Bought a Gibson Les Paul Studio (Fireburst). Now I need an amp - Recommendations?
 

Ok, this is the Miscellaneous section, so I believe it's ok to post my thread here...

On Friday, I ordered 2 items re: Black Friday sales:
1) A Warwick-Rockbass Alien 6 from Bass Alien. I've already posted threads regarding this item in the Basses threads http://www.talkbass.com/forum/f8/jus...s-alien-935138 and the sponsored Warwick threads http://www.talkbass.com/forum/f238/j...s-alien-935139

2) I didn't mention yet. I wanted to own at least one guitar. I saw a great price at Sweetwater. I bought a new Gibson Les Paul Studio in Fireburst for $599. It's only for my home/personal use so I think a Studio model is fine for me. Now, I need an amp. What are decent amps these days? I'm only interested in a 1 or 2 speaker combo amp, nothing elaborate.

I didn't want to bother signing up & asking in a guitar forums. I'm already comfortable with my TalkBass community & didn't feel like being subjected to "Elite Guitarist Scrutiny". Besides, I know a lot of you play both guitar and bass. Marshall is on my mind, as they seem to go hand-in-hand with Gibson. But I've seen a lot of Orange amps pop up in music stores over the past while & I'm not too familiar with their quality.

You need to decide whether to go tube or solid state. My preference would be a real tube amp for guitar (although I prefer SS for bass).

What's your budget? Marshall or Orange both make great amps, but if you're rich and cost is no object, the very best of the best for guitar amplification has to be Mesa Boogie, in my opinion. Pricey, but just about perfect.

I personally would go with a tube guitar amp, they have always sounded better to me. There are some pretty affordable, decent quality tube amps out there, especially if you go used. Fender makes the Blues Jr., which I own and really like as a pretty good quality gigging and recording amp. Also check out the peavey classic 30 or 50. This amp is the one thing peavey got reeeally right imo. A very sweet amp, I own the classic 30 and it is a very sweet amp.

I agree. I'm a Mesa bass gear user, and have been thinking about picking up a guitar as well (great score on the LP Studio). I've had no issues with my Mesa gear and although it will be pricey to pick up a mini guitar rig, but I know that if I go Mesa I'll be getting quality gear and top notch CS.

You can get a 70's Fender Musicmaster for a pretty good price. I think the amp is 30 watts. It's a low wattage tube amp for bass (what was Fender thinking?) It has a sweet tone for guitar. I know the Black Keys use this amp sometimes.

I really like my Peavey Vypyr 30 modelling amp. It's solid state but they also make a 60 and 120 watt tube version. This guy has a good collection of videos demoing several different versions.

http://www.youtube.com/user/mattrocks01/videos?view=0

I like the suggestions for low-watt, 1-speaker combo tube amps. You will get everything from crystal cleans to plenty of authentic pop rock crunch from these. I myself am hooked on the 15-watt Fender tweed 5E3 style amps, I even use them live, plenty of volume. But the 30-watters from Fender and Peavey are great choices too.

Thanks for the suggestions everyone! I have a starting point now, anyway. My budget's not too high. Maybe $200-$300 at the most. Bass will always be my #1 instrument.

At that price you can also get an old Fender Sidekick from the 80's. There are solid state but they sound amazing. Very warm and tubey.

SS can sound good. Look into a TwinKat. It's a two channel 150 watt 2x10 with some sweet features. They sound great. Not sure what they're going for though. The only bad thing about it is that you can't change tones quickly.

VHT.

A Les Paul, eh? There's only one amp that will make it sound good, that will give it the classic Pete Townshend/Jimmy Page sound, and that amp is...




Ear protection is optional, although highly recommended!
:D

Traynor makes some seriously beautiful sounding tube amps for guitar: Great clean tone, really smooth overdrive too.

http://traynoramps.com/guitar/ycv/product/ycv40/

2-300 bucks? Fender Mustang II or III. Best modeling sounds I've ever heard. As a bassist who wants to play some guitar, these will give you every guitar sound there ever was.

we can't give you a useful answer until we know what you're gonna use it for!

are you rockin' guitar in a band in clubs? 40-60 watt tube amp.

are you jamming in the garage with friends occasionally? 20-40 watt amp, tube hopefully.

are you noodling by yourself, maybe late at night? new solid-state modeling amp with headphone jack, or even a guitar processor thing that lets you get "studio" guitar tones through your computer speakers.

i use various tube amps for actual gigs, and an old johnson J-station modeling thingy plugged into my computer (which feeds my home stereo speakers) for playing at home. the J-station is fun for big sustainy "produced" guitar tones at whisper volume, something tube amps will not do.

It's just for my home use. Likely home recording, if anything. As for my limit, I might go up to $400, in case I've under estimated the cost I should expect.

then i would suggest the current crop of digital modeling stuff, including a bunch of little practice amps that have USB ports and such. they can sound really good direct into a recorder.

there should be plenty of good options for well under that budget. vox tonelab, fender mustang, line 6 pod, etc.

Give the Marshall Class 5 a look. I have one and it sounds awesome. I've never used it in a jam, but it's plenty loud. It's light on features. It just has volume, bass, mid, and treble... no second channel or effects loop or anything, just 5 watts of all tube class A Marshall goodness.

I'm a bass player (duh), but for my guitar noodling it sounds great and it wasn't terribly expensive.

I also looked at the Egnater tweaker. It has more features and it also sounds great, but I figured I didn't need the bells and whistles.

Also, +1 on the Peavey Classic 30. Great sounding amp and it's built like a tank.

A Blackstar combo (used) may be close to your price range and is a perfect match for the Gibson humbuckers. I have the HT20 for my Les Paul along with a B52 slant 412 and this thing just screams in overdrive or is crystal clear in clean. IIRC Blackstar was created by some guys that used to work for Marshall but want to create their own line so it's very Marshall sounding to me. Nothing like my Fender guitar amps, which sound a little twangy in comparson.

I kinda like the Fender Super Champ XD, tube-SS hybrid, 16 amp models and a number of digital effects (Reverb, phasing, tremelo, etc.). To my ears, it has great tone due to the 2 or 3 tubes it has. The different amp models and FX all sound good to me. At 15 watts it's maybe not useful in a band context unless mic'ed, but for home use and recording it's more than adequate.
Now designated the X2, (not sure of the difference from the XD) Avilable at Sweetwater for about $350.