I bought this a year or so ago just to try something new. I have lots of other affordable outboard preamps but the B12A has become my go-to for basically every mono source (and often followed by a DBX 160A when appropriate). It's my best DI for bass guitar hands down- so rich and full! Paired with an e906 in front of a V30, it's perfect for clean, dirty and heavy guitars, but I haven't tried DI for IRs yet (not really my thing). Perfect on kick drum, but since I only own one B12A I haven't tried it on other drums. Pairs really really well with my WA67- I've never heard my vocals or acoustic guitar sound more "finished". In all cases, the GAIN knob is between 11 and 1 o'clock depending on the source, so BLA has it dialed in at noon as a good design should. I used to think the lack of output control was a major flaw, but I got the quad version a few months ago and it just doesn't seem to have the same mojo. The paperwork for the quad says the OUTPUT knob is just an attenuator but I don't think that's quite right. More importantly, I find it significantly more difficult to dial in the right GAIN and OUTPUT on the quad and always second guess if a different blend would make it sound more like the single channel unit. So, I've become thankful for the simplicity (purity?) of the single B12A mkIII and it's musical representation. I don't think it's entirely clean because it does add coloration, but if there is any distortion around the noon position, I think it's mostly in the low end… read more and very tastefully subtle. Besides, if I want real dirt, I have Neve clones and other preamps that do just fine for that.

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