tastes, it'd be the Crema, I like the tighter lows when cranked.
Jim you have made one of the best demo vids I have seen on the tube. Thank you. I do have a question though, it sounds like there is some distorted clipping going on, is that from the amps or the sound mix?
Hey Jim, I have a Crema Wheat and a Buckwheat (yes I'm lucky) and I wanted to know if the Mosaic MKII gives up the goods at a much lower volume than the Crema? BTW, I love your demos and it fills the void left by Greg V (I hope he is doing well as he seems to have disappeared from the music world. Do you have any recordings besides those on soundcloud?
Hi, the Mosaic MKII breaks up early and at a much lower volume than the Crema. It's total tweed though, compared to the Crema. Greg V does all the video work for Bogner now and does some great photography , also. Cheers and thanks!
Eventhough the two channels are separated on the Cream Wheat compared to the Cortez (5e3) the biggest difference should be in the speaker. The Cortez comes with a classic jensen 50's 11 oz alnico type speaker and the crema wheat comes with a british speaker with a typical Muller type cone and either a 35 or 50 oz ceramic magnet.Very different sound in those two spekaers.... .. Besides that the crema wheat has a cathodyne PI and cathode biased 6v6 output tubes with no negative feedback like the cortez. But the heavy bass coming of those 0.1µf caps in the preamp of the Cortez (5e3)are never gonna be tight with the 5y3 rectifier and small 16µf filter cap on the 6v6 plates, The Crema Wheat have oversized transformers and runs with a strong GZ34 rectifier and 30µf first filter cap..So more headroom and tighter bass..
I think that the Mosaic with a clean boost would be my favorite. How loud does the thing get? Loud enough to hang with drums for rehearsal or miced gigs? How about apartment/room levels? Breaks up much faster than the other two?
Jake Stewart Music Hi Jake, It's not that loud at all. It'll work with a drummer that's not heavy handed but you won't have any headroom, definitely need to mic it up in a bigger room. I'd say the Cortez breaks up right out of the gate, then the Mosaic. The Crema has decent headroom.
My drummer is a basher, but my intention is to dime the volume and work the volume knob as needed; the dirty tones are my priority. I suspect that this may make the cut for small gigs and larger stages with good sound systems. Seems ideal as a recording amp in my apartment... Thanks so much!
Jim Burkard Thanks for your videos on the Mosaic; wouldn't have found out about it without them. I got my Mosaic MKI 12" last week and gigged it over the weekend. Great tones! Can't wait to take it into the studio and mic it up at home, too.
Was expecting to prefer the crema wheat based on your previous demo's but the Cortez sounded really nice and aggressive on this...obviously a bit looser as well. Didn't like the Mosaic nearly as much
Hi Archie, I only have the 2 Marshall Super Leads now, the reissue and a '74. I sold the Germino Club 40 to get the '74. I could do a vid with the 2 SL's, coolness!
