Worst Amps Hall of Fame?

Sned Nensons "Harmonic Crapulator" comes to mind along with the short lived, but much maligned 1958 "Atomic Turd Bucket" made by Leo's arch rival Elgernon Bavaquah.




...originating source of the phrase "You Can't Polish A Turd". :mrgreen:






.

I guess I like bad tone because a few of the mentioned amps don't sound that bad to me. Such as;

PV classic 30, Fender Super 60, Mesa Boogie (the studio .22 is great IMO), PV Bandits, Red Knob Twins, Ampeg RI's...

And of course little 15 watt SS practice amps sound like pooh, what were you expecting?

Most "pro" amps have a tone in them, one guy playing one and it sounds like crap and then comes along someone else, plugs in and twists a few knobs and it makes you scratch your head. Too funny.

HH IC100
I had one of these in my mid teens, kept conking out, still I suppose one good thing was that it did match with the PA Amp, Speakers and Monitor slave...........

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y4/rab622/amp.jpg
I got one of these in about 1976 and still have it, head only not a combo played it through a Marshall slope quad copy with Celestions. Was and still is a monster, huge volume and tone to die for.

All that's been done to it in all that time is replace the filter caps in the power supply and a bias resistor.

Also had a couple of Dan Armstrongs in the early to mid 70's and these were pretty good for the time too. ( minor problems with these, see Lenard below )

Other amps include a Vadis 60W and a Lenard GB150, the Vadis was a beginners amp with tone to match and the Lenard was a brutal bass amp but had a long pin strip circuit board that was only supported at the ends so broken tails on Caps were a regular feature.

I bought the Champ 600 thinking it would have a tube Fender sound. Didn't realize it would have such a farty sound. I think it is made for Fender by Crapco in China. If you replace the speaker, grill, tubes, pot, caps, resistors, transformer and a few other parts along with a different circuit design, they can sound a bit better, but then you will have $$$ in a small crappy reputation amp.

I bought the Champ 600 thinking it would have a tube Fender sound. Didn't realize it would have such a farty sound. I think it is made for Fender by Crapco in China. If you replace the speaker, grill, tubes, pot, caps, resistors, transformer and a few other parts along with a different circuit design, they can sound a bit better, but then you will have $$$ in a small crappy reputation amp.

+1. Luckily I bought mine for $58 and was able to sell it for $60. The Epi Vjr. is in the same league as the 600 IMO.

And of course little 15 watt SS practice amps sound like pooh, what were you expecting?
Well, there are several 15 watt *tube* amps that sound glorious, so why is it logical to expect that all 15 watt SS amps must sound nasty?

I know a good bit about electronics, so it's not that I don't understand the differences in harmonic distortion and clipping characteristics between SS and tube amps. Electronics engineers who build guitar amps know that it is very difficult, if not impossible, to make an SS amp that sounds really good.

But from the end users point of view, these technology differences don't matter. Why is there any good reason to put up with nasty sound from one 15 W amp if another 15 W amp sounds much better?

-Gnobuddy

Silvertone 1465... 150 solid state watts into 6 10" speakers. Loudest POS amp I ever owned. Bought it for $50 in 1980, sold for the same around 1983. So loud it almost knocked itself over.

I don't have to say but I will, a few of my early dyi amps. WOW!!! I was on the cutting edge of stupidity trying to re-invent the wheel. Not good results...

Close 2nd to those would be a couple Carvin amps I've used.....

Tweed blues junior. Sounded terribly tinny. The new speaker sucked.

I don't have to say but I will, a few of my early dyi amps. WOW!!! I was on the cutting edge of stupidity trying to re-invent the wheel. Not good results...
But good learning experiences, no? I've made a few stabs at building (solid state) guitar amps and pedals myself, often with, shall we say, less than lovable sonic results. :wink: But I learned something every time.

Somewhere in the mid 1980's, Elektor magazine published an article on a (solid state) guitar preamp that I built. It had some neat features - a parametric eq with bass, mid, and treble controls, and a distortion circuit very different (and much more sophisticated) than the nasty-sounding ones used in almost every other solid state distortion/fuzz circuit out there. You could get a sort of muted throaty distortion sound out of it that was way nicer than most SS distortion circuits. But there was very little forgiveness to it - turn down the gain a hair and it cleaned up too much, turn it up a hair and the distortion became harsh and unpleasant like all the other SS distortion boxes.

Over the years I've built quite a few things that sounded worse than that Elektor preamp, and maybe one that sounded better (a "Stack In A Box" tube preamp from a PAIA kit). But nothing I built ever sounded anywhere near as good as my current Super Champ XD!

Nastiest sounding guitar amp I've ever heard: Squier SP 10, a horrible little beast that comes with some of those $175 "starter pack" deals that include a guitar, an amp, a strap, some picks and strings, and a little booklet. It sounds so incredibly bad that I'd expect it to instantly discourage any would-be guitarist who had any musical taste at all. Only a completely tone-deaf person could enjoy playing through this thing!

-Gnobuddy

Squier SP 10, a horrible little beast that comes with some of those $175 "starter pack" deals that include a guitar, an amp, a strap, some picks and strings, and a little booklet. It sounds so incredibly bad that I'd expect it to instantly discourage any would-be guitarist who had any musical taste at all. Only a completely tone-deaf person could enjoy playing through this thing!

-Gnobuddy


Is that one of those amps that sounds better if you clip one transistor leg or something?

Is that one of those amps that sounds better if you clip one transistor leg or something?
Or something. It sounds much better if you smash it to bits with a large sledgehammer. :mrgreen:

Sorry, you fed me such a great straight line I couldn't resist!

-Gnobuddy

Line 6 Spider 3, absolute ****

Line 6 Spider 3, absolute ****
Yeah, gotta agree with you, painful though the memories are. At $300 that was (and still is) the most expensive guitar amp I ever bought. I mail-ordered the thing and never could find a good sound in it. Days and weeks and months and eventually years went by, it still sounded awful, and I thought my inability to sound good through the thing it was my fault as a guitarist.

It took me a very long time to realise that the bad tone wasn't me, it was just that awful amp, and I had wasted my money.

