Return to How to buy an electric guitar
When buying a new
amplifier, there are about ten gajillion things you need to keep in mind. Since I'm a space-conscious noder, I think I'll only list the first four or five gajillion here.
Firstly, do your research! Coming here was a great first step. A
salesman can smell
ignorance like a
lion can smell a wounded
gazelle...and they'll both
pounce in a New York minute. Walking around my local
Guitar Center, I've seen the
uninitiated tiptoe around the place like they'd found Solomon's mine. With a little
research and
preparation beforehand, you'll be well on your way to getting exactly what you want without having to give up your
firstborn as payment.
Solid-State vs. Tube Amps Ahh, the age-old question. Tube Amps get a
warmer
tone,
overdrive easier, and make for a great conversation piece in a guitarists' pissing contest. Solid-State amps are
cheaper, don't require regular
maintanence, and are generally less moody than their
valve-based
counterparts. Y'see, a solid-state amp uses
transistor circuitry to do its thang, which usually results in a sound musicians describe as 'cold' and 'unyielding'. A Tube Amp uses power
tubes to process the
signal coming through the
input. Somehow tube
gremlins are friendlier than transistor gremlins, resulting in a nice
creamy tone with a much richer
mid-range. However, the
jazzies swear that solid-state's better, because they're harder to
overdrive and they give off a more crisp
high-range tone. It all depends on your
personal preference.
Head n' Cab vs. Combo This one is mainly a factor of
noise and
money. If you're a
professional performer playing to
stadiums of 10,000+, get yourself a nice 100-watt head and a wall o' cabs and
destroy the place. But if you're an
amateur or a semi-pro
weekend warlord, a nice 30-50 watt combo with a 1x12 or a 2x12 speaker unit should do you fine. Which brings us to my next point...
Wattage Don't let the numbers fool you; more
wattage does
not mean more
noise. However, more
wattage does mean that the
amp will stay true to the
tone at greater
volumes,
i.e. You have to crank it up to get good
overdrive. Most high-end amplifiers will have a
channel volume as well as a
master volume, so you should be able to
overdrive just about any of them without
deafening your nearest neighboring country.
Effects On-amp effects are
all the rage these days, and I've got to admit, they can be pretty useful when you've got something you really like and want to stick with through your entire set. I'm kinda
partial to my amp's coil-driven
reverb. It's an effect that's pretty much
static in my
repertoire, so I leave it on all the time. But then there are some onboard effects that just
piss me off. Like
flange. Some guys like a little
flange in their music...I'm just not one of them. So I leave it turned off, and now I've
paid for an
effect I don't use. Another thing to look out for when you're buying an amp for the
effects it to check whether the amp supports
footswitching, and if so, find out whether the footswitch is
included. This is one I learned from
experience...
Well, that's all for now, kiddies...Good luck out there, and jam responsibly.