Characteristics of Blues Cube Stage and Artist

[Jones89]

Hi all,

Currently, I’ve a Roland Blues Cube Hot, that works fine for most things. It has some issues that I’m not totally satisfied with. I think it has something to do with headroom and with it being a small tweed amp, which of course is the nature of the beast. I like it when playing clean/semi-clean, but when I turn up the channel volume or use my Mad Professor Sweet Honey OD (especially with my ES-335 copy and especially when playing chords) it all turns into mush. It’s a very ‘compact’ overdrive sound.

On my practice amp (Fender Champion 20) I mostly play the ‘middle’ model of the tweed and blackface, which is supposed to be a Deluxe. I think the Stage is supposed to be closer to a Deluxe and the Artist closer to a Bassman. I would probably buy an Ultimate Blues Tone Capsule to get the Blackface sound.

Right now, someone is selling a Blues Cube Artist really cheap, but I’m not sure if it’s the right one between the Artist and a Stage. I don’t really need the extra power, effects loop and tremolo of the Artist (but the Presence knob is a nice addition of course), so I’m only interested in hearing how the character of Stage and Artist differs, if someone is able to describe it? I cannot tryout both amps, since no shops have them where I live

- Jonas

 

[superjam144]

From what I understand they all have the same tone essentially but the artist has a bigger cabinet and more knobs/features. I have the hot and artist models. Great amps.

I found a great demo of all 3 online, it was at a namm show. I’ll see if I can dig it up.

 

[ruger9]

For more headroom you could buy one of the Tone Capsules, I use the Ultimate Blues tone capsule, and it gives the clean channel more headroom (and also gives the dirty channel more gain.) They also have the Sparkle Clean and New York Blues tone capsules, I've never used them but I think they also have more headroom.

FWIW, I've had my Artist 1x12 for 3 years now, I use it with my band all the time, it's light, sounds great, sounds great at any volume- something tube amps have a hard time doing-, and has given me zero problems. I keep threatening to bring my Hot Cat to gigs, but why bother when the Artists sounds so good and is so much easier to transport?

 

[Jones89]

From what I understand they all have the same tone essentially but the artist has a bigger cabinet and more knobs/features. I have the hot and artist models. Great amps.

I found a great demo of all 3 online, it was at a namm show. I’ll see if I can dig it up.

So the only difference should actually be the cabinet size, and you can’t really compare it to the difference between a deluxe and bassman, which I guess is totally different circuits?

And did you ever try the Stage as well?

 

[Jones89]

For more headroom you could buy one of the Tone Capsules, I use the Ultimate Blues tone capsule, and it gives the clean channel more headroom (and also gives the dirty channel more gain.) They also have the Sparkle Clean and New York Blues tone capsules, I've never used them but I think they also have more headroom.

FWIW, I've had my Artist 1x12 for 3 years now, I use it with my band all the time, it's light, sounds great, sounds great at any volume- something tube amps have a hard time doing-, and has given me zero problems. I keep threatening to bring my Hot Cat to gigs, but why bother when the Artists sounds so good and is so much easier to transport?

Yes, I’m probably going to get a Ultimate Blues, but for that I need either the Stage or Artist

 

[Happy Enchilada]

I love my Blues Cube Stage.
But since they all have the Wattage selector switch that makes them sound just as good at "bedroom" volume as "gig" volume, I wouldn't pass on a great deal on a Blues Cube Artist.
I haven't heard many people here or elsewhere complain that their amp has TOO MUCH POWER.
Usually it's the opposite.
So yeah, if the deal is screamin' on the Artist, I'd jump on it.

 

[superjam144]

So the only difference should actually be the cabinet size, and you can’t really compare it to the difference between a deluxe and bassman, which I guess is totally different circuits?

And did you ever try the Stage as well?

I haven’t tried the stage. I wanted a larger amp essentially for the look of a nice blues deluxe sized amp. The extra power could prove useful if you ever start a group later on too.

They are feather light. I read in the manual that the circuit for the blues cubes was based on a bassman.

I would get the artist.

 

[Blrfl]

The firmware in all of them is the same low-headroom 5F6A model; just the cabinet, number of speakers and feature set differ.

I have the Artist with the Ultimate Blues tone capsule and find that firmware a better choice for my wants/needs, which include headroom.

