Cool Music Gear You Should Know About, part 1: Guitar Amps

Friends often come to me asking for advice on cool, unique, or useful music gear of all sorts. I’ll admit first of all that if you’re a drummer or a bass player than I probably don’t have much for you. However, if you’re recording or if you’re playing keyboards and guitar then I have a few neat treats for you. This time around I’ll fill you in on some of the better amps that I’ve played. These range between $20 to $5000, so there is something for everyone.

So here’s some gear that you may or may not know about, but you should! (I’m not paid by any of these companies)

Guitar Amps:

• Orange- Tiny Terror: This is a freaking cool little amp. It’s inexpensive, great sounding, flexible and just overall a great deal! I can’t think of a downside to owning/playing one of these. Ok, probably not your main stage amp for death metal, but for other things it’s one of the best deals in town for a tube amp.
• Epiphone- Valve Junior: It’s small. It’s cheap. It’s around $150. It’s easy to modify. Oh, and it’s a tube amp! Not all tube amps are great, but this one sure is a great deal and with a little work you can really make it sweet with some simple mods. There is no excuse for not being able to afford a tube amp with this little guy out. None. Ever wanted an easy way to have stereo on stage, but couldn’t afford it? This is the answer.
• Gabriel Amps: Ok, these aren’t cheap and there’s no way around that. But they are rather sweet amps that can do a lot. Not many people know about these, but they are well worth looking into. I have gotten some of the literal best tones of my life out of them. Period.
• Divided by 13: These are simply killer amps. Again, not cheap, but well worth it. Sir Paul McCartney is using these now for his band. Everyone else in the world is looking for 1963 AC30’s that Sir Paul has a closet full of, but yet chooses to use these as his main live amps these days (and often in the studio). If it’s good enough for the wealthiest musician ever, then it’s damn good enough for me.
• Diezel- Herbert: I am not generally a fan of multi-channel uber amps with loads of gain that are made on PCBs. However once you hear these amps your jaw drops. I know certainly if I was going to play something “heavy” that I’d go for a Diezel first and foremost. They aren’t buzzy sounding, they are just huge. Billy Corigan of the Smashing Pumpkins is using these for the most part now, and damn the amp takes over the stage. Oh, and these also qualify as “not cheap”
• Roland JC-120: A Jazz Chorus amp? Solid state? WTF? By Roland? YES! If you’ve ever wanted the cleanest clean on an amp (and on occasion you do need it) then this is the amp to grab for. Somewhat of a one-trick pony imho, but it does it very well. You can find them for $200-300USD on Craigslist quite often, although stores will often try to sell used ones for over twice that. It’s solid state and there’s not much to worry about being broken in there. If you’ve got more than 5 amps, you should have one of these laying around. They even made a head-only version, which is pretty cool but rare.
• Smoky Amps: These are weird little cigarette box sized amps that run off a battery. They are about $20. Get two or three! As your main amp? Hell no. To keep with your tuner in your guitar case? Yes. As something to layer up in a track for something ‘different’? Yes. To run a drum machine through and mic? Yes! Plus you can gang them into another amp and use as a fuzz pedal, or drive another cab with them. Freaking cool. Stupidly cheap. If you’re a photographer, think of it like a Holga.
• Selmer Amps: You aren’t going to find these in just about any music store. You’ll likely never see one live- ever. Yet if you should ever come across a Selmer Zodiac, you should really give it a shot. They were often used by the Beatles and other bands of the early 60’s. Between the glowing light on the front pulsing in sync with the tremelo to the insanely creamy tone these are jaw dropping. The prices have shot up in the past 5 years quite a bit. They are far more common in the UK than here in the States. Not something to tour with, but really an amazing amp to have in the studio.

When buying an amp, make sure to check it out at multiple volumes. Think about where you’ll play it. To be honest most guitar stores are pretty bad places to try out amps. Make sure they have a good return policy. Ask if you can test it out one night with your band. You need to make sure that the amp can ‘cut’ through in the mix of the band and stand out, but also you want a certan amount of blend and cohesion. A good amp with do both. Amps also generally sound far different recorded than they do in a room, so if its recording make sure to actually check it out by recording it!

Also for any amp tube or solid state, you should really consider having a backup or at least backup parts for quick repairs if you’re touring or playing live seriously. Extra tubes (complete sets) and fuses at least are must haves.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 6th, 2008 at 11:51 pm and is filed under audio. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.