marshall bluesbreaker any good?

thomasw88

seen this, which is quite near me.. got some money in my pocket as I just sold a sf pro reverb.

couple of questions:
1. Are they reliable?
2. Do they sound great both alone and with pedals?   were the 90's versions based ont the bassman?
3 are they flexible ie can i get a good crunch as well as a sparkling clean.?

Ossyrocks

I've had one and a mate gigs one all the time, never had any issues with reliability.

They do take pedals well. They are not an exact recreation circuitwise of the original, but fairly close.

To get them to crunch they have to be turned right up and they are hellish loud at that point. I wouldn't say they are sparkly clean, but a decent vintage Marshall clean can be had.

The 90's ones were not the correct depth cabinet, they were too thin. Marshall corrected this in the later model.

Rob

57Deluxe

Ah - the Backbreaker... an amp that has more kudos than usuable tones

John_A

Lovey lovely amps, not versatile without a few pedals, and do get squishy with very high gain sounds so not really for metal, but I'm guessing its unlikely that you're looking at one for this As ossyrocks says, for crunch they need to be wound up, but can be modded easily to add a master volume

thomasw88

oh well, that kills that then!! cheers fellas.

ICBM

thomasw88 said:

seen this, which is quite near me.. got some money in my pocket as I just sold a sf pro reverb.

couple of questions:
1. Are they reliable?
2. Do they sound great both alone and with pedals?   were the 90's versions based ont the bassman?
3 are they flexible ie can i get a good crunch as well as a sparkling clean.?

1 - yes, they are among the best-made of all modern Marshall amps, roughly equivalent in construction to the late-70s JMPs. The valve rectifier is really the only weak point, and that's largely because modern rectifier valves aren't very good.

2 - yes, yes and yes. All JTM45/Bluesbreakers are essentially Bassman copies with a different output impedance and NFB ratio.

3 - yes, although they're quite loud when they crunch. Not unusably so if you're in a loud band, but enough that it might cause trouble at quieter venues.

But that's not really a problem because the clean tone is *fantastic*, contrary to the usual impression of Marshalls, and they take almost any pedal I've ever heard well.

The only things I don't like about them is that they are quite heavy, large and an awkward shape to carry, particularly if you're short; and that the tremolo is poor and only works on one channel - although this can be fairly easily modded to fix both problems, if tremolo is important to you.

John_A

I need to use my jtm45 with an attenuator for pub gigs to get much of a crunch, but any old overdrive in front sounds wonderful and for a full chiming cleaned sound you can't beat them. Don't not get one just because they stay clean when loud, you would be missing out on a great amp

ThePrettyDamned

ICBM said:

thomasw88 said:

seen this, which is quite near me.. got some money in my pocket as I just sold a sf pro reverb.

couple of questions:
1. Are they reliable?
2. Do they sound great both alone and with pedals?   were the 90's versions based ont the bassman?
3 are they flexible ie can i get a good crunch as well as a sparkling clean.?

1 - yes, they are among the best-made of all modern Marshall amps, roughly equivalent in construction to the late-70s JMPs. The valve rectifier is really the only weak point, and that's largely because modern rectifier valves aren't very good.

2 - yes, yes and yes. All JTM45/Bluesbreakers are essentially Bassman copies with a different output impedance and NFB ratio.

3 - yes, although they're quite loud when they crunch. Not unusably so if you're in a loud band, but enough that it might cause trouble at quieter venues.

But that's not really a problem because the clean tone is *fantastic*, contrary to the usual impression of Marshalls, and they take almost any pedal I've ever heard well.

The only things I don't like about them is that they are quite heavy, large and an awkward shape to carry, particularly if you're short; and that the tremolo is poor and only works on one channel - although this can be fairly easily modded to fix both problems, if tremolo is important to you.

These are all reasons why I'm thinking of having a JTM45 style amp built, but with higher power rating (JTM45/100 anyone?), solid state rectifier (maybe switchable with valve if that's a possible thing without going mesa?) which should make it higher gain friendly (along with the higher power rating) and more reliable, and lastly adding a PPIMV.  

Basically a high powered version of it. Should make it more versatile without much compromise of the classic sounds. Maybe.

If it's possible. I need to get the money together before I start discussing specs...

nickb_boy

ThePrettyDamned;398476" said:

ICBM said:



thomasw88 said:

seen this, which is quite near me.. got some money in my pocket as I just sold a sf pro reverb.



couple of questions:

1. Are they reliable?

2. Do they sound great both alone and with pedals?   were the 90's versions based ont the bassman?

3 are they flexible ie can i get a good crunch as well as a sparkling clean.?










