What is the worst amp you’ve ever played?

ICBM

BillDL said:

So THAT'S what "FAL" was an acronym for.

Yes - Futuristic Aids Ltd. Unfortunate, given what happened a few years later, although I suspect their reputation for awfulness had already done for them.

I got given a FAL Kestrel head a few years ago - it was a badly-built piece of junk really, but it did have a certain charm to it when (this may no longer surprise you... ) it was turned up full, including the reverb - it sounded like a sort of punk Ennio Morricone. To my great surprise, doing that didn't kill it either, despite me trying really quite hard to find its limit with a dummy load. So having proved it was guaranteeable enough to sell, I did . I think I got £99 for it.

Kalimna

I had one of these as my first amp. The clean was ok, reverb 'sprangy' from memory. But the pull-knob overdrive was a fizzy wasp nest of dry unpleasantness. 

https://lifeguitars.co.uk/products/1981-roland-cube-60-electric-guitar-keyboard-amplifier

Penn

Kalimna said:

I had one of these as my first amp. The clean was ok, reverb 'sprangy' from memory. But the pull-knob overdrive was a fizzy wasp nest of dry unpleasantness. 

https://lifeguitars.co.uk/products/1981-roland-cube-60-electric-guitar-keyboard-amplifier

Has anyone been to life guitars? 

ICBM

Penn said:

Has anyone been to life guitars? 

Attracted by a hilariously overpriced tatty example of a not-desirable amp, perhaps…

Kalimna

Hey, it was the first picture I found on Google

nick79

Blackstar HT5 for me. Couldn’t get a sound out of it I liked and it kept breaking anyway. In the end I chucked out all the pcb stuff and kept the chassis and cabinet in the hope of one day using it for a diy amp build. 

I did have an HT1 some years ago though that I did like. 

nickaslin

SquireJapan said:

For me it was the smallest Guerrilla amp they made - that's what I had with my first Yamaha RGX112 guitar (that was ace).

I'm amazed that I kept playing after having to live with that thing. Was very jealous of my friend's Park G10 - that did (and still does) kick arse.



It wasn't just quiet, it robbed the entire guitar of any life. Even from a noddy player like me.

That image transports me straight back to my high school music room - what a backline . .  

OilCityPickups

Penn said:

Barquentine said:

I've played plenty of terrible amps but, of those I've actually owned, the Peavey Bravo stands out as a particularly bad memory - an utterly dull, lifeless clean channel and an over-compressed weedy lead channel with not an ounce of bite to it. But the top of my list would be the Katana. It was like a library of the worst guitar tones ever created. What was even more amazing was the amount of people who claimed it was one of the greatest amps ever and better than their Marshalls, Deluxe Reverbs, AC30's etc. On the other hand there are people who think Mrs Brown's Boys is a great comedy show.

I am so glad to hear someone else doesn’t like Mrs Browns Boys. Just do not get it. 

Funny how a few people have said about the katana when some people seem to think they are the best thing ever. 

I had a micro terror. It wasn’t amazing and only did the orange sound but as a little toy amp it wasn’t the worst thing ever. 

Katana is my main amp ... and the one that goes to guitar shows. 

NelsonP

Supportact said:

A little Sound City solid state combo I had as a teenager. It sounded awful but it was my first amp so I didn't have anything to compare it to. I didn't understand about overdrive at first so I was a bit disappointed it didn't make the noise I'd heard on records. Not that it helped when I managed to get hold of a Rocktek overdrive pedal and pair that with it. That sound I'd created there was possibly some kind of human rights violation towards whoever heard it. 

Ha ha, I had the same sound city combo and fully agree that it was utterly crap. I used an Arion Metal Master into it. Imagine how that sounded!

Mine also broke.

Supportact

NelsonP said:

Supportact said:

A little Sound City solid state combo I had as a teenager. It sounded awful but it was my first amp so I didn't have anything to compare it to. I didn't understand about overdrive at first so I was a bit disappointed it didn't make the noise I'd heard on records. Not that it helped when I managed to get hold of a Rocktek overdrive pedal and pair that with it. That sound I'd created there was possibly some kind of human rights violation towards whoever heard it. 

Ha ha, I had the same sound city combo and fully agree that it was utterly crap. I used an Arion Metal Master into it. Imagine how that sounded!

Mine also broke.

Wow. If we'd have happened to jam together with those set ups we'd have probably inadvertently opened a portal into hell. 

NelsonP

Supportact said:

NelsonP said:

Supportact said:

A little Sound City solid state combo I had as a teenager. It sounded awful but it was my first amp so I didn't have anything to compare it to. I didn't understand about overdrive at first so I was a bit disappointed it didn't make the noise I'd heard on records. Not that it helped when I managed to get hold of a Rocktek overdrive pedal and pair that with it. That sound I'd created there was possibly some kind of human rights violation towards whoever heard it. 

