Quirky old solid-state amps

[Axeman52]

Any love for Award Session amps in this thread?



Really great bluesy sounding solid states from the 1980s - not sure if they are necessarily "quirky" enough for this thread, but I thought they were worth a mention.

[s_mcsleazy]

That Kay at the bottom is mine. Picked it up for £15 at a boot sale. It sounds pretty nice actually. Great for home practice and I think the styling is pretty cool. The speaker gets buzzy as soon as it gets a bit loud so I might find a cheap replacement for it sometime. Definitely usable, even takes drive pedals ok too.

i have the 100 watt vertion of the fal. what impedance is yours? im having a few problems with mine atm

[jthomas]

Heathkit TA-16 combo. Really great distortion. And... also LOUD!

[shoule79]

I've got a couple.

I have this old Gibson SS from the early 70's. Good reverb and trem, nice and loud. Loves pedals, especially a good Rat. My only gripe is a high noise floor. I've had it for sale for ages locally @ $75 and have gotten 0 responses.



I bought this old GBX to use for my bass amp but ended up liking it with guitar. Crappy internet photo as someone I know is borrowing mine. Weird design, its a head and cab, but the amp itself resides in the cabinet and the head is a glorified pre-amp. It was designed like that so that one head could control up to 4 cabinets. The cab is ridiculously heavy though...like 4X10 Bassman heavy.

Its nice and loud (150 watts) and likes pedals. Again it seems to love the Rat. The best 'metal' tone I ever recorded to tape was this amp and a Rat. I say that as someone who used a JCM 800 as my main amp for over a decade.

[preservation]

Does anyone have experience with the old orange Roland Cube 40 ?
One 8"spkr- looks to be built like a tank and there's a kid on YouTube that gets a great sound out of it with his strat...

[gutter rock]

Hey, I used to have one of those old Gibson's as well. Mine was a G100a, crazy deep reverb and a decent pedal platform. I bought it for $100 thinking I was getting a steal, sold it for the exact same amount a couple of years later! I do wish I would have swiped the knobs off of it before I sold it, they were a sweet almost Starcaster style knob!

[fakefurcoat]

Does anyone have experience with the old orange Roland Cube 40 ?
One 8"spkr- looks to be built like a tank and there's a kid on YouTube that gets a great sound out of it with his strat...

I actually do have one of those, it's quite cool. Definitely build like a tank, it's heavier than my Pro Junior. It could probably do with a speaker upgrade but it actually really grinds and has a few great tones, and going flat out has a neat mushy lo-fi thing going. It doesn't have a lot of depth in the sound, but its very clear. That's probably due to the little cabinet though, it might open up more going into an extension cabinet... I should try that.

What sounds really cool is running my Greco violin bass into it with the pre-amp cranked, and then using the Pre-out and going into my bassman. HUUUGE bass overdrive that i've never heard a pedal replicate. Very fun.

it's also a 1x10 by the way, IIRC

[hecubus]

My first amp was a 1990 Fender H.O.T. with gray carpet covering, red knobs, and four push button gain stages. AFAIK H.O.T. didn't stand for anything. There were also a J.A.M and R.A.D. in the series. In typical SS fashion it had sterile cleans and uninspiring distortion. However, it had the best spring reverb! I loved kicking it (gently) to get that boingy splash sound.

[Pedrotheswift]

I have this Ace Tone GH600 built in 1976. Like all the other Ace Tones I've seen and heard about it's loud. I have no idea what the output wattage is but it kicks ass. I'm trying to find out more about it . So far all I know is the model name and the year of manufacture. It has a very nice clean sound at low volume reminiscent of British Blues but couple it up to my Fender Showmaster with twin humbuckers and it screams. This amp has a spring type reverb which is very configurable even alongside some effects pedals. If anyone knows any info about it I'd be grateful if you could post it here.

[MattK]

A local pawn shop has a Yamaha YTA-95 for about $A400 - I have no need for it but I am kind of tempted.

[greebo830]

Here's a quirky little beast. (need to get a better picture)


Picked this up off ebay a couple of years ago in a evilbay auction with no reserve, cost me £20 and £19 of that was shipping. I believe that it was made by hohner guitars at the end of the 70''s / beginning of the 80's.
Specs are =
Pine Packing Case
Solid State Amplifier
12” Fane Speaker
2 Inputs (Normal & Bright)
Volume Control, Bass & Treble Controls
Reverb Control
24” x 15” x 10”

Although pretty basic it makes a fantastic practice amp and take pedals really well, the only downside is it's heavy as hell.

[loveinathens]

Any love for Award Session amps in this thread?



Really great bluesy sounding solid states from the 1980s - not sure if they are necessarily "quirky" enough for this thread, but I thought they were worth a mention.

Haven't heard the old ones, but I really like the Award Session Blues Babies.

[fuzzjunkie]

Back when I was first learning to play guitar I picked up a 60s sunburst Jazzmaster at a pawnshop, but didn't have enough money to get an amp. That was okay, because I had a friend who was also learning and his older brothers had a ton of music gear. Drums, guitars, bass (an old Gibson Grabber) and a Fender electric Piano. All pawnshop prizes. Ha!

The guitar amp was an old Yamaha solid state that worked for us because it had multiple inputs so we could both plug into the amp at the same time! It was a strange wedge shape thing. We called it "The Pyramid " but his brother thought it looked like the obelisk from 2001 a Space Odyssey. It was futuristic for the time and even sounded spacey without any reverb. A Yamaha TA-60. I guess they are pretty rare in the US since I don't remember ever seeing another one. Fun times. I remember trying to learn new chords by looking at record sleeves from the Police and Cheap Trick!

This is a TA-30, but same idea in a smaller package.