My current Super Champ XD cost me $275 on sale, less than that *urd of a Line 6 amp. The SCXD is everything the Spider wasn't. I've had the SCXD for something approaching two years now, and still love it every time I turn it on and find the magic still there.

I have a new slogan for Line 6: "Eighty six different ways to make your guitar sound like a kazoo!"

-Gnobuddy

70's era Yamaha S50 1-12. It was my very first amp. The price wasn't bad, so I bought it, without listening too it (hey, I was young and dumb at 14, what can I say).

Almost the size of a Fender Twin, weighed almost as much as one of the Queen Mary's anchors, but it looked cool and modern for an amp in the 70's.

Harsh. Brutal. Inconsistant in tone. Clean was sickeningly blah. Gain was like having three 600 series caterpillar motors w/twin turbos, strapped into a dyno rack, held at full throttle, and drained of all oil and coolant. Loud and viscouisly nasty. But unlike the cats, it never siezed up!

Not only did it frustrate me, it hurt my back lifting it!

Only quality that was admirable about it was, that it seemed nearly indestructable. It fell off the back of a pick up at about 20-25 mph, and only the tolex got scuffed. Not even a tear! Finally decided to off it by using it for target practice in the desert. That thing took more 12 guage slugs than what we thought was possible! Eventually strapped on some home made explosives, which finally dispatched that amp to tone hell!

God what an awful amp!

I had a 2-12 Yamaha so perhaps I've suffered twice as much. :wink:

I once had a "Gibson Sonax" solid state amp, similar in size to a Fender Vibrolux Reverb Blackface, I believe the Sonax had a green vinyl skin and 2-10" speakers. It was truly terrible amp, but I didn't really know it until I played a job with my friend who was plugged into a Peavey Classic (2-12" speaker, trans-tube amp). My friend utterly destroyed me with his sound and volume. That bad decision was followed by another bad decision when I bought a Marshall 1/2 stack, (the Marshall head had a post production "master volume" which was terrible). That amp was followed up with another terrible, Marshall "Combo" amp, which was kind of like a Fender Twin reverb, the combo was heavy as hell, had 2-12's in it and a number of "pin" switches on the faceplate, as you would expect, I was never able to get a good sound with the combo. Fortunately, I learned from my mistakes and follow this up with a "67 Gibson Ranger, a '67 Fender Blackface Vibrolux Reverb and a new Victoria 45-410T..all incredible amps.

I'm no Boogie fan, either--they can turn any guitar into an icepick.

I'd add to the list any Marshall ValveState. Pure crap.

I had an early 90's Valvestate 80W combo, it was a great amp

I'd add to the list any Marshall ValveState. Pure crap.

I had an early 90's Valvestate 80W combo, it was a great amp

My AVT100 is a great amp too!

I know this is a zombie thread & all, but people sure are picky. I love JCM 120s, Tuck & Roll Kustoms, Sunns, Acoustics, what have you. Also any Peavey.

Almost SS amp with reasonable power that's not malfunctioning can be made to sound ok. Overdrive sucks? Use a tube screamer! How does it sound? Not like a AC-15, but not like a train wreck or beer commercial either.

When I was rehearsing in New York City in by-the-hour rehearsal studios and got tired of playing through malfunctioning amps, I started plugging into the biggest, oldest solid state monstrosities I saw in each studio, & I found that those had a tendency to work the best. I still kind of like that sound, which was also the sound of a lot of punk and grunge in the 80s and 90s, but also Santana, Albert King & John Fogarty in the high volume early 70s.

Well my Gorilla amp in the 80's was pretty bad. I wanted Marshall distortion and Fender sparkle. Lets just say it didn't deliver those sounds.

Almost SS amp with reasonable power that's not malfunctioning can be made to sound ok. Overdrive sucks? Use a tube screamer!
As far as I can tell, the Tube Screamer was made famous by a guy who didn't really use it as a distortion pedal...he used it more as a clean boost, and got his distortion from his amp. His *tube* amp!

To my ears, the sound of a Tube Screamer (and just about every other distortion pedal using back-to-back semiconductor diodes to generate its distortion) irresistibly brings to mind mental images of chewing on a mouthful of sand - painful, harsh, grit-your-teeth torture. It sounds worst through a solid-state amp. A good tube amp can soften the painful harshness of those awful, awful clipping diodes a bit. But I'd much rather not listen to them at all.

I think I understand the desperation of the engineer who first came up with that awful distortion pedal design - the transistor amps of the time sounded awful, people knew the older tube amps distorted and sounded great, so he was trying to find some way to generate intentional distortion from a solid-state circuit. Using feedback through a non-linear device was the obvious answer, so people tried germanium diodes (awful), germanium transistors (awful), silicon diodes (worse), and silicon transistors (also worse). Never mind that the non-linearity of back-to-back clipping diodes generates harsh, painful distortion, very unlike the smooth and musical sound of triode and pentode tubes being pushed beyond their linear area of operation.

Somewhere along the way enough guitarists were using these awful things so that people came to accept the harsh sound. Those guitarists were probably all drugged out of their minds so they couldn't hear how bad they sounded. This was the decade of widespread drug use, remember? And, like the awful-sounding Yamaha DX-7 electronic "piano" sound, the harsh and unmusical sound of an electric guitar played through a pair of back-to-back clipping diodes came to be accepted by many.

It gets worse. These days many electronic keyboards emulate the cheesy, ringing, fake sound of the old DX-7 "piano". And in the same vein, new solid-state modelling amps use complex DSP and firmware to - intentionally - emulate the harsh, sand-between-the-teeth sound of the old 1970's era clipping diodes.

It gives me some hope, though, to notice that there is a backlash of sorts, with a number of guitarists re-discovering how much better tone they can create by simply plugging a guitar directly into a tube amp. And there are also distortion boxes based around tubes or MOSFET's that sound good instead of like sand between the teeth.

I swear, in my humble opinion, if every last distortion pedal using clipping diodes on this earth were to suddenly magically disappear, this planet would be musically much better off for it!

