Mesa Boogie Mark V 25 Watt Head - Black Taurus

I was looking to buy an amp that would cover all my needs: portable, can be played at bedroom volumes, as well as with a band, and cover a wide range of genres. This amp is very portable obviously, and is very light. The cleans are very nice, better than I expected. The crunch channel and channel 2 have lots of useable od/gain sounds, ranging in compression levels and voicings. The build quality is very good, as it should be for the price. In my experience, mesas have always been reliable and last forever if you keep good care of them. This amp can be endlessly tweaked to shape the tone you're looking for, which is great for versatility. The negative points of the amp include the price which is competitive with other boutique brands. Also, this is not really a plug in and play amp, as it can be difficult to dial in until you get use to it. The gain, treble and volume are very interactive with each other. Bedroom volume is ok, but even on 10watts, this amp is very loud for quiet playing, and the volume knob is very sensitive at lower volumes. There are better amps for those who play mostly at tv volumes. This amp really excels a little louder. The amp's fan is quite loud, and can heard in a quiet room. Overall, this is the best amp I own for versatility, sound, portability. The few shortcomings are easily overlooked. This is a great amp.

I set out with the goal of purchasing a lower wattage tube amp head. I'm not a gigging musician, just somebody that really enjoys playing guitar. I spent a considerable amount of time researching and listening to a multitude of heads, and I kept returning to this one. I was held back by the price, until I realized why I kept returning to it. The other amps I tried all had one or two great tones, but this amp has a half dozen or more. Further value comes because the amp has built-in reverb (with a separate control for each of the two channels), and a footswitchable eq. With these available, I don't need to buy either a reverb, or an eq pedal. Further value comes through the in-build cab clone. I haven't had a chance to experiment with the cab clone yet, but I'm glad to have it, even though on-line reviews suggest that it is only okay. No compromises are made in this amps tonal quality to achieve versatility. The tones range from clean to crunchy to high gain. I paired this head with the Mesa Boogie 1x12 slant cab. I love the look! I just can't believe that so much sound comes out of something of this size. I get why people love tube amps. (This is my first.) The distortion is so natural sounding. There are so many sounds possible on this amp. I?ll be ages exploring a small fraction of them. (The manual is 45 pages long!) Right now I am really digging the clean channel, but with the gain turned up (master volume too, if possible), the tubes really get cookin! You can turn down and almost clean it up, and then dig in and get a sweet distorted tone. I now know what the volume knob on my guitar is for. :-) I?ve actually already learned some interesting things about my new amp. In the manual they mentioned that it will cause you to play differently. They also mention that it responds quickly to the notes you play. I thought that was just marketing talk, but when I played I noticed what they meant. It is so responsive and sensitive. I?ve already found that I?m picking more lightly and carefully. Subtle differences and mistakes, are way more noticeable. I?ve also noticed a difference between my two main guitars. The amp lets the character of the guitar shine through. I'd never noticed previously that my Strat?s pickups are quieter than those on my PRS. The Strat sounds great on the clean and low gain sounds, but it can?t compete with the PRS and its humbuckers on the high gain sounds. The effects loops is great! With the distortion mainly coming through the preamp, an effects loops is really important. I played for a bit with my delay pedal out front. It was an interesting sound, but way too muddy. It cleaned up really well when I put it through the effects loop. My set-up is now more complicated than it was on my previous solid state amp, where I put all of my pedals out front, and relied on pedal distortion. I now have a few pedals in front (distortion and wah) of the amp and a few more in the effects loop (delay, chorus and phaser). It is a good thing that I bought some extra instrument cables! I don?t really need a distortion pedal any more, but I?ve experimented a bit with the OCD in front of the amp. It sounds great, so much better than it did in front of my previous solid state amp. I used the OCD on the clean channel, but with the gain set to the edge of break up. The OCD gives a boost and gets a great distorted sound. The sound isn?t better than the amps distortion, but it is good, and it is another sound to play with. So much fun! The footswitch is great too. Some people complained on-line that it doesn't allow selection of more options. However, switching between channel 1 and 2, and turning eq on and off is good for me. Very happy with my purchase! I just wish I had more time to play!

When it comes to dialing up tones, this amp is versatile. Clean cleans, furry cleans, crunch, liquid gain. Each setting is very tweak-able. The FX loop is fantastic and the reverb sounds great. The footswitch can create the odd 'pop' which is a bit of a drawback in an otherwise high quality amp. The Cab-Clone DI output sounds believeable and is a handy tool to have. At 25 watts, the MarkV25 is loud enough for rehearsals and small to mid size gigs. It's also super light and relatively inexpensive to re-tube. To summmarize: This little beast wasn't cheap, but it sounds dope and I dig it. I think you'll dig it too.

Ive had this Amp for around 3 months now and its worth every penny. I can get the softest cleans, i can get twangy cleans, i can get smooth jazz tones, i can get classic rock tones up to the most brutal of Metal tones. With a 1x12 you can get great tones at apartment levels and with a 4x12 you can hang with the big boys. I dont even need any pedals to get the tones i want witch is nice and refreshing. Give one a try you wont regret it.

It has it all!! I love hi gain, but my first day playing I stayed on the clean sound. Great for home practice, Stage, Recording, etc... it has it all 10 watt mode shook my house!!

Very versatile amp. Great cleans, and the OD channel's sound has persuaded me to mothball my Green Rhino. I've owned a Mark II since 1979, time to retire it!

10/10 must own!!

Quite Possibly one of the most versatile amps to recently come out on the market. Being somewhat a fanboy of mesa boogie, i've tried all of their recently released lower wattage products going back until about 2011. From Blues to Rock to Metal and back to pristine clean, this amp encapsulates the Fender clean tone with a pushed Marshall in the same box, along with the classic 90's California high gain Mesa is known for, this amp can compare to any amp renowned for what it does well. The seperate EQ is what really brings this amp to life and is essential for it's diverse, verbose tonal possibilities. Although it shouldn't be compared to other products, the nature of the business is just that, and will always be. The mark series is it's own animal boasting versatility and quality tone, defying any genre. The only drawback i could see this amp having, is not as loud as some may like especially for gigging. Also, the extreme Channel (albeit, as little experience i have in that setting) can get muddy with lower tunings or extra strings.

I bought this amp because I am a basement musician and the great sounding Mark V is way more amp than I needed. This mini Mark does everything from great cleans to all the over driven tube distortion anyone could want. I read the manual a couple times as suggested in some gear forums and within a couple of hours i had a sound and tone that i loved and was more than pleased with my purchase of this amp. I highly recommend this amp well worth the price and wait.

I bought this for a small club gig and was blown away at the range and quality of tones you can get out of it. I think some people would like to see foot switching options between the 3 modes within each channel and reverb foot switching, but Mesa had to make some compromises due to the small real estate the amp takes up, which is a winning feature for me anyway. Run this with a quality 1 x 12 cab and you will be amazed, not to mention save your back from any strain. I can carry the cab and head at the same time with ease. It's a winner!

Very impressive, both channels have great tone possibilities. The OD is really good! I use a king of tone pedal, and it sounds great on either channel. I'm a professional musician, and this has quickly become my every gig amp!

This amp is truly innovative and remarkable. The tonal possibilities are really endless, with all the optional settings. Being able to run channel 1 and 2 on different wattages allows amazing voicing. The distortion in this amp is insane and being I have a mesa throttle box I can go anywhere. So the facts. Great cleans and fats with awesome crunch and drive. You get all the angles covered in this amp. Try it and buy it. It's worth every penny for all that versatility.