Rivera amps please bring your opinions..

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Jdub

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I am looking at getting another good channel switcher and the Riveras have peaked my interest. No dealers near me so I have to resort to the net. any help is appreciated...

I have read the Rivera lounge thread thread on HC and exhausted all the info I can find on the net..... but I would like to get some specific opinions on some Rivera amps and how they compare to one another as well as how they stack up against other brands.

How do the older Knuckleheads compare to the Ktre?
Can the Ktre get good in between mid gain sounds or is more like the Uberschall in that is is ultra clean or ultra dirty.
How bout the M series in comparison to the Knuckleheads

Lastly how do you find the Riveras stack up against other high end channel switchers like Bogner ,Soldano and VHT. I have lots of experience with these 3 brands, but not in comparison to the Rivera's.

Please bring on the opinions and observations.


Thanks,
Jason
 
my friend has that knucklehead tre i think its called? awesome clean tone, nice channel 2 , and channel 3 sucks IMO. so its kinda like a JSX only with a better clean.
 
TBR1SL and TBR2SL are BADASS!!!!!!

They're the only ones I've owned, I've never played a more versitile amp, from Jazz to Country to Death Metal.....it'll do it.
 
The TBR series are the only ones that Id even look at. All the rest of the riveras that I have tried throughout the years sucked ass IMHO. I heard the K-tre in person and it sounded like a swarm of bees on steroids. One of the worst POS that I have ever heard IMHO. Teh Knuckleheads also sound liek crap IMHO. to be honest with you, you can get a better tone with a JMP and a pedal.
Thats just my take on them YMMV.
 
Gainfreak":7f4bd said:
The TBR series are the only ones that Id even look at. All the rest of the riveras that I have tried throughout the years sucked ass IMHO. I heard the K-tre in person and it sounded like a swarm of bees on steroids. One of the worst POS that I have ever heard IMHO. Teh Knuckleheads also sound liek crap IMHO. to be honest with you, you can get a better tone with a JMP and a pedal.
Thats just my take on them YMMV.
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Keeping it real. Thanks Ralph!! Happy Holidays..
 
i've got the kr-100 and it's pretty sweet, but it does have its flaws. it can be pretty fizzy with the boosts at low volumes in particular. the mid gain range isn't bad. much better than an uber for sure. the clean shines wonderfully. i've recently started to like the vht's more, though.
 
I had a KHII with KT88's and I thought it sounded great....but only at loud volumes. At bedroom volumes it sounded like a swarm of bees for sure (footnote: Ralphie :) )
 
AmpliFIRE":c175f said:
I had a KHII with KT88's and I thought it sounded great....but only at loud volumes. At bedroom volumes it sounded like a swarm of bees for sure (footnote: Ralphie :) )
Click to expand...
I would agree as well. Bees with the master low. Much better without a ton of preamp gain, and cranking it to quite a bit to band rehearsal levels. Sucked ass at bedroom volume (well my KH2 that is).
 
you either love em or hate em !

I'm totally splawn/marshall so Rivera is definitely not my cup o tea

NOTE: I did happen (over 10 years ago) play a TRB1SL so I'll agree with Juggernaut 100 %

Juggernaut":2014d said:
TBR1SL and TBR2SL are BADASS!!!!!!
Click to expand...

in a word TBR = Bogner-esque :rock:
but less congested :thumbsup:

The problem is the KN and BH series & M series sounds NOTHING like
the TBR series.

I for one would like to see ( and would buy!) rivera put out a TBR based preamp or single channel amp a la JCM-800.

I gave up waiting and bought a splawn instead

after buying one of the 1st KN's paul rivera ever made and discovering that it didn't sound at all like the TBR-1 I played years ago. I immediately sold it and bought a BH after being told by rivera that quote " the BH is more marshally". I

Yeah Right !!, I went splawn and never looked back.
 
Jdub":4a753 said:
I am looking at getting another good channel switcher and the Riveras have peaked my interest. No dealers near me so I have to resort to the net. any help is appreciated...

I have read the Rivera lounge thread thread on HC and exhausted all the info I can find on the net..... but I would like to get some specific opinions on some Rivera amps and how they compare to one another as well as how they stack up against other brands.