Ha ha, I had the same sound city combo and fully agree that it was utterly crap. I used an Arion Metal Master into it. Imagine how that sounded!

Mine also broke.

Wow. If we'd have happened to jam together with those set ups we'd have probably inadvertently opened a portal into hell. 

Ha ha. Like in Stranger things!

Keefy

Penn said:

Kalimna said:

I had one of these as my first amp. The clean was ok, reverb 'sprangy' from memory. But the pull-knob overdrive was a fizzy wasp nest of dry unpleasantness. 

https://lifeguitars.co.uk/products/1981-roland-cube-60-electric-guitar-keyboard-amplifier

Has anyone been to life guitars? 

Yes I went there a few weeks ago when Mrs Keefy and I had a day in Exeter. I thought they had a decent range of stock, likewise Project Music. That other shop on South St (I think) had gone and taken its comedy pricing with it.

Telejester

Peavey Classic 30 combo. Overly bright pile of junk with THE worst circuit board design conceivable. I loved my Peavey mk1 5150 head when I had it, but the classic 30 combo just deserves to be smashed to bits by Glenn Fricker and his hammer of truth.

rickd2112a

H&H 100W 2x12 Combo in 1980.
Most awful amp. Clean and spiky. Didn't take overdrives at all.

SpoonMan

Worst one I've played through was a friend's stagg 30w combo.

He bought it new and it was cheap as chips, had everything you'd want on a guitar combo but it just sounded unpleasant really, to me. 
He seemed to like it though and tbf could make it sound OK as a loud clean amp with his squire strat and his band sound good so maybe I'm just a gear snob 

Nerine

Some of these “awful” amps would probably sound absolutely killer micd up on a record. 

I’m getting to the point where I believe there aren’t particularly many flavours of amplifier distortion. 

A lot of amps sound VERY similar into the same cab with the same mics and positioning on it. 

Put that into a mix and the differences are lost even further. 

Which makes all these real high end amps seem a bit pointless to me. It’s the “shitty” ones mentioned in this thread which would actually sound interesting on record. Especially the real nasty ones. They’d sound heavy as fuck with the right pedals and stuff. 

Possibly “horrid” in the room, yeah. But probably amazing in a mix. 

NickB

Nerine said:

Some of these “awful” amps would probably sound absolutely killer micd up on a record. 

I’m getting to the point where I believe there aren’t particularly many flavours of amplifier distortion. 

A lot of amps sound VERY similar into the same cab with the same mics and positioning on it. 

Put that into a mix and the differences are lost even further. 

Which makes all these real high end amps seem a bit pointless to me. It’s the “shitty” ones mentioned in this thread which would actually sound interesting on record. Especially the real nasty ones. They’d sound heavy as fuck with the right pedals and stuff. 

Possibly “horrid” in the room, yeah. But probably amazing in a mix. 

Isn't that any Marshall amp?  ;-)

polotska

Marshall MG15CFX is the worst I can remember, but more recently, the Boss Nextone Special was surprisingly dire.

The Mesa Fillmore must be the most disappointing. I’ve long hoped for a moderate-gain amp with two identical channels, and I thought it sounded great in online demos, so I expected to love it. When I finally tried one, I thought the clean sounds were fine (though unremarkable)—but it sounded terrible with any level of distortion. Two identical crap channels took it from single- to double-plus-ungood.

Flanging_Fred

A couple of tiny practice amps like a Solec amp (my first) and a Yamaha Budokan, were bad but the one that stands out is a Vox ac4tv. That was so disappointing, harsh, fatiguing and simultaneously too loud to sound good for home practice and too quiet to play in a band with. Nasty.

ICBM

Nerine said:

Some of these “awful” amps would probably sound absolutely killer micd up on a record. 

I’m getting to the point where I believe there aren’t particularly many flavours of amplifier distortion. 

A lot of amps sound VERY similar into the same cab with the same mics and positioning on it. 

Put that into a mix and the differences are lost even further. 

Which makes all these real high end amps seem a bit pointless to me. It’s the “shitty” ones mentioned in this thread which would actually sound interesting on record. Especially the real nasty ones. They’d sound heavy as fuck with the right pedals and stuff. 

Possibly “horrid” in the room, yeah. But probably amazing in a mix. 

I'm really not joking that some of the awful old solid-state amps mentioned really do sound very good, and probably more interesting than many valve amps, when they're turned right up. There's something that happens even with solid-state when the power stage is hammering the hell out of the speakers - even assuming the speakers are rated high enough, so won't blow - and the amp doesn't then die (which is a real risk with many). Not a versatile sound to be sure - usually in the punky/bluesy/Jack White type ballpark - but still a great sound, and actually quite hard to reproduce with pedals or modellers.

A punk band from the 70s who many of you will have heard of which I used to do some tech work for used a Carlsbro Stingray on all their early records. They've still got it, although both the guitarists use valve Marshalls on stage now... but I still think the Stingray sounds better *for their music*.