Re: What's your favorite guitar amp brand?
I like Mesa for their innovativity. Think Progressive Linkage, SimulClass, 3 tube gain stages, channel switching, channel-assignable FX-loops and reverb and so on. Not all of those are really considered revolutions, but I guess the most decisive of those would have to be the 3 gain stages. It's what defined their brand, when Randall Smith boogied up a Fender Princeton to 100 watt and 3 gain stages and Carlos Santana walked in right when they were giving it a testrun. From there on, I'm sure everyone here knows the story
Oh, and off course I like the tone of many a great Mesa.
I voted 'Other' though. My vote goes to Hughes & Kettner, primarily for their Triamp, their ultimate creation, a 3-preamp, 6-channel, MIDI-compatible 100 watt monster. Of the 6 channels, 5 sound good (of which 3 are incredible in my opinion). The 6th is nice too, but it's hard to make anything of it because of the shared EQ and master volume with the adjacent channel of preamp 2. Channel 2A is a very bright Marshall 1959-like tone, 2B is like a cross between a 1959 with interconnected channels and the drive channel of an old Fender (boomy, deep and slightly fuzzy). That doesn't mix well on one shared EQ!
I haven't heard the Triamp Mk 2 though, so I don't know whether they've fixed that by now. Mine is of the first generation (actually, from the first year of production).
Edit: only now do I realize how OLD this thread is! :haha: