Search

Stringed Guitars

Created by a passionate guitarist, containing a bit of gear reviews and news

Open Search
Tag

Marshall

Marshall Code

So, a few weeks ago Marshall posted on their official Facebook account that on the 21st of January they where going to “change the world” again or something like that, when I saw that I got really anxious and I honestly had no idea what could they possibly launch, they don’t need much do they? it’s like Coca Cola… they got the brand and the recipe… nothing needs to be improved, no matter how many flavours they launch you always go back to the regular Coca Cola, however they’ve launched something called “Code”, which is effectively a modelling amp.

Marshall has been smart about this, let’s be honest.. there are tons of amp modellings… but they are from Line 6 or VOX, and to be honest they are not the most popular amps out there… but they offer modellings that “recreate” the sound of the classics, however… nothing gets more classic than a good old Marshall tube amp, and if you’ve tried these modelling amps I think it’s fair to say that they are excellent… but you still want a Marshall.

The idea behind this is brilliant, it’s a cheap-ish (£169 for the 25w combo version) solid state amp that can recreate pretty much any other amp in the Marshall range, but it’s not only that… for those of you that are crazy about tubes/valves this little amp lets you combine pre-amps with output amps using different combinations of tube types on either of one of them, and this is great because this is something that’s hard to achieve when you have a tube amp, you can’t just go around changing tubes without re-biasing or buying adapters.

I don’t know about you but I’m thrilled with this and can’t wait to get my hands on one, I’ll certainly be sharing the experience if I do so!

Main photo is from Marshall official website: link

here is a cool video from Marshall showing the features of this product:

1

A decent practice session

It’s a well known fact that musicians have a hard time getting a decent practice session where we live, doesn’t matter if it’s a house or a small flat you’ll always be bothering someone if you try to drive the tubes on your amp.

So we usually spend loads of money trying to find a perfect practice amp, and I’m not saying I found the perfect couple… but pretty close to it.

I purchased a Blackstar HT1-R it’s 1W with a 8″ speaker and reverb, but… it has an 12ax7 tube which makes a big difference, it’s a pre-amp tube so it won’t give you a true tube sound but this amp sounds so big! I mean… 8″ speaker but it just has loads of oomph and at really decent volume, the best thing about this amp is that it’s loud enough to be used in a full band practice session but it’s also appropriate for “bedroom practice”, and it’s not too expensive, they go used for £150 or so.

All in all I totally recommend this amp as a practice amp, it’s so much better than a small Marshall.

Marshall… Marshall… (echoes..) so… I can’t insult a Marshall and even less when I’m talking about blackstar, as you may know Blackstar was founded by ex Marshall employees.

Of course my other favourite practice amp is a Marshall.. and it’s the already mentioned on this website Class 5. this is superb… but slightly louder and you need a bigger space to drive the 10″ speaker and the full tube circuit, even if you get the model that comes with a master volume (or an attenuator) it still feels that it needs more volume to get the best out of it… I absolutely love this amp and it just screams AC/DC all over the place it’s not versatile at all.. but then who wants versatility, we only want one thing.. or maybe two… Blues and Rock!

Add this Marshall Class 5 to the practice amp list… but only if you live in a house and you got a room far away from parents and neighbours, because you’ll need to crank it! and this one can be used for a gig or practice at any time.

So there you go… my 2 favourite practice amps. Marshall for blues or rock and Blackstar if you want to blast some Megadeth from your guitar.

0

Marshall Class 5

The little beast.

I’ve always wanted one of these boutique looking Marshalls, I’ve had JCM 900, JTM30, etc. you name it. But this one just looks awesome.

Don’t be fooled by the fact that it’s only a 5 watt amp, this thing can scream! I’ve used in on rehearsals and on pub gigs, and it held up pretty good without any PA assistance, I’m not sure why but it’s just too damn loud.

This is the first version they released which doesn’t have a master volume so it’s practically impossible to get a nice distortion without having your neighbours call the police, Marshall later released a 2nd version with an open back and a master volume which of course allows you to get a nice distortion at practice volume.

By the time I bought this beauty I was not aware of the existence of a 2nd version so I added a master volume my self to the back of the amp, it’s not the prettiest looking mod… but hey… it does the job.

This amp combined with any of my vintage Gibson SGs creates the classic AC/DC sound, great sustain loads of harmonics, the speaker is a “specially designed” Celestion G10-F, to my taste it sounds awesome, probably a Celestion Greenback will be the choice if I wish to swap the speakers, but for now I think this is one of my all time favourite amps.

_DSC7511 (2) _DSC7512 (2)

0

Blog at WordPress.com.

Up ↑