The comments above illustrate how much the idea of "tubey sound" varies. If that is suppose to mean a warm sound (upper bass, lower midrange prominence), I cannot think of too much gear that is the antithesis of this kind of sound than Audio Research, particularly pre-Reference 3 gear. It would help to know, by comparison of what the OP has heard, a bit more about what the goals are because the different kinds of sound of tube gear is at least as vast as solid state.
In one post above, CJ, Atmasphere and Cary are listed as tube-based brands, and yet, the gear they produce sound quite dramatically different. You cannot reasonably lump together all of the tube gear from just the Cary line alone because the sound among models is so different. The SLP-98 linestage is very different from the SLP-05 (the former having a much warmer sound).