How do the older Knuckleheads compare to the Ktre?
Can the Ktre get good in between mid gain sounds or is more like the Uberschall in that is is ultra clean or ultra dirty.
How bout the M series in comparison to the Knuckleheads

Lastly how do you find the Riveras stack up against other high end channel switchers like Bogner ,Soldano and VHT. I have lots of experience with these 3 brands, but not in comparison to the Rivera's.

Please bring on the opinions and observations.


Thanks,
Jason
Click to expand...

I owned the M100 for about a year; the clean channel is bar none one of the best cleans I've ever played. The gain channel is either love/hate. Kind of a hot-rodded JCM800 tone, but smoother in the mids. I couldn't really get it to do what I wanted, but I was in more of a metal phase then (a few years ago). You could easily get chugga-chugga metal with a good boost, but maybe more so 80s metal without. There are tons of tones to be had, but a LOT of tweaking (especially the drive channel) as the EQ is very interactive.

Most people agree they're built like a brick shithouse; however, within a week of receiving mine off of EvilBay, the power tranny fried. Now, it could've been due to the previous owner/music store being retarded and not taking care of it, but it didn't fill me with warm fuzzy feelings. The replacement worked like a charm, though, and Rivera was a pleasure to deal with.
 
Remember the TBR series comes in either SL (Super Lead) or M which is multi-voiced. It doesn't have the same gain structure as the SL but I can state that it's clean and crunch are very good. As far as build quality, Rivera amps are equal to anything outthere. They are tough, industrial built amps. The discontinued Jake series is killer, I personally love Rivera amps, and dig the Chubster 40 and the Venus 6. Their subwoofer systems are monstorous!

TheGrooveking
 
Thanks much everyone.

I will keep my eyes open for a TBR. I understand the M series is almost identical according to Rivera, but others disagree??
 
aloha j!

i had the tbr-1, standard, not the super lead SL or dumble M voices. i tried to mod mine to the SL but paul said they ran out of the components to do it.

the amp on a whole was very tight/stiff straight in. it did produce some great clean tones along the country pedal steel lines, but the crunch was a little too dry for my tastes. never cared enough about the preamp tones to really pursue it as a stand alone channel switcher.
however when i traded it out the guy who picked it up had a emg strat and it got a lot hotter and grindier sounding.

overall i think the tbrs are solid, and were built in the era where racks became en vogue, so you had a lot of nice features like pcomp or pickup compensation control, a pre-preamp loop for pedals, a true post preamp effects loop with independant send and return level controls...honestly i ended up using it as a stereo power amp for my triaxis and i traded it for a mesa 395 which imo sounded better as a power amp with the tri,

but i bet if you scored a tbr SL and NOSed it with tubes and maybe even modded it up a bit, you'd have quite an amazing deal.

i'm with gainy on the knucklehead and you can toss in the bonehead as well....those amps are putrid and made me laugh out loud.
 
A buddy of mine has an old BONEHEAD for sale.

3 channels, super clean-mid drive- full on.


these amps really resopnd to tube changes rather well.
popped and old nos in the v1, made the amp more alive.

for info, pm me.

Brae
 
Thanks all for your opinions. I really appreciate all of you taking the time to respond..

To clarify, my goal here is to get a good amp or two to achieve good, usable tones at both band and home levels at a reasonable price. I have shitloads of high end amps and guitars laying around and need money (winter in a beach resort town In oregon) So I want to ditch all my corksniffer stuff and get some poor mans gear that will still sound good.. So with that said thanks again for your input. Here is where i am at with it now..

I have tried a few Riveras out recently. I actually bought an M60 combo. It was here locally, and in great shape for a fair price. I found that I do like this amp reasonably well. I use it with my Bog 212 cab and it certainly gets the job done. The cleans are only fair though and not as good as i had remembered the M series to be. Slightly boxy and they do not have much headroom. Fair to good but not great. The dirt is good. Very Marshallesque, but thicker in the mids. Slightly dry and boxy, but holds its own and is no slouch. Not the best, but pretty damn good, especially for the $. Also gets good tones at low volumes. All in overall good review of the M60, but not sure it will quite satisfy. Good as backup or a second amp, but i still want something a bit better..