1 - yes, they are among the best-made of all modern Marshall amps, roughly equivalent in construction to the late-70s JMPs. The valve rectifier is really the only weak point, and that's largely because modern rectifier valves aren't very good.

2 - yes, yes and yes. All JTM45/Bluesbreakers are essentially Bassman copies with a different output impedance and NFB ratio.

3 - yes, although they're quite loud when they crunch. Not unusably so if you're in a loud band, but enough that it might cause trouble at quieter venues.

But that's not really a problem because the clean tone is *fantastic*, contrary to the usual impression of Marshalls, and they take almost any pedal I've ever heard well.

The only things I don't like about them is that they are quite heavy, large and an awkward shape to carry, particularly if you're short; and that the tremolo is poor and only works on one channel - although this can be fairly easily modded to fix both problems, if tremolo is important to you.





These are all reasons why I'm thinking of having a JTM45 style amp built, but with higher power rating (JTM45/100 anyone?), solid state rectifier (maybe switchable with valve if that's a possible thing without going mesa?) which should make it higher gain friendly (along with the higher power rating) and more reliable, and lastly adding a PPIMV.  

Basically a high powered version of it. Should make it more versatile without much compromise of the classic sounds. Maybe.

If it's possible. I need to get the money together before I start discussing specs...

@ThePrettyDamned You just about summed up new amp, even with the mods!

ThePrettyDamned

nickb_boy said:

ThePrettyDamned;398476" said:

ICBM said:



thomasw88 said:

seen this, which is quite near me.. got some money in my pocket as I just sold a sf pro reverb.



couple of questions:

1. Are they reliable?

2. Do they sound great both alone and with pedals?   were the 90's versions based ont the bassman?

3 are they flexible ie can i get a good crunch as well as a sparkling clean.?










1 - yes, they are among the best-made of all modern Marshall amps, roughly equivalent in construction to the late-70s JMPs. The valve rectifier is really the only weak point, and that's largely because modern rectifier valves aren't very good.

2 - yes, yes and yes. All JTM45/Bluesbreakers are essentially Bassman copies with a different output impedance and NFB ratio.

3 - yes, although they're quite loud when they crunch. Not unusably so if you're in a loud band, but enough that it might cause trouble at quieter venues.

But that's not really a problem because the clean tone is *fantastic*, contrary to the usual impression of Marshalls, and they take almost any pedal I've ever heard well.

The only things I don't like about them is that they are quite heavy, large and an awkward shape to carry, particularly if you're short; and that the tremolo is poor and only works on one channel - although this can be fairly easily modded to fix both problems, if tremolo is important to you.





These are all reasons why I'm thinking of having a JTM45 style amp built, but with higher power rating (JTM45/100 anyone?), solid state rectifier (maybe switchable with valve if that's a possible thing without going mesa?) which should make it higher gain friendly (along with the higher power rating) and more reliable, and lastly adding a PPIMV.  

Basically a high powered version of it. Should make it more versatile without much compromise of the classic sounds. Maybe.

If it's possible. I need to get the money together before I start discussing specs...

@ThePrettyDamned You just about summed up new amp, even with the mods!

:O

Okay, where is the thread man?!

p90fool

57Deluxe said:

Ah - the Backbreaker... an amp that has more kudos than usuable tones

Why? It's pretty much the same as a JTM45 reissue, it's a great amp.

Voxman

p90fool;399019" said:

57Deluxe said:

Ah - the Backbreaker... an amp that has more kudos than usuable tones





Why? It's pretty much the same as a JTM45 reissue, it's a great amp.

Yeah. I always thought the bluesbreaker was essentially a jtm45 combo.

ICBM

p90fool said:

57Deluxe said:

Ah - the Backbreaker... an amp that has more kudos than usuable tones

Why? It's pretty much the same as a JTM45 reissue, it's a great amp.

If you can't get a usable tone out of a Bluesbreaker, the problem is not in the amp .

I totally agree they're a pain to carry though.

Voxman said:

I always thought the bluesbreaker was essentially a jtm45 combo.

That's exactly what it is, with a fairly poor tremolo that almost no-one uses - and anyway is on the less useful of the two channels. Modding the tremolo so it works more effectively and on both channels is a pretty simple job though.