-Gnobuddy

5150. ANY Peavey, for that matter..


liked my modded Bravo, love my Older Classic 50 {early 4xEL84} with a NEO 15 & baffle conversion. Friend had a 50/50 which was excellent, may have had something to do with the Holdsworth pre-amp..

Agree Fender HRod series not for me, but get one if you must.....

I think I read somewhere that Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age actually uses those little Gorilla Amps on their records. I find it hard to believe, though.

Guitar World - March 2010, Them Crooked Vultures interview. I found it in a pile of old magazines and couldn't help but laugh when I read that.

EMC ( they were around in the late 60s).

Back in the mid 70's, when Gibson was owned by Norlin, they came out with the SG amps. I bought their 212 model because it had the Maestro Phase Shifter built in. The phase shifter was the only thing that sounded good on this expensive POS.

5E3 clones and Tweed Deluxes are the worst amps ever. Do not get them, as they will mess you up for other amps. Go with other amps that have solid state technology and some tubes. Buy many of them.

I think I read somewhere that Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age actually uses those little Gorilla Amps on their records. I find it hard to believe, though.

He uses them in a couple songs on "Songs for the Deaf" to simulate the sound of music coming through a cheap car radio. I think that was the purpose anyway, since there's a lot of simulated radio channel switching between tracks on that album. It's a cool contrast... the guitar signal switches from a cheesy practice amp to the "real" amp just as the bass and all the other drum mics kick in.

I think he uses them as a sort of fuzzed out, narrow range, thin sound on some lead parts, too. Zappa did similar things with a Pignose in the studio. Jimmy Page has some pretty whacked out, thin and crappy tones on some of their studio work, too. It's all about different, interesting sounds. Perfect "tone" all the time gets boring.

Check out the first 25 seconds, and some of the fill riffs later on...

mbr_tJh8E_o

Covering the speaker cabinet with cheap auto upholstery (or sleazy bar booth seat covering) that swallows any and all sound that comes from the speaker before it can radiate outward, and then using a horrible transistorized preamp-power amp circuit makes this line of amps the worst I have ever heard. How can Sheryl Crow possibly be using these things (unless they are 'dummy' amps like Petty's VOX's).

Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. It has a clean channel, crap channel with a MORE crap button. Useless horrid reverb, a round brick/doorstop thingy that looks like a speaker. Input jacks that you don't dare even look at or even think about using. It does however feature a built in synthesizer that makes rumbling,rattling,farting,vibrating,oscillating,gh ost-note,squealing,dying sounds which are meant to resemble a guitar through an amp. Oh yeah, it does have light bulbs in the back, but tubes would be better.

Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. It has a clean channel, crap channel with a MORE crap button. Useless horrid reverb, a round brick/doorstop thingy that looks like a speaker. Input jacks that you don't dare even look at or even think about using. It does however feature a built in synthesizer that makes rumbling,rattling,farting,vibrating,oscillating,gh ost-note,squealing,dying sounds which are meant to resemble a guitar through an amp. Oh yeah, it does have light bulbs in the back, but tubes would be better.

Ha! Love the light bulbs part the best.

80's Peavey Bandit. Sounded like my arse.
Had a Marshall JCM900 combo that I bought because it said Marshall on it. That was utter crap. Tone knobs did nothing. Replaced it with a red knob twin which was great. Surprised there's no love for them. I have fond memories of mine.

The new Roland JC120s are disappointing (the older models are a standard). The Randall DimeBag amp I never liked. I also played through a tiny Gorilla amp once, pretty crappy.

Man, ya'll knock a lot of at least decent amps. Earth for example, the ideal....no...but a usable amp. A lot of us had to suffer with solid state sears, harmony, western auto, pennys and other amps that were like bad am radios when we were growing up. I have a Johnson acoustic bass amp now I picked up in a trade brand new. It is practically unuasable. There are a lot of "beginner" amps in any brand that are pretty bad, some prettygood. The small guitar amps are actually better than the really small cheap bass amps I have had go through my hands. They actually make better guitar amps.

I was playing a (decent sounding) Super Reverb at an outdoor concert and it was not doing me any favors in that context. I plugged into my bandleaders Peavey LA400 combo with a Black Widow and TONE for days! I don't get it, but I know it happened.

I have a Peavey Triumph 120 all valve combo that I absolutely hate. It is shrill lacks any bass and has two useless gain channels.

Wow this is an old thread that keeps going, but I'll chime in with my vote.

I had a Pignose 30/60 that was awful in every way.

I would add a +1 on the JCs. Never understood those.

Some of those old Yamahas were also terrible back in the late 70s, 80s. Crates of the period were rough. A buddy of mine had a Carvin that I thought sounded terrible.

Has anyone mentioned Fender Power Chorus? What a shrill amp. Makes my ears bleed thinking about it.

Anything with the word valve in it( Vox, Marshall). Fender's Blues and Hot Rod anything. To simplify: Anything with an effects loop is gonna be crap to me.

Any love or hate for the Univox U-1011 100 watt head? It's from the 70's. I got it from the owner of Two Rock, ironically and I hated it at first. But when he says give it a chance, he's usually right. I took it to a rehearsal and it sounded very good. It just doesn't act like anything I've had before on first listening. The tubes have like 600 volts on them, but it's not real clean. The breakup is nice, plus it has reverb and tremolo. I like it now.

I actually like the old Peavey's, like the Bandit, Special 130, etc. I've heard many players sound great on them, as well. They don't sound as colorful as tube amps, but they have a cool texture to me. They share the same preamp which is full of 4558 chips(tube screamer) for tube-ish sound. The LA400 has the same preamp but has some kind of subtle built-in compression that makes it easy to play. They have more fatness than all these newer SS amps and they are cheap!

