Amps

Just as there are two classic guitar brands, Fender and Gibson, I have always had a very special affection for Marshall amps. The Marshall stack is the quintessential piece of rock 'n' roll equipment, the icon of loudness. The Marshall sound is hands down what I always go for, and I do so more or less instinctively. It is telling that whenever I sit down with something digital and modelling, the first thing I always do is put it to what I refer to as The Marshall Test. If I can get a saturated Plexi or JCM 800-type out of it, it's all right, otherwise I'm not interested.

For all the allure of a Marshall stack, I've never owned one, not really. Either my 100-watt Marshalls have been combos, or they have lacked the vacuum tubes. There have been exactly two occasions where I've had both the intention as well as the cash all ready to go to purchase The Stack. The first time around, the band broke up right around the time I was looking to make the big purchase. The second and most recent time, I got sidetracked.

When I told the guy at the store what I was looking for, he simply nodded, said I'm going to show you something, and motioned for me to tag along. I did so, whereupon he proceeded to plug me into a 20-watt Blackstar combo.

I still think that that was one of the most spectacular feats of salesmanship I have ever seen. It would have been the easiest thing for him to walk into the warehouse, pick up a JVM 410H, ring it up at the register and collect the commission, if any. Instead he suggested I try something about a third of the price, which, as history has made abundantly clear, was what I actually needed. That's what keeps a customer coming back.

Blackstar Studio 20

Putting my money on a relatively new and unknown brand was not something I did particularly lightly. I still had vivid memories of the nightmare that was my Peavey combo, and did absolutely not wish to own another spectacular lemon like that. It was also way less featured and considerably less powerful than what I had in mind. Still, I swallowed my doubts, crossed my fingers and went at it.

I only had to use the '20 for a few solo noodling sessions, two rehearsals and a gig to come to the conclusion that it was just perfect. 20 watts were just about enough for my intended use, and upon further reflection, I realized that I really don't need more than a clean and a distorted channel. Especially not with an amp that is as reactive to my guitar volume as this. Should I want more, there are boost and overdrive pedals, for nuance, I can actually play the electric guitar and manipulate my playing dynamics, the volume and tone settings, and pickup selection. What took longer than that was for the thing to prove itself in the reliability department. After a scare pretty early on, it has kept ticking like a Swiss watch since 2012.

The Studio 20 has done more than that. It might sound like a cheesy sales blurb, but it really redefined what I like, want and need in an amp. It got me out of coveting all those big-name expensive amplifiers, chiefly because it brought home to me once and for all that good enough actually can be good enough. This didn't happen overnight, but eventually I got tired of plugging into Marshalls, Mesas and the like, asking myself what I could get out of these amps that mine couldn't do for me. For my purposes, I couldn't come up with a good answer.

During the time that I've owned the Studio 20 (I bought it in January, 2011—do the math), it's happened way more frequently that it's been slightly overpowered for what I've asked it to do. Only on a very few occasions have I felt that I could have used more than those 20 watts. On the other hand, those situations have often involved overly-loud bass players, and have been resolved simply by asking the offending party to turn down a tad. It works as long as I don't expect it to have that chest-warming punch of a 100-watter. In fact, I have to turn the bass way down in order to get it to project properly. I don't mind since it still sounds really good.

Bluetooth, Headphones & Refrigerators

In the years that followed, it was plain as day that something had changed, a spell appeared to have been broken. What I learned while processing my buyer's remorse about the Blackstar was immensely helpful (see the article about power for the perfect example). But it did not reflect particularly well on my erstwhile favorite amp brand.

In fact, I soon got rather disillusioned by Marshall. It was all 50- and 100-watt monsters, either anniversary-this or reissue-that, just the same old stuff, at unusable power levels, with not a hint of innovation anywhere. It wasn't bad stuff, but I couldn't help feeling that no matter what I tried, I would immediately afterwards plug into a similar Blackstar, and it would invariably sound like someone had removed a wet blanket from the proceedings. It truly felt like Bletchley had got stuck in 1979, mired in dinosaur rock land, and when they got into headphones and Bluetooth speakers I just gave up on them.