I had a Knucklehead K Tre for about 10 days now. It has some incredible clean tones. About the best cleans I can recall from a high gain channel switcher. The loop worked well, the features are also very well thought out. The gain channel is very bright, scooped and buzzy at low to modest volumes. ( I can see where the negative comments come from) BUT... If you crank it up and the get the Master at 3 or better, the amp changes greatly. Back the gain and bass off, crank the mids and it is pretty killer and very dynamic. Clean to scream with a flick of the volume knob. However..tt still has an overall scooped sound, so it is not really my thing, ( I loves me midrange) If I worked at it, I could get some pretty killer tones out of it, ( at really loud volumes) but basically I was setting the amp to achieve tones that is was not really designed for.

In a nutshell, I must be too old for this amp. I can't name a slipnot, tool or other new age metal band tune to save my life, and do not really care to learn; not my bag. Being from the Schenker, Lynch, Roth, De Martini, Malmsteen , Rhoads school, the Ktre went back to Portland Music as it just was not the right amp for me. They were great to deal with and allowed me a 10 day trial. It was worth it to check it. Overall. Awesome cleans, good dirt when cranked, sucky at low volumes, and geared at the younger crowd IMO. I will say it is a good amp IMO, it does what it was designer for. I do not think it is bad, it is just clearly a scooped, booming, new metal monster.

I know have a Knucklehead reverb on the way (used)_ and hopefully it will be somwhere in the middle of the M and the Ktre..
 
Gainfreak":35808 said:
The TBR series are the only ones that Id even look at. All the rest of the riveras that I have tried throughout the years sucked ass IMHO. I heard the K-tre in person and it sounded like a swarm of bees on steroids. One of the worst POS that I have ever heard IMHO. Teh Knuckleheads also sound liek crap IMHO. to be honest with you, you can get a better tone with a JMP and a pedal.
Thats just my take on them YMMV.
Click to expand...

YMMV indeed, I had a TBR that was a boat anchor. It did a decent fender clean and a decent vintage marshall, but that was about it. It did high gain as well as Danny Partridge would play Rob Zombie tunes. Took a forklift to move it too!

Pete
 
I've owned three M-100s, an BM-60 Anniversary head and a Knucklehead 55. Rivera makes amps that are bullet prof quality wise. Tone is subjective, so I'll keep it to my experiences with the amp.

I LOVE the M series. If you use the amp right, you have a nice Fender style clean channel and a thick Marshallesq channel. The secret weapon with this amp is the "Slave Master," as you can use it as a third Boogie liquid lead tone. It even has it's own separate EX loop. One of these days, I'll pickup another one of these. They sound great in the band mix, and shine at gig volumes.

The original Knucklehead amps were based off of a plexi type of tone. You had the typical Rivera Clean channel and then a really creamy flavor of rodded plexi. Think Warren Haynes tone in spades. I really miss my K55, and plan on owning one again as well. Although these are getting harder to find. I wish Rivera would bring these back into the lineup.

The K series had more gain but the Ms sound more hot-rodded, if that makes sense.
 
SFW":17117 said:
I've owned three M-100s, an BM-60 Anniversary head and a Knucklehead 55. Rivera makes amps that are bullet prof quality wise. Tone is subjective, so I'll keep it to my experiences with the amp.

I LOVE the M series. If you use the amp right, you have a nice Fender style clean channel and a thick Marshallesq channel. The secret weapon with this amp is the "Slave Master," as you can use it as a third Boogie liquid lead tone. It even has it's own separate EX loop. One of these days, I'll pickup another one of these. They sound great in the band mix, and shine at gig volumes.

The original Knucklehead amps were based off of a plexi type of tone. You had the typical Rivera Clean channel and then a really creamy flavor of rodded plexi. Think Warren Haynes tone in spades. I really miss my K55, and plan on owning one again as well. Although these are getting harder to find. I wish Rivera would bring these back into the lineup.

The K series had more gain but the Ms sound more hot-rodded, if that makes sense.
Click to expand...

Thanks for that. I am liking mt M60 pretty well, and yes the slavemaster adds a real thick, creamy character to the tone... very boogieesque IMO . Alot of guys seem to hate Rivera amps, but not sure why. Possibly if they were only tried at low volumes, than I can totally see it. The Ktre sounded horrible at low volumes, but pretty good when cranked. It was very good at what it is aimed at.
 
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