Yup I like the old Peaveys too. In fact I regularly gig with two Special 130's, each loaded with EV 12L Classics. Wonderful, big sounding, clean amps. I'm actually a late-bloomer to SS amps, having played Fender tube amps my entire life. I bought my first Special 130 two years ago and loved the sound so much, I totally quit gigging with my old Fenders. My first taste of SS was back in 1970 when my band partner bought a new Fender Twin SS. That was the most terrible sounding amp I had ever heard and I swore I would never own SS...that is until I "discovered" the Peavey Special 130's. I have introduced these 130's to a couple of seasoned other players as well, who were/are totally amazed by the clarity and fullness these amps offer. They each own one now and gig with them regularly. I have bought and sold many amps in the past 48 years of playing, and have only found one or two that totally would never be on my stage. I found the others had some redeeming quality to them, that with a little tweaking, could get you by in a pinch. You just have to be smarter than the amp...excercise a little patience and realize amps are not plug'n play devices.

Behringer = Bad

Blues Jr,,,Fender's cruel joke on all of us who wasted good $$$ tryin' to get any semblance of tone out of these POS's.

T

Blues Jr,,,Fender's cruel joke on all of us who wasted good $$$ tryin' to get any semblance of tone out of these POS's.

T

Yup

i really detest the line 6 spider

Blackstar HT range, most overhyped amps ever. The whole british music press said they were fantastic. sounded worse than any tranny amp i have ever heard.

Behringer = Bad

+1

I love my Crate.

Blackstar HT range, most overhyped amps ever. The whole british music press said they were fantastic. sounded worse than any tranny amp i have ever heard.

Bought a HT stage 60. Was not happy with it, so I sent it to my amp tech. He modified it, put different valves/tubes in it, and now its one of the best EL34 powered amps I have heard.
They have potential.
The worst amp has to be the Peavey Special 212. I bought one of them years ago, still have it. Talk about toneless!

I agree with the cat a few posts ago that said some of us had to play thru crap. Late 70's I had a silverface Bassman 100, that thing ROCKED and my bud had a Marlboro, I felt bad for him. He put a Big Muff into it and it was almost plausible... I disagree with the poster who dis'ed Musicman, I have a Musicman 65 now and when I changed tubes she came alive. Sold a PV special 212, fair, but only just... Ya know it is what you want to do with em' makes all the difference. Cain't rock the Colosseum with a champ, and ya ain't doin' church gigs with a Marshall stack either.

4. The first solid state Crate Amps that actually were built to look like wooden fruit crates. Remember that marketing nightmare from about 1978? Crate thought that Country Musicians would love the genuine "crate" look because of the rugged look. Brown wooden boards with big plastic knobs sticking out. Yikes.

OMG I had one of those! You couldn't pull tone out of one of those with industrial pliers.

Behringer = Bad

I have a Behringer keyboard amp, it had to be repaired twice within first month of owning. I'd stopped gigging and rehearsing with it, not worth the risk, now it just takes up space.

I have a great sounding Fender Blues Deluxe on clean but the drive is unusable, no practice or gigging situation lets me crank it up loud enough to get a decent sound.

i really detest the line 6 spider
I had one. It was incredibly versatile. With the wonders of modern DSP technology and Line 6's "amplifier emulation", I could instantly dial up the sound of at least fifty different types of kazoo... :rolleyes:

I don't mean to annoy anyone, but I had much the same reaction to the current Fender Mustang I. Tons of different types of kazoo sound in one box, and even more kazoo sounds available if you plug it into your computer and tweak the software...

-Gnobuddy

The Evil Twin (w/ the red knobs) :-)

-Jagg

My absolute worst amplifier experience was with a bass amp. Rattled louder then the actual notes if you set the volume past 2.
But anyway,
Not that it's a bad amp, but I felt massively let down by the Hot Rod Deluxe ( I know it's been mentioned a whole bunch) It's not that the gain channel is bad it just sounds..... sterile. It can be tweaked to actually have a relatively present crunch but my Blackstar HT-40 (mind you, I scrapped all the tubes and put an eminence in there) Outshines it by a mile.
Also, the Hiwatt T-20, wasn't bad, just don't advertise it sounding like Page.

Also, the Vox Valve reactor with it's 'brilliant' high gain channel. Sounds like a Boss FZ-5. If you want modern high gain from just an amplifier, don't go near Vox.

Just my opinions.

Original Peavey Classic amp,with the black contact paper/stickers on the knobs.
Most constipated amp I think I've ever played through---like a Muff Fuzz with a half-dead battery straight into a mixing console.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v229/refin/Steve%20Stuff/classicamp.jpg

Anyone mention Stage amps ? Made by Unicord in the late 70's I think.

http://www.univox.org/pics/amps/stage_720.jpg

I think Gorilla amps were inspired by them.

The JTM 30 looked good on paper, but the reality was horrible. What the heck happened with that one?

There was a column in Vintage Guitar last year called 'Sleeper Amps' that focused on those Marshall JTM's.
Apparently, they shipped with the wrong power tubes for starters and there's some kind of clipping diode on the dirt channel that prevents it from being nice and Marshall-y sounding.
Fix those two things and you have an ok amp.
I used to play through one a a long time ago and I don't think it was that bad :?:
Basically they came out at the same time as the Peavey Classic series and as we all know those amps (Classic 30 et al) have gone on to become quite collectable but not the Marshall JTM's.

Fender G-Dec Junior, thankfully I got rid of that thing.

I have a Crate V5 tube amp (5 watt) that has absolutely no tube characteristics to it. Only $100, and I guess I got what I paid for.

5. Any Pignose Product. Practical but awful.

John

actually the little 700 is awesome, even for ss. has a crunch that no one else has. I've even used the line out for some great sounding recording. the big stuff is lame, but the original us king.

This is the first time I've heard anyone not liking the Peavey Special 130 :?: I've had one for years and it sounds killer with a Tele :!:

Same here.

Peavey Bandit.

Anything that says Crate on it. They seem to fall apart easily. Unlike a an actual crate!

Any amp with a fuzzy, indoor/outdoor carpeting cover instead of Tolex.

I'm Hurt! I have a Legend Rock & Roll 50, and I love it! It is a one trick pony, though. Used it for 20 years with no problem. I have to admit. They were inconsistent with their components. They like humbuckers, tolerate Strats and don't get along with Teles. Since I now only have Teles , I mostly use my Hot Rod Deluxe. The worst amp I had was an Ampeg. Don't remember the model, Solid state POS. No tone and obviously no distortion. :roll:

Many years ago my steel player was using a Peavey Session 400 and to me it sounded great with his steel so when I saw one for sale I just went out and bought it. I tried for ages to get a decent sound from it using a 56 Tele but it never had that same twang as my steel players amp. But luckily another steel player offered to swap his Fender Twin for it so we both ended up happy... Slowpoke

Peavey valve king 112. Lived though it's warranty and no longer.

