I'll tell you it can take a spankin, when I slap that bitch the sound is incredible as it is when I get mellow. Loud drummer and it is just fine. I got a lot of Mesa stuff and other amps. This one is goin out tonite and I'm not worried about sound or sound level. Tip, The tubes they are shipped with sound like mud. I'm using jan phillips, and my other fav is telefunkens. This will clean the heck our of that amp like an enema. the stock JJ's suck in this amp.