roland cube 60 goes down in price

heho amigos. the roland cube 60 is 299 at thomann.de. very, very tempting, because it is so light and unbrakable from what i heard. does anybody here have experience with it? i had a cube 30 for a while. that sounded good, but was not "filling" enough for the band. maybe the 12" speaker helps. eddie

I've got one and still have it. I used it at church for a while. It's versatile enough but I ended up using 'black panel' simulation and some reverb. I still use the pedals for OD and delay. I wish it had footswitchable amp simulation apart from the JC clean.

I'll keep it because it didn't cost me much (used) and handy when jamming with friends and that. If I'm buying, I'd rather get a 15 watt tube amp. The Epiphone VJs look very tempting.

Pal of mine - pro player - bought a Cube 60 a while ago and has been mightily impressed with it, so when an almost-new one recently came up on UK eBay with a BIN price of £120(GBP) - that's about 168 euros or US$240 - and in London, close enough to collect in person, I snapped it up PDQ. It's in perfect nick and so new it still had the sticker on the grille, so I reckon I got a bargain.

This amp is a remarkable little beastie, with a sonic punch way out of proportion to its tiny physical size and absolutely no lack whatsoever of bottom end. The modelled overdriven sounds are great fun to play around with and gratifyingly convincing. The built-in effects, though their range of adjustment is limited, are a big bonus, particularly for indoor practice/noodling, and the amp retains its tonality at all levels from "don't wake the baby" to "Holy 5hit!!!".

However, I still had doubts as to how well the Cube 60 would perform in a real gig situation, but I needn't have worried. I used it on Saturday on a tilt-back stand in a big hall and it performed superbly. I used just the JC Clean and Blackface voices, running my outboard effects into the front end, and it sang out loud, clear and full without my having to set the volume controls even half-way up.

I've seen some critical comments about the plastic jack-sockets and I agree that they seem a potential weak point. However, by the simple expedient of giving the signal lead (cord) a turn or two around the stowage hooks on the back before plugging in, any strain caused by wayward feet won't reach the jack plug.

My Cube 60 isn't going to replace any of my other gigging amps but it's an immensely useful additional weapon in my armoury, brilliant for practice, home or studio rehearsal and any gig where space is tight. Thoroughly recommended - buy yours today!

BTW, I've bought a few items from Thomann myself and I have nothing but good to say about their service. Excellent company to do business with.

heho amigos. the roland cube 60 is 299 at thomann.de. very, very tempting, because it is so light and unbrakable from what i heard. does anybody here have experience with it? i had a cube 30 for a while. that sounded good, but was not "filling" enough for the band. maybe the 12" speaker helps. eddie


Maybe I'm missing something... €299 = £200 approx. The Cube 60 has had a rrp or £199 for quite a while, street price about £175.

Great amp - I too have seen pros buy them for small function gigs.

Colin's right - although Thomann's price for the domestic German market is 299 euros, for the UK they're only asking 289 euros including carriage, or about £210 at your credit card's typical exchange rate. Must be different VAT rates or something. However, Soundslive.co.uk are punting the Cube 60 out at £148.00 and Dolphin Music at £148.99.

Eddie - you may find a better deal than Thomann somewhere in Germany, or it may even be financially viable to buy from a UK supplier such as those above. The mains voltage is the same in Germany but you'd have to change the plug or use an adaptor.

Probably our best store in Milan. I guess they can ship internationally, save their address and have a look sometimes. Not all the pages have their English translations (not the guitar amp page)

http://www.luckymusic.com/ita/products/dettaglio.php?id=23124

if i buy it i will buy at thomann. i had such good experiences with the guys, i let them have my 10 euros more. i send so much stuff back and forth, any other dealer would have killed me. never a problem with thomann. i am still a bit undecided....

...I am still a bit undecided....

If my experience is anything to go by, you won't be sorry. Go for it! :grin:

I've done small country music style pub gigs with one and it's easy to get a decent clean sound that's pretty well as comfortable to use and as responsive as if you were plugged into a small tube amp. It was just a drummer, a bass player, a vocalist and myself and I didn't find myself wishing I weren't using it. I could just forget about it and play.
It's not as good as an actual tube amp if you really listen or perhaps do an A/B test, especially if you set it for a slightly overdriven sound (there's an edge to the sound that isn't quite smooth enough or something) but compared to most non-tube amps it's pretty darned good.

And it's great for noodling on at home too. You can get the same sounds at whisper levels.

i love my cube 60...it's my take arounder, for sure. with single coil pickups of a lower output, the blackface model sounds surprisingly "tube like"-- i'd say as good as a cheap tube amp. i do have to admit though, i hardly ever use anything aside from this model, and the "JC Clean"

but overall, avery good value

I just sold mine...to our lead guitar player, because it blew his 50W Marshal away. I replaced it with the Roland AC-60, which worked a lot better for my electric banjo. I used the cube 60 for 2 years, and it never gave me any trouble, and I never ran out of head room at small venues. It also has a line out which i used when we used the PA, and the cube became my moniter. Tough sucker too. Mine fell from 4 feet, onto concrete upside down...bounced...and I thought it was done for...nope...nothing broke!

I demo'd a Valve JR and one of these just a couple of weeks ago.

The VJ head and extension cab setup was about the same price as the Cube 60. I chose the Cube and in my opinion you'd be nuts to take a VJ over one of these things. The VJ, while having lots of cool factor, just sounded muddy and dull by comparison.

+1 for great Cube 60 sound. I've used it with acoustic and electric guitars, and have always been really happy.