drpietrzak
New member
My Valve Jr Head arrived a couple days ago. I have played minefo several hours now and have been having agreat time with it. I tried it with my 1x12 closed cab with a Carvin G75 clone, my Avatar 2x12 V30 cab (closed) and my 1x12 cab with the Cannibis Rex (semi closed). I just used my Warmoth guitar (buckers - Seth Lover and Pearly Gates). I hit it with the Jackhammer, the SD-1 (boost) and other pedals and tried my early Weber Load Dump and newer Weber Mass. I have used my Dano 7 band eq with it.
My take is that it is a great little amp. At the current proce it is a steal! Iit is a darker amp, voiced similarly to the early (greenboard) Blues Jr for sound on the clean end and a 18 watt Marshall on the other end. But, it is VERY quiet! As I like a darker sound this was great for me (I use my Blues Jr a fair bit).
It responded great to different speaker cabs, different pick-up selections (split bucker, combinations, etc). It did not homogenize the sounds, but did what I would have expected here nicely.
For break-up it gets into the same sort range of distortion/break-up my Supro, and Champ. So it can get into China Grove territory. It did a decent job with early ZZ sorta, George Thoroghgood (Bad to the Bone), a bit of the Stones, etc with this guitar. With a few tweaks of the guitar I could get some early Clapton, and a Tweedish-early Plexi-ish vibe to my lame ears. For vintage rock and traditional electric blues it was great to me. It has very little head room. But has a nice clean to just break up (SRV-ish territory) to me. As with the Supro the bass side can get a little farty with the wrong cab at full volume. It seemed to have a sweet spot for grind about 2 o'clock (there are no numbers on the volume control), so the knob is pointed at the "e" in volume (give or take a 1/2") a fair bit here.
It seemed to respond very well to the pedals I tried. Each pedal retained it unique character, but as that generally harsh 8k range was not prominat on this amp it sounded nice with all pedals.
As the preamp tube is a 12AX7, you can use any of the 12 series tubes to mess with headroom, etc. I have not tried it, but I would bet the 12AU7, like I have in my Blues Jr now, will country this thing up a fair bit for example.
So in sum, for me, this is a great little amp. For much of what I play this thing is just plug and play. It was the best $99 I have spent on a new amp in a long time. Is it going to replace my dearly loved Genz Benz El Diablo? No. ButI would look very closely at one before I bought another small tube amp. Is it built for the rough road use venue? Probably not. But, neither is my Blues Jr, Supro, or Champ amp either and it is a lot cheaper!
The other, perhaps most telling, thing here to me is that it proves one can be a pretty decent amp for not a lot of money. This thing is talked about everywhere right now. I suspect it is seling fast. Ther are already mods for this out, and I would bet someone will figure out what things to chnage to brighten it up. I suspect though in doing so one brings in the 8k rnage and it will sound a bit harsh.
Obviously, there is a strong market for a decent lower power tube amp (low cost). So I would expect Fender (or someone) to think hard about a single similar 6V6 amp. This will natually lead to the same thoughts on single 6L6, EL34, etc based amps as well I would guess. If so this would give the univalve market a run I would guess (at $700 or more). But, before the univalve folks attack, no it is not as solidly built as a univalvle, nor does it have the attenuator or flexibility of a univalve so it is not a univalve amp. But, if 2-3 of these things come out with different power tube options, an a/b switch will open some interesting doors I think.
This is just my 2 cents on this one. I will keep it, but is may not be to everyone's liking. It is very good for my stuff though.
My take is that it is a great little amp. At the current proce it is a steal! Iit is a darker amp, voiced similarly to the early (greenboard) Blues Jr for sound on the clean end and a 18 watt Marshall on the other end. But, it is VERY quiet! As I like a darker sound this was great for me (I use my Blues Jr a fair bit).
It responded great to different speaker cabs, different pick-up selections (split bucker, combinations, etc). It did not homogenize the sounds, but did what I would have expected here nicely.
For break-up it gets into the same sort range of distortion/break-up my Supro, and Champ. So it can get into China Grove territory. It did a decent job with early ZZ sorta, George Thoroghgood (Bad to the Bone), a bit of the Stones, etc with this guitar. With a few tweaks of the guitar I could get some early Clapton, and a Tweedish-early Plexi-ish vibe to my lame ears. For vintage rock and traditional electric blues it was great to me. It has very little head room. But has a nice clean to just break up (SRV-ish territory) to me. As with the Supro the bass side can get a little farty with the wrong cab at full volume. It seemed to have a sweet spot for grind about 2 o'clock (there are no numbers on the volume control), so the knob is pointed at the "e" in volume (give or take a 1/2") a fair bit here.
It seemed to respond very well to the pedals I tried. Each pedal retained it unique character, but as that generally harsh 8k range was not prominat on this amp it sounded nice with all pedals.
As the preamp tube is a 12AX7, you can use any of the 12 series tubes to mess with headroom, etc. I have not tried it, but I would bet the 12AU7, like I have in my Blues Jr now, will country this thing up a fair bit for example.
So in sum, for me, this is a great little amp. For much of what I play this thing is just plug and play. It was the best $99 I have spent on a new amp in a long time. Is it going to replace my dearly loved Genz Benz El Diablo? No. ButI would look very closely at one before I bought another small tube amp. Is it built for the rough road use venue? Probably not. But, neither is my Blues Jr, Supro, or Champ amp either and it is a lot cheaper!
The other, perhaps most telling, thing here to me is that it proves one can be a pretty decent amp for not a lot of money. This thing is talked about everywhere right now. I suspect it is seling fast. Ther are already mods for this out, and I would bet someone will figure out what things to chnage to brighten it up. I suspect though in doing so one brings in the 8k rnage and it will sound a bit harsh.
Obviously, there is a strong market for a decent lower power tube amp (low cost). So I would expect Fender (or someone) to think hard about a single similar 6V6 amp. This will natually lead to the same thoughts on single 6L6, EL34, etc based amps as well I would guess. If so this would give the univalve market a run I would guess (at $700 or more). But, before the univalve folks attack, no it is not as solidly built as a univalvle, nor does it have the attenuator or flexibility of a univalve so it is not a univalve amp. But, if 2-3 of these things come out with different power tube options, an a/b switch will open some interesting doors I think.
This is just my 2 cents on this one. I will keep it, but is may not be to everyone's liking. It is very good for my stuff though.