It took years before I could summon any sort of excitement over anything that Marshall released. In the end, they did redeem themselves. We got a range of programmable digital amps (Code). They rolled out small form-factor heads and combos of 1, 5 and 20 watts in the DSL series. There are still more or less impractical reissue amps, but the Studio series packs the classic tones into considerably smaller enclosures with way more useable 20-watt power stages. I might not have found the Code 25 all that useful for recording, but I've had a ton of fun practicing through it, and it's inspired me to write quite a few songs throughout the years.

What's next?

I go through periods where I'm unhappy with my amp and long for something new. There have even been occasions when the common complaints against Blackstar have caused considerable insecurity. Neither tends to last for very long, and I have learned not to make much of them. So what if there are solid-state components in my amp? There are no tubes in Tube Screamers, and that doesn't seem to stop anybody from putting them in front of tube amps. As for the rest, I have found time and again that whenever I feel that it just ain't happening with the Studio 20, all I need to do is to come back to it with fresh ears the next week. By then, the problem appears to have passed, and I love it again. I'm not going to blame my amp for my occasional off days.

I don't have any plans whatsoever to replace my amp. Sure, there are a couple of Marshalls and Mesas that could be fun to try out for an extended period of time, but I absolutely don't feel that anything is missing in the amplification department. Right now, I can say with almost 100 percent certainty that it'd have to take a burglary or a breakdown beyond all reasonable repair before I even started considering buying something new.

This notional new amp would probably be something very similar: 15-25 watts and one or two channels. Reverb is nice but not essential, neither is an effects loop. I wouldn't be averse to looking for another HT-20 used. There are also the Mark II and III versions, which have EL84 tubes and add an extra feature or two, and the St. James 6L6, which is something else entirely.

Looking beyond Blackstar, I'd absolutely consider a Marshall. They've come a long way from 2010-11 in that there is a plethora of suitable amps in their current range. The DSL20 head probably makes the most sense, given that I have a bit of experience playing through one and know that I can get it to sound exactly the way I want. I wouldn't touch the JVM series unless Marshall came out with a scaled-down 20-watt version with the OD1 channel. Any of the small JCM 800, Silver Jubilee or Origin 20 would work provided I used my SD-1 in front of them. The Studio Vintage, glorious though it may sound, would probably need to be played at an impractical volume level to get the tone I want.

Digital Amps

It is by no means certain that I will ever get another tube amp. Digital long ago passed the point where it's impossible to tell a simulation from the real deal. It used to be that you could kind of hear what they were trying to simulate. Nowadays my reaction is more in the style of "holy shit, that's a JCM 800!" Modern modeling gear can even nail the very specific feel of the strings that only a cranked tube amp normally can create. And even if it hadn't, there is still the massive convenience factor to contend with.

What a digital amp or effects unit cannot do is duplicate that presence and ferocity that only a proper tube amp seems to be able to deliver. I am fairly sure that I would miss the experience of standing next to a real amp at full blast. But given the tendency towards silent stages, affordable in-ear systems etc., it feels natural to strive towards a more modern setup. One mustn't forget that sheer volume, while exhilarating in its own way, is just a byproduct of the more essential issue: that I need to be able to hear myself.

For a good many years, I upgraded my digital gear as prices came down and hardware got more capable. I've never really felt constrained or dissatisfied, yet there's been a feeling of constant improvement. The Fender G-DEC was noticeably better than the Digitech RP100, the Blackstar ID:30 better still, and, as long as I played to its strengths, the Marshall Code 25 represented just about the pinnacle of digital sound quality. The Blackstar was starting to show its age after six or seven years, but by that time something else had happened. A paradigm change. Software amps.