Well as I might need to use it very soon I just spent an hour at Sound Control, and have come away with the Vox DA5. It has a lot of silly lead guitar effects, and the clean guitar sound is not quite as true as the microcube (I always used the mic setting for guitar, by the way), but you can choose between louder (busking, morris?) or longer battery time (loud enough for me - I don't really want the audience to even notice it's on).

I set up a microcube to cross reference, and the guitar channel is adequate, though the mic channel is dire-sounding, with no eq or ANYthing. However, on those very very rare occasions when I do need mic AND guitar, I can just reverse the channels. A pedal eq can take care of the guitar, mandocello, mandola (new), mandolin and dulcimer, while I use the main channel (including reverb for whistles) for the mic.

The mic through the main channel is a big improvement over a mic through the microcube - that's the better speaker, I guess.

JAB, the bass end it pretty good. Like the microcube there is only one basic tone control, but I've found that the Danelectro 5-stage pedal eqs are reasonably transparent, plus very cheap, and small enough to sit on a small amp. One of those might give the you pump you need for jugs.

Tom