 

[johnnyASAT]

Artist has onboard tremolo, which I think the amp needs. I have a stage but I find it needs my Mr. Moto spring reverb/tremolo to feel complete. I really like the stock tweed Bassman tone but I also have the UB capsule. The lower headroom of the stock setting is kind of offset by the master speaker and wattage settings, but I can see the UB opening things up for pedals. But the artist has an effects loop, something else I wish the Stage had, so that might not be too much of a consideration.

 

[Jones89]

And the bigger cabinet of the Artist will mean more bass, but less treble and mids or how does that work? And a more open sound?

 

[ruger9]

And the bigger cabinet of the Artist will mean more bass, but less treble and mids or how does that work? And a more open sound?

Maybe a little more low end. Bigger cabinets generally = more "girth" or "body" in the tone. It doesn't affect mids or treble much, just the perception of them, due to the slightly increased bass.

 

[albatros]

I owned a Roland Blues Cube Hot & I sold it. It simply didnt sound good to me. After that I bought a Fender 57 custom champ & never looked back. I would also say that I love my Roland JC 22 which is a completely different amp but a very good one.

 

[chucker]

when the time came i was short of cash and got a blues cube hot. otherwise i would have paid the extra for features i would never use. whatever. roland makes some nice gear.

 

[archiestone]

The whole 'tone capsule' concept ruined those amps for me. Too pricey! - esp. on top of what you shell out for the amp.

 

[Robert H.]

I have the Stage. It's got excellent headroom and tone on the Clean channel and the attennuater works like a dream. I don't use any capsules. But if I had an opportunity to grab the Artist at a good price, and didn't have the Stage, I'd do it in a second.

 

[CVS54]

I have had the Artist for close to 5 years. I have used it a gigs and in the house almost everyday since I purchased it. Never had any quality issues with the amp. It is a real workhorse for me. To get a completly clean tone, I play out of the clean channel and keep the volume at sightly below 3. At 3 or above, it can start to breakup, especially with a guitar with humbuckers. I use the power settings and the master volume to get the desired level of loudness. Some guitars clean up nicely when you roll back the volume knob. Other have mentioned getting a tone capsule. If you want more clean headroom, the right tone capsule might be what you are looking for. I have also found that effects like reverb and delay sound better to me when run through the effects loop. The extra 20 watts of power that the Artist has may be enough to get you the clean tone you are looking for at the volume you need.

 

[AndrewG]

I bought a 'Stage', loved the tone, but once pushed into distortion I felt the designers had engineered too much looseness into the sound resulting in too flabby an overdriven tone-especially for tight rhythm parts; I was playing Les Pauls at the time. Clearly the design brief was to emulate the response of a Fender amp. Did they succeed? I have too little experience with Fender amps to pass any meaningful comment, although I did gig a remarkable (and remarkably heavy!), Pro Tube Pro Reverb for a year or so.

 

[Jones89]

Well well well… I couldn’t resist, so bought the amp! He will send it as soon as he can, and I’m really looking forward to getting it
He sold it for the same price as I (hopefully) can get for my BC Hot, since he didn’t want to bargain and just set the price low from the beginning. So I think it’s going to be a win-win for me!

 

[CVS54]

Well well well… I couldn’t resist, so bought the amp! He will send it as soon as he can, and I’m really looking forward to getting it
He sold it for the same price as I (hopefully) can get for my BC Hot, since he didn’t want to bargain and just set the price low from the beginning. So I think it’s going to be a win-win for me!

I will be anxious to hear whether or not it does the job for you. I hope you enjoy it as much as I like mine.

 

[SRHmusic]

I have both a Stage and an Artist, and mainly play an HSS Strat (or two) with relatively hot, noisless single coils and medium humbuckers. The Stage has more 'spank,' and a definite midrange to the voice, which is really cool. Sounds great with Tele and Strats on the cleaner side. I use it for practice with the band. We used to be in a warehouse where it sounded great.

I gig with the Artist, which has a wider range, in my opinion, for classic rock and blues, but it won't quite get that same voice as the Stage. The Artist channel and boost switching is much better for gigs IMO. Both sound great at the higher power levels, but both also have 0.5 and 15W settings. The Artist has a great, heavy classic rock tone with the neck or bridge humbucker.