Any amp with a fuzzy, indoor/outdoor carpeting cover instead of Tolex.

If I may ask, what amp brand is that? my first amp looked a lot like that except a 15 watter. Same fuzzy whatever it is on the outside and green knobs.
It's long gone but what is the brand of that amp?

Peavey Bandit.


I had 45W model 1983-87, i liked it. Marshall 50W which replaced it was not better, after all.
Now i have good Fender and VOX amps, i would like to have that Bandit still with me.:cool:

I had 45W model 1983-87, i liked it. Marshall 50W which replaced it was not better, after all. Both were good.
Now i have good Fender and VOX amps, i would like to have that Bandit still with me.:cool:


Oh, worst amp? Maybe that Dynacord 20W i had two months in 1965, before i got VOX AC15. That one was good.

Three amps come to mind for me:

- My first amp was a little SS Univox practice-type amp. This would have been about 1977 or so. I was a total novice guitar player and I had read all the interviews with stars in Guitar Player where they said when they turned their amps up all the way, it sounded great. My Univox did not sound great cranked. It sounded awful. Awful. In fact, it sounded awful even at low volume.

- I don't remember the model number, but I played through a borrowed Randall 100w combo - like a Twin, but all SS in the early 80s. Ugh. Horrible.

- I had a friend in the late 1980s who was a great, raw blues player. But unfortunately, he played a Yamaha G50-112 combo amp, which he absolutely loved. It had this "distortion" control on it, which he generally kept cranked. It was an amazingly loud amp for its size, but it also had the worst tone imaginable. It was the harshest, most ear-piercing thing I've ever heard. Just stomach-churningly bad.

Anyway, a couple years ago I was checking my emails from the local Freecycle and I see an ad for the same model amp! Since it was free, I went and got it. I'm going to take the innards out and convert it to a Fender PR clone I think. In the meantime I do some internet searches and find out some folks like these things!

Mine's still in the basement in my project queue. Someday I'll get to it, but in the meantime, I'm afraid to turn on it and hear what it sounds like. Every time I think about my friend's amp I shudder.

-Kevin

5150. ANY Peavey, for that matter.



Love my Classic 30.:roll:

70's era Yamaha S50 1-12. It was my very first amp. The price wasn't bad, so I bought it, without listening too it (hey, I was young and dumb at 14, what can I say).

Almost the size of a Fender Twin, weighed almost as much as one of the Queen Mary's anchors, but it looked cool and modern for an amp in the 70's.

Harsh. Brutal. Inconsistant in tone. Clean was sickeningly blah. Gain was like having three 600 series caterpillar motors w/twin turbos, strapped into a dyno rack, held at full throttle, and drained of all oil and coolant. Loud and viscouisly nasty. But unlike the cats, it never siezed up!

Not only did it frustrate me, it hurt my back lifting it!

Only quality that was admirable about it was, that it seemed nearly indestructable. It fell off the back of a pick up at about 20-25 mph, and only the tolex got scuffed. Not even a tear! Finally decided to off it by using it for target practice in the desert. That thing took more 12 guage slugs than what we thought was possible! Eventually strapped on some home made explosives, which finally dispatched that amp to tone hell!

God what an awful amp!

Awesome story....

Fender Frontman 10G...

Any amp with a fuzzy, indoor/outdoor carpeting cover instead of Tolex.

Yeah, what is this amp? It looks similar to my first amp. LOL.

Worse Amp. Hughes & Kettner TubeMeister.

Worse Amp. Hughes & Kettner TubeMeister.

Why? Do tell ...

I almost bought one a few weeks ago .

Goodness gracious...

A four year old thread that I started has been rekindled. IDK if I should feel a sense of accomplishment or one of shame.

I guess that this one marries well with the "Stock Pickups Are Fine?" thread that gets reanimated occasionally, that I think I started around the same time.

But I'm still sticking by my story with the Peavey Stereo Chorus 212, circa 80's, with horrible digital reverb, three useless channels, and heavier than a Twin Reverb. I'll defend many Peaveys to the death (including a really cool 70's Stereo Chorus w/analog 'verb) but not that 80's monstrosity.

I knew better than to ever bring home a GK or Gorilla amp, at least for my preferences. The 80's were a real rough patch if you were trying to "trade up" for a great new amp, IMO.

I wonder where this thread will be in 2012?

Still being read by the people

Has anyone mentioned Fender Power Chorus? What a shrill amp. Makes my ears bleed thinking about it.

To my ears this is a very good solid state amp. The cleans are excellent, maybe you are commenting on the distortion side of it.

I've always tried to stay away from anything with the word "Gorilla" on it...
Jake

And with good reason. A friend of mine "loaned" me this when he moved house. He has since failed to respond to calls or emails. I think it's a kind of curse. Someone said they sound like a chainsaw; it's not true. Chainsaws sound much nicer. Funny how the idea of a chainsaw arises unbidden in the subconscious when discussing Gorilla amps ...

http://i976.photobucket.com/albums/ae242/w3stie/bassamp1.jpg

German Dynacord guitar amps. The Dynacord Star from the mid-seventies. And then:

http://www.guitarmaniacs.de/gallery_pics/big/XEPn0zHzo0u2GM1ye1JsJglsb.jpg

The Dynacord GS 824. Built in a flight case, loud and rugged, but sounds like crap!

These threads crack me up..

People go out and buy or are given budget amps, and then they complain that they don't sound like a vintage hand wired classic.

Or they buy a high gain amp and complain about the cleans, or they buy a amp that is primarily a clean machine and bitch about the OD..

I suppose there is some justification for feeling that you were taken BITD when you bought the latest and greatest solid state creation and were told that tubes were on the death watch, and this baby could do it all, but really; NO usable sounds? I have never owned a amp, (and I have owned plenty) that didn't have some useables in it..they might be funky, they might be off the wall, but they were better than no amp at all..

Somewhere along the line too many people have decided that every amp needs to sound like some angelic combination of a BF Twin, a Plexi and a JMI AC-30 and these tones should be available merely by willing them to exist...

I have to say a vox vt30...has so many fxs and buttons that when you do find that tone your looking for one touch of the wrong button and your back on your tone quest.Selling mine now! grabbed a fender roc pro1000 and the clean channel is crystal clear, and offers all that my Tele and Comanche need to make me very happy.

Some Epiphone 25 watt solid state 10" combo that was my first amp. I had a DOD Grunge pedal for it too. I was 13 and it even sounded awful to me

I have to say a vox vt30...has so many fxs and buttons that when you do find that tone your looking for one touch of the wrong button and your back on your tone quest.Selling mine now! grabbed a fender roc pro1000 and the clean channel is crystal clear, and offers all that my Tele and Comanche need to make me very happy.


Hope you did not mean it`s tone is bad too? Because i think it has nice tones.
Why not take simple approach, memorize 4-8 sounds in your head, don`t try to pick them from tone bank, but set them yourself every time. I know that won`t work on a gig, but i play my VT30 in home only. For CV50 Tele clean Tone 1: AC15 no top boost, bass 5, mid 8, treble 7, delay at 40%...i have 5-6 tones i set, they work excellent for me.
I admit it`s too complicated, but it sounds quite good!

Blues jr hot rod deluxe Marshall class 5 ....all waisted money and time.

Don't get the hate for the blues jr. Or Crates. I had a VC 50 that was a lot of fun to play. My vote for worst: Orange.

People go out and buy or are given budget amps, and then they complain that they don't sound like a vintage hand wired classic.

I don't think that is the case at all. There is a good deal of old 'vintage' amps in this thread getting as good a panning. If an amp is unreliable, badly engineered or sounds bad it is likely to get a mention in this thread.

My first amp was a Peavey Rage 158 Transtube. I'm pretty sure all Transtube means is you have to crank the hell out of it to get it to break up, but its still solid state. Worst amp ever.

If I may ask, what amp brand is that? my first amp looked a lot like that except a 15 watter. Same fuzzy whatever it is on the outside and green knobs.
It's long gone but what is the brand of that amp?

I think Randall made some amps like that

Squier SP-10, complete garbage. The Line Sux Spyders are horrible POSs as well, as are the Fender Frontmen, and Marshall MGs.

Squier SP-10, complete garbage. The Line Sux Spyders are horrible POSs as well, as are the Fender Frontmen, and Marshall MGs.

I'm with you on the squier. Squier is never total garbage, except for that. I got one with a strat pack. Nobody will buy it off me.

My vote goes to either any Gorilla amps or Line 6...can't stand modeling personally. Plus the insane channel just sounds like fingernails on a chalkboard...

I had a Dean Markley 75w Solid State, loud but tonally pretty rubbish. Not sure where or when I got it from to be honest. Gave it to a mate who needed a back-up. I don't think he ever used it

Friend of mine traded in his Blues Deluxe (tweed) for a Crate "120 watt" SS 2X12 combo with "DSP", straight up. I just couldn't believe it. This wasn't a new one, it had blue and chrome trim. I tried to get him to take it back, but I guess he just wasn't able to face facts. The sound of the distortion covered so many frequencies you couldn't tell what he was trying to do. Horrible. Eventually he brought it back, but his Fender was gone. The good news is he now plays through a Rivera, don't remember which one.



This sounds like a nightmare :(

Anything Line 6

People seem to really hate crates... I have a Vintage Club 30 from the early 90s and that thing sounds great! (more so after I took out the Sovteks) The overdrive channel isn't so hot but the clean channel is wonderful, especially when I play the tele through a Tube Screamer.


Friend of mine has the 50 watt version, he took out the 2(?) speakers and had a single 15" put in. Dman does that thing sound fantastic clean with a Tele.

I remember owning very very early in my career a thing called a Lemon with a big arse 15" speaker lived up to it's name.

I traded my peavey(worst purchase) for a Vox. I have no idea what the person who traded with me was thinking. Anyway a win for me and a loss for the poor guy who traded.

peavey backstage.... apparently some like theirs but my dads sounded terrible

The worst.....Peavey bandit 65, vox climax, amps where every time I had good sound set I would note the settings.
Come back a day later and the same settings sound horrible. You keep trying but then flip em eventually.

The worst.....Peavey bandit 65, vox climax, amps where every time I had good sound set I would note the settings.
Come back a day later and the same settings sound horrible. You keep trying but then flip em eventually.

Say it ain't so...Surely you were playing the dirty channel on the Peavey.

Ampeg Gemini. Some old solid state Sunn combo my local mom-and-pop shop has. And maybe the Spider Valve stuff to a lesser extent... somehow they sound worse than the regular SS Line 6 offerings...

This may be true, but The Rob Chapman Silver Back looks pretty sweet.

I'm just chiming in to reiterate a disdain for blues juniors. Sure I clipped the bright cap, swapped speakers and tubes and biased my DRRI the first day I had it, but now it's awesome. The blues junior I had? Billm or anyone else couldn't make that an amp I could stand playing! What a piece.

Cheers,
Benjamin

These threads crack me up..

People go out and buy or are given budget amps, and then they complain that they don't sound like a vintage hand wired classic.

Or they buy a high gain amp and complain about the cleans, or they buy a amp that is primarily a clean machine and bitch about the OD..

I suppose there is some justification for feeling that you were taken BITD when you bought the latest and greatest solid state creation and were told that tubes were on the death watch, and this baby could do it all, but really; NO usable sounds? I have never owned a amp, (and I have owned plenty) that didn't have some useables in it..they might be funky, they might be off the wall, but they were better than no amp at all..

Somewhere along the line too many people have decided that every amp needs to sound like some angelic combination of a BF Twin, a Plexi and a JMI AC-30 and these tones should be available merely by willing them to exist...

Word! (late, I realize,but "word" nevertheless!) .. Cheers!

Just like our musical tastes are sort of defined by the time we are 16 years old (well, a lot of us anyway, certainly not all)

at least some of our tastes in amps are defined early on as well.... and for some of us, we keep buying amps looking for that elusive tone we heard or imagined or even had, when we were young.

Some guys I know keep buying the same style of amp over and over, more and more expensive versions of more or less the same thing...

VOX AC30VR

the worst

im selling mine for $300

want it?

No such thing as a bad amp. It may not have the tone you want, but it has a tone that somebody can make use of.

I did an entire demo CD using a Gorilla GG-10 - the head part anyway, mounted in another cabinet with a Pyle 8" speaker. Careful knob placement, a bit of work with the mic placement...sounded just fine. Hell, I even used the "tube stack" in a couple of places. Best punk tone ever, the Gorilla Tube Stack control is.

I not only still have this amp, I use it quite often.

I notice that the solid-state Yamahas come in for a beating on this thread. They are as heavy as an anvil, this is true. And they really only have one usable tone (clean), and they don't take pedals well. I borrowed and gigged with one a few times, ditched my pedalboard after the first set and went guitar -> cord -> Yamaha. Worked quite well, a little weird going with no effects (I use them a lot) but you know, it got me through the gigs, I could hear myself, and nobody complained. I'd buy one but I'm terrified of shipping costs on a 900 pound amp or whatever those things weigh.

Any amp, or cab, that says GBX on it. Awful.
Also, Legend amps, though they are way better than GBX, they're still a sad amp. :shock: :?
+1 on GBX!!
Utter crap IMHO, I knew people who owned these horrible things in the '70s, never heard one that sounded good, no usable tones.

I hate to say it, and I think George and Leo would agree, my Music Man has no musicality at all.

No such thing as a bad amp. It may not have the tone you want, but it has a tone that somebody can make use of.

I did an entire demo CD using a Gorilla GG-10 - the head part anyway, mounted in another cabinet with a Pyle 8" speaker. Careful knob placement, a bit of work with the mic placement...sounded just fine. Hell, I even used the "tube stack" in a couple of places. Best punk tone ever, the Gorilla Tube Stack control is.

I not only still have this amp, I use it quite often.

I notice that the solid-state Yamahas come in for a beating on this thread. They are as heavy as an anvil, this is true. And they really only have one usable tone (clean), and they don't take pedals well. I borrowed and gigged with one a few times, ditched my pedalboard after the first set and went guitar -> cord -> Yamaha. Worked quite well, a little weird going with no effects (I use them a lot) but you know, it got me through the gigs, I could hear myself, and nobody complained. I'd buy one but I'm terrified of shipping costs on a 900 pound amp or whatever those things weigh.

Jeez, I don't believe it!! I have a Gorilla TC-110 in the loft that hasn't been used for quite a few years! I bought it off a mate years ago cos I liked the crunch. It never did anything wrong it just looks out of date nowadays for me. Must dig it out again some day! :grin:

I'm with Arbiter I have owned/ used a whole range of amps from boutique tube stuff to thrift store ss finds, part of the fun is finding out what stuff can do.
My local Goodwill has a whole palate of these in different designs for $3 each, I'm tempted..http://www.walmart.com/ip/14659191?adid=22222222227000505268&wmlspartner=wlpa&wl0=&wl1=g&wl2=[m]&wl3=14056936030&wl4=&wl5=pla&veh=sem

I woudn't go that far.

ditto - Peavy Classic 30 or 50' are good amps/ bad ? never owned a bad amp, yes owned a B Junior, but it was ok by me.

According to some reviews there, the Gorillas are just about the best thing going! :wink:

I think I had one a long time ago, I had one of those Crates that looked like a crate, I had some sort of Sunn solid state thing, a couple of bad Peaveys, a Legend--with the cane grill.

Dude, that's quite a "lucky streak" of amps. Do you live under a ladder or something?
Those Sunns... oh my.
For me the worst is The Line6 Pod XT or is it XT300 now? We had a guitar player who insisted on playing through one of those into a twin. Loud, over compressed, fake distortion.

Dude, that's quite a "lucky streak" of amps. Do you live under a ladder or something?
Those Sunns... oh my.
For me the worst is The Line6 Pod XT or is it XT300 now? We had a guitar player who insisted on playing through one of those into a twin. Loud, over compressed, fake distortion.

So....think it's safe to say that according to this thread, most amps are therefore c - - p. Yes?

Line 6 Spider Series. Even the pawn shops avoid them.

Worst let-down for me was the Fender Blues Jr. III. Sounded great in the stores... Lusted for one for several years, finally got one and took it home and really hated it. Got a Peavey Delta Blues and that was what the BJ-III should of been. It was the one with the 15" speaker... Hell of a slide amp. Almost miss it.

I think all of the Fender Hot Rods I've seen/heard/played are expensive trash.

Have since ended up with a '59 Bassman RI, CBS Twin w/push-pull master (LOVE this amp), and a Cyber Twin I head ran through a Marshall 1936 cab. I love all these amps greatly. Rarely use my pedals anymore. Having a Fender Tank for the reverb is a big plus.

Another amp I love is the little Fender Champ Six I've moded (on the cheap) Replaced the speaker and changed the tubes. Running it out of an 8" speaker cab is where this amp really shines. I do most of my recordings with that thing.

Line 6 Spider Series. Even the pawn shops avoid them.

Just the SS versions or the Spider Valve/Bogner Series as well?

Quantums were always horribad imo.

http://www.tdpri.com/forum/attachments/epic-threads/121072d1332803551-worst-amps-hall-fame-quantum_angle-jpg

man, i finally got myself my first tube amp (hot rod deluxe) this year, i was pretty happy to not be playing solid state anymore. Now i see all the hatred and i feel bad. It sounds just fine to me! well, the clean channel anyways, i agree the OD sounds awful. but that's what a nice OD pedal is for!

I'm trying to think of an amp that I have ever owned that I thought "I need to get rid of this thing ASAP" and I cant think of any. I will say that really the only Solid State amp I have fallen in love with since I bought my first tube amp is my Vox Cambridge. I dont really click with SS amps anymore...

Quantums were always horribad imo.

http://www.tdpri.com/forum/attachments/epic-threads/121072d1332803551-worst-amps-hall-fame-quantum_angle-jpg

Looks like it came out of the Car Audio section at Walmart

Prolly not actually a terrible amp... But prolly the worst amp video ever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Q0-E-gk0vU

Acoustic 134 from the 70s. 4 X 10 and solid state. I was playing in clubs in the 70s and the older guys in the band told me Marshall full stack was too loud. They convinced me this was the way to go. I have been in therapy ever since.

:roll:Well, I think we covered just about any amp that was in production from 1960 - 2012. Nice job!

Acoustic 134 from the 70s. 4 X 10 and solid state. I was playing in clubs in the 70s and the older guys in the band told me Marshall full stack was too loud. They convinced me this was the way to go. I have been in therapy ever since.

Great jazz amp though Metheny used one for years..

Great jazz amp though Metheny used one for years..

Yeah, it did have a decent clean tone. The change in feel, going from the Marshall stack and doing primarily Zep, Trower, etc.... to covering "Feelings" and losing that tubey goodness was emasculating, though. The irony is that it was a very loud amp, and open-backed. I could have stayed with a half-stack;)

These days, I use a pair of low-wattage tube amps into a stereo cab ( 2 or 4 Vintage 30s). It's relatively compact and the stereo FX are lush. Very satisfying.

Reading through the thread, I see that someone mentioned the old Yamaha ship's anchors. Perhaps that would have been a better candidate. Never liked anything about them. Never owned one, but played with someone who did. Made the sign of the cross and rubbed garlic all over myself whenever it was nearby.

There are certain old Twin Reverbs that should be avoided. These are master volume models that have a more powerful transformer. That's really all I know, but you can do your homework...

:roll:Well, I think we covered just about any amp that was in production from 1960 - 2012. Nice job!

:mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen:

-Gnobuddy

Couldn't
Really
Afford
The
Equipment.

Basically anything by CRATE.

Three pop to the top of my list.

Fender M-80 Chorus
Vox Buckingham
Peavey Stereo Chorus 212

Fender M-80! Worst amp I ever owned. And I've owned some that were listed in this thread.

Sonax; the only good sound it made was when it fell down a flight of stairs.

Hey, you guys forgot:

1. Traynor

2. Polytone

3. Earth

4. Fender Hot Rod series ( I know, I know, buy 'em if you like 'em )

I coud add a few others, but I think I stepped on enough toes with that last one..........sorry.

Yes I'm only reading this post now...Traynor? up here those are fightin' words.My Custom Special 50 kicks butt but I could agree with some of those SS Traynors.I always thought of the tube versions as tough and good sounding.But I could also be a hoser EH?http://www.tdpri.com/forum/images/smilies/icon_mrgreen.gif

Fender M-80! Worst amp I ever owned. And I've owned some that were listed in this thread.

How about a SS 1984 Fender Montreaux?100W that could barely keep up with a 20W tube amp playing beside it.Nice cleans, good reverb, but the gain channel is dirty indeed, and not in a good way.Gross.What were they thinking or smokin'?Anyway mine's under cover waiting for classic status if only from it's vintage.Hmm bad amps n skinny ties...

Hello...

Fender Super Sonic 22....great tones but noisy reverb tube and I had 2 crap out on me weeks after buying them....thank goodness for the Fender 5 year warranty....I wish they would fix the glitches....

R

Amazed to see Sunn amps mentioned because a certain corner of the heavy metal community seem to swear by them. I've never seen a Sunn amp here in the UK so cannot comment. However it seems they were all but universally panned back in the day.

I read the whole thread - I'm bored - such is old guy fun

My nominee amps are all a special brand of wretched. By that, I don't mean that they are just crappy amps. Most amps aren't all that hot, so what. I mean they were products that many people had to pretend were good or valuable but were extra crappy. Or in some cases these are products that were always crap but have been held up by someone 30 years later as good. I've played all of 'em.

Silvertone 1482 ( the only people who think these are cool never had to take one out of car and try and play a gig with one - no guts, no bottom, no top traded mine for a six pack and two Leon Russel tickets)

Any solid state Vox made by Thomas organ company (the bigger it gets the worse it sounds)

Randall 70s (they would suck the tone out of the amps playing next to them)

Sunn coloseums, Acoustic 270

Standell 70s (epoxy modules -"The Standell amplifier company does not claim that MODULUX is a duplicate for a Leslie loudspeaker system" - they shouldn't have claimed those tragic POSs were amplifiers for guitars)

Kustom 50 70s (a rolled and pleated nightmare not only sounded bad but it was heavy for SS trash)

Peavey Classic, Bandit and any other Peavey SS garbage with those 2 pieces of aluminum down the sides (awful dead sounding gak but like most Peavey's won't break even if you want it to)

G&K 250 ML (an extra snarly little piece of crap)

Fender - zodiac series, M-80, Princeton stereo chorus, Hotrod deluxe (v1 &2 worst reverb in a tube amp ever) and, of course, the rightfully despised red knobs

Johnson modeling amps, ART modeling amps, Roland modeling amps, Line 6 spider series,

Mesa Subway, Blue angel, SOB

Matchless baby

Gibson Goldtone (sound terrible / cost a lot / who could ask for more)

Randall 70s (they would suck the tone out of the amps playing next to them)

Thanks, that made me laugh.

Any amp that has chorus on it, particularly the fender super chorus... Somone in our area craigslist keeps trying to sell it for 400 bucks or so

man, i finally got myself my first tube amp (hot rod deluxe) this year, i was pretty happy to not be playing solid state anymore. Now i see all the hatred and i feel bad. It sounds just fine to me! well, the clean channel anyways, i agree the OD sounds awful. but that's what a nice OD pedal is for!

I think my fender hot rod deluxe (White lightning addition that has a dif speaker) sounds great. I had my amp tech build a master volum box in the loop and I can get super bluzey sounds on the clean channel. It also takes pedals really well, so if you start hating it try a new speaker out.. i suggest the celestion vintage g12 century that came in the white lightning