Marshall Amps

I mentioned earlier about Les Paul “inventing” the solid-body guitar, recognizing that since electric guitars depend on the pickups and amplifier (“amp”) for sound, a hollow body was no longer necessary.  Clearly, then, the amplifier is a crucial part of the guitar’s sound – you won’t have a sound without it.

 Since the mid-60s, the top choice of amplifiers among professional musicians is clearly Marshall.  Although Fender and Gibson make their own amps (Fender’s being more popular by far), as do many other companies – Laney, Mesa-Boogie, Orange, etc. - far and away the most popular are Marshall.  

Back in January 1990, I joined the ranks and bought my own, a humble little combo, the 25^th Anniversary (1962-1987) Jubilee edition, 50 watts, with one 12” Celestion speaker and an overdrive switch.  This series was a favorite of Slash, of Guns N’Roses, so much so that his own signature series amp was modeled after this one.  

In April 2010, I finally managed to get a half-stack, a JCM900 100 watt Dual Reverb head with a 4x12" 1960AV slanted (top) cabinet with Celestion Vintage 30s.  It's VERY LOUD.

 The Stack.  In the mid 60s, Pete Townshend of The Who was looking for more power and bigger amps.  After his roadies bitched at him that the 8x12” cabinets Marshall made for him were too big and heavy, Marshall compromised by cutting the 8x12” cabinets in half, creating the stack: a separate “head” for the amplifier itself, and two cabinets, each with 4 12” speakers (4x12”).  Add more stacks for more power, and collect a wall of them.  Blue Cheer blew their advance from Phillips on their stacks; and KISS, when starting out, used empty cabinets to give the illusion of a full wall of amps. 

            By contrast, the Beatles had been using much smaller amps (Vox combos), without even a P.A., in huge stadiums – no wonder they couldn’t hear themselves play.  Maybe if they had invested in some quality ampage and power, and some decent monitors, they’d have enjoyed the live experience much more, and not have given up in 1966 to focus only on records.  Paul McCartney isn’t scraping by in concert these days with a single AC30 behind him – but since he switches from bass to guitar by song, he needs both types of amp.  Even so, he doesn’t have a full wall of amps the way most rock bands do, more like a few half-stacks (head with one 4x12” angled cabinet).

 Tubes vs. Solid-state. My first amp was a solid-state Peavey Studio Pro 50, a 1x12” combo, which came on immediately after being turned on, and had terrible distortion.  I had to use an MXR Distortion pedal to approximate a decent distortion sound.  When I got the all-tube Marshall, I was able to sell the pedal back to my guitar teacher, Joel, who had sold it to me at cost, and simply use a footswitch and the amp’s effects loop.  The tube distortion sound was warm, thick, with lots of body and midrange.  Joel explained that the “tube vs. solid-state” debate was “sound vs. reliability”, tube amps having the sound advantage and solid states having the edge on reliability, no pesky tubes to replace or burn out.  But in all the years I’ve had this Marshall, I’ve replaced the tubes and had them biased once.  Moreover, if reliability was such a huge factor, why do professional musicians – whose livelihoods depend on reliable amps and have to cart them from venue to venue, handled by clumsy roadies and suffering trucks and planes across continents - use tube Marshalls?  There’s the proof.  

 Having said that, Marshall does make solid-state and hybrid amps, and they cost much less than the full tube versions and sound almost the same.  And many other tube amps sound like a Marshall, more or less.  When I was looking for amps in January 1990, various salesmen steered me to other brands: Laney, Mesa-Boogie, etc., always promising that they were either “as good” or “almost as good” as a Marshall.  Well, if I could afford a Marshall, why not buy a Marshall?  And so I did. 

 By the way, despite being the most popular amp (or perhaps because it is) Marshall does not give away its amps to professionals for endorsements.  Jim Marshall’s reasoning: “if you’re professional enough to endorse the product, you can afford it.  Amateur musicians shouldn’t be subsidizing you.” 

 Distortion.  In the late 60s, guitarists were learning the limitations of the stock amps – as noted above with the Beatles.  What they also learned was that many amps when cranked up high enough, started distorting.  To most amp manufacturers, this was a BAD thing.  I recall asking Joel, way back when, why we couldn’t plug the guitar into a stereo.  He explained that stereos are designed to play back with high fidelity (“hi-fi”) and minimum distortion, whereas (knowing the kind of music I liked and was asking him to teach me) that what we want from amps is maximum distortion.  Tony Iommi recalls an amp company reacting with horror when he asked if they could make an amp with MORE distortion.  They didn’t get it.  And their ads – promising NO DISTORTION – showed how clueless they were, even Marshall (someone commented about such a Marshall ad, “thank God for false advertising!”).  Eventually Marshall, and later other companies, wised up, listened to the guitarists, and began designing amps with the appropriate “dirty” channels and putting in speakers which sounded good when distorted.     

 Models. Since 1962, Marshall has put out a bewildering array of models with confusing numbers, special editions, signature editions, etc. sometimes in blue, purple, red, or even silver.  The most common and important models, however, are: the original JTM45 100 watt heads, to go with the 4x12” cabinets in the stack; then the 1959 SLP (Super Lead Plexiglas, often just called the “Plexi”); followed by the JCM800 (2204 50 watt and 2203 100 watt) models.  More recently came the JCM900 (Master Volume and Dual Reverb), DSL (Dual Super Lead) and TSL (Triple Super Lead) models, and the Mode 4 350 watt head.