A member on Lw blues forum mentioned the Zt lunchbox amp very favourably for harp,has any body used or come up with similar positive opinions on this amp,I'm all ears ,cheers
I have one of these...tiny but unbelievely loud. I take it with me when I'm travelling as it doesn't take up much room. I would say it sounds OK for harp....a harp attack pedal makes it sound 100% better. Its quite a clean sound but you can fatten it up with cupping or a pedal. It has a strange ambience control which is supposed to emulate the sound of an amp with an open back but if you turn it full up it sounds like you've added a little reverb. I last used it at christmas time in a pub setting with a guitar player and for once I had to turn my amp down¬!!
Actually Isaac it's not too bad. The secret is to crank to gain and drop the ambience and tone and cup hard. I've just plugged an old vintage 10" speaker and it sounds lovely...very loud and loads more bass. ---------- Oisin
Thanks Oisin! I'm *sorta* in the market for a new street amp for busking (springs a comin' soon here!), and I was actually looking quite hard at the ZT Junior (which I could run off my 12v battery). My current street amp has a 5" speaker, and while it sounds pretty good for its size, it's lacking in the bass department. I was wondering if the ZT's were better, and it sounds like they are, but still not the same as a larger speaker can provide. Perhaps my best option is just to build my own battery powered busking amp with a larger speaker. I may end up doing that, but my time for that kind of stuff is much less these days than it was a few years ago!
It certainly is. I think I may know why Greg didn't like it though. I have just played the amp with a CR bullet mike and it doesn't sound half as good as the Akai DM13 I used earlier..
I'm gonna try and do a youtube vid over the weekend and I'll show you the difference and the immense sound!
I was looking internet for someone who uses this amp to so I've found this topic. I like this amp a lot. It's really loud, it's really lightweight and it has a lineout. I've tried and own some tube amps: twin reverb, blues junior, hot rod deluxe, hot rod deville, some peavey and laney amps, orange. Some of them good for harp some of them don't. In my country is hard to get a good boutique harp amp :) But I think ZT Lunchbox is not so bad. You really can get a good harmonica tone from it and It's loud enough for middle sized club or you can use a line out.
In this video I use it mixed by shure 57 on the middle sized concert hall (~600 people).
In this video I use it without line out: gain on 12, volume on the 4.5, middle sized club.
Please don't listen too carefully my playing in these videos, I don't like it :) Just listen to the amp :) ---------- Konstantin Kolesnichenko(Ukraine) you can by my last album here: CDBaby Amazon ITunes Google Music my music on youtube
4 month ago I bought ZT Lunchbox Jr and I due to size, weight an volume it become an amp I use for most gigs and tours. I can get it with me to the plane, it works great unmiked for small duo gigs for up to 50 listeners. When I put it rather high and close to my ear it help me a lot to hear myself at louder gigs. I am crazy about this amp. Yes, it possible don't have to deep bass, but it have very prominent and fat low mid frequencies. I start to think about getting regular (bigger) lunchbox as it's still much smaller than my other amps and sounds almost as good. ---------- My videos. My album with Mikhail Bashakov. Seydel endorser. LoneWolf Blues Co endorser. Harmonica teacher. My facebook.
Let me first say that I have ZERO personal knowledge here. But, I was out looking for this Lunchbox a while ago and the local store that used to keep it said they´ve discontinued all connections with that producer. They were rather adamant. Product wasn´t up to standard, too many problems, hard to get spare parts and so on. Just take that into consideration if you´re out looking for a new amp. But once again, I´ve no experience myself.
The Lunch Box Jr. is OK for making noise when busking (Runs off 12V). Hard to get deep with a 3" speaker. I bought it way cheap on close out. The cabinet is cheap resin board wrapped in a decal to make it look metallic. Held together with a lot of glue. But it is cheap,small and fairly loud. But what can you expect from an amp < $100.00. One thing is to make sure to place it up high. Not on the floor.
Last Edited by R2D2 on Nov 24, 2015 6:41 AM
I got myself a ZT Lunchbox Junior a couple of months ago, as a busking amp. I'm pretty happy with it. I use an external battery.
It's loud enough, and much smaller than the homemade rig it replaces. It can run off mains powers or via an external battery: very nice.
I've just used it outdoors, my style requires a clean sound, this device delivers it. Don't know what it would be like for more traditional sounds, that would probably depend on what effects you have. It also has a 9V DC output, very nice.
Cheap too. I recommend it. ---------- Tony Eyers Australia www.HarmonicaAcademy.com everyone plays...
Here's rough video I use ZT lunchbox jr unmiked. Guitar played through great Acus acoustic amp, vocal and acoustic harmonica plays through local JBL EON. There's bunch of effects on. Main tone is EV Co4 -> LoneWolf HarpOctave - MXR Carbon Copy - LoneWolf HarpBreak - ZT Lunchbox.
P.S. It's a new song, a have to change harmonicas plenty times so I get them wrong side twice here (:
A little OT here, but that video fascinates me; blues dulcimer is scarce as hen's teeth. Lovin' the sound of harp and bass dulcimer.
Would you know if the dulcimer was built by a fellow named Ken Bloom? The guy is kind of a genius with such stuff. He holds them like a cello and plays them with a bow (blues and everything else). Never seen one played like this before.
This one looks thinner near the headstock and thicker near the tailpiece, which is a bit of a tell on his builds.
