"Modded Marshall"

[Guest]

When someone says they have a "modded Marshall", is there some widely-accepted assumption about what that's supposed to mean? If there are a thousand different Marshalls and a thousand ways to modify them, how do I know what they're talking about? Is it a vintage Plexi modified to sound like a Soldano? A JCM 900 modified to sound like a Bluesbreaker? An MG with a pick holder stuck to the back panel?

[Demanic]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

Could be any of those and more.

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[GilmourD]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

Usually starts with a master volume in a NMV amp and goes from there.

[Lake Placid Blues]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

It could refer to the cottage industry that sprang up in the 80s of adding gain stages to JCM800s and other Marshalls. Perhaps a better term for that would be Hot Rodded Marshalls, though.

[JeffB]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

For me- modded marshalls are just a nmv or early mv (2203/04) that has been changed to enable higher gain and/or a re-voicing. Most Marshall amps designed post 2203/04, I.e. 2205/10, Jubilee, 900 series, D/TSL are variations on that theme as well...diodes,extra gain stages,revoicings,etc. Blah.

[Securb]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

An MG with a pick holder stuck to the back panel?

That made my morning

[PFDarkside]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

When I hear "modded Marshall" today I think either:
-New crop of high gain amps that trace lineage to the original modded plexi NMV amp's from
The 80's. Bogner, Friedman, Splawn, etc.
-A high gain pedal that is vaguely Marshallesque in the vein of the amps above.

Of course IMO the original definition usually entails 50W and 100W NMV with added master volume and cascading inputs. (Not jumpered, internally cascaded, sometimes with an additional gain stage or two added that inspired the amp's above)

[Aceman]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

I think Plexi to Soldano....

[Empty Pockets]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

It's a marketing term for a Marshall sound with more gain.

[Kamanda~SD]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

It could refer to the cottage industry that sprang up in the 80s of adding gain stages to JCM800s and other Marshalls. Perhaps a better term for that would be Hot Rodded Marshalls, though.

This.

[Darg1911]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

It always means it's a "Marshall" with a one wire mod and a PPIMV.

J/K. Agree that it could mean anything. Only way to find out is to ask what the hell was done to it.

[Kamanda~SD]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

This is also true ^^ Both my 800's have been modified in some way:

My 2204 has an added channel (stock channel is well, stock) which IIRC has some diodes and such in there (I really need to have someone look at it again) for some more gain. I'm usually too lazy to bring my footswitch and the thing sounds deadly on the stock channel so...

My 2210 has been modded as well. Once again, IIRC it was to a) fix the known channel bleed issue and b) to have the 'normal' channel better matched with the boost channel. Once again I usually just run one channel, and Marshall is smart enough to have the default channel be the 'boost' channel when no FS is in.

[El Dunco]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

The JVM basically is already a hot rodded Marshall. The OD channels IIRC have the most gain out of any Marshall while still doing the earlier sounds with the crunch modes. However, I still modified it. I took out C38 and switched a cap to tame the insane amounts of gain (no-one needs that much, it's too buzzy/fizzy) and fix the scratchy sound in the hi-mids. Really minor stuff. Could have probably accomplished roughly the same thing by trying different tube types but I like it now. You can just take any guitar, doesn't even need actives, could have decent passives, plug right into the front and get a great, tight, clear, punchy heavy metal distortion just like a quality high gain amp is supposed to do. I did a similarly minor mod to my Dual Rectifier (2ch) to make the red channel closer to the Revision C sound because I'm really not much of a fan of the Revision G 'grunge looseness'. I replaced the gain pot to 1M and changed the capacitor to an orange drop. Now it doesn't have the fizz problem when the gain goes past 2'o clock and all the gain it has is now actually useable. Same deal. Plug in, you get a badass sound.

I think "modded Marshall" in a general sense means "Marshall timbre with more (of something, usually gain, or whatever). You are right though. It's waaay to broad without mentioning what the modification was to what Marshall. The craze in the 80s and early 90s was to have JCM800s modded for "that Van Halen sound" which I think involved extra gain stages and so on. Dino Cazares described it as "basically like having an extra preamp in front of it and a noise gate built in." Listen to Soul Of A New Machine, Demanufacture and Obsolete. That's a Marshall. Here's a clip of playing through it.



Does it sound anything like a Marshall? Does it sound anything like Van Halen? Not really! Sure, it's bright. It's grindy, but it must have been a hell of a mod.


Kerry King goes on about some 2203 he's always used where "everything just worked". I take that to mean it's stock but he got lucky in that it already had the sound everyone else was chasing.

Then there's that modded JMP Metallica had which got stolen and naturally nobody can remember what the mods were... If you take your Marshall in to an amp tech and just ask him "can you modify this for that modded Marshall sound?" he's probably going to stare at you for a little while waiting for you to finish your sentence before asking what you're on and why you're in his place of business.

[MetalManiac]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

A few posts of mine related to the topic that might be helpful in understanding it;;

http://www.marshallforum.com/threads/hot-rod-superlead-and-hot-rod-jcm800.78190/

http://www.marshallforum.com/threads/is-the-2203-essentially-a-superlead-circuit-w-preamp.77831/

[/url]http://www.marshallforum.com/threads...ain-amp.76097/

[El Dunco]

Re: "Modded Marshall"

A few posts of mine related to the topic that might be helpful in understanding it;;

http://www.marshallforum.com/threads/hot-rod-superlead-and-hot-rod-jcm800.78190/

http://www.marshallforum.com/threads/is-the-2203-essentially-a-superlead-circuit-w-preamp.77831/

[/url]http://www.marshallforum.com/threads...ain-amp.76097/

Those folks sure like to rag on Van Halen.