14-year-old wants practice amp. What's good? Yamaha THR vs. Boss Dual Cube vs. what else?

[homesick345]

Certainly something without menus or digital bloat.

An amp with basic, direct controls V-T-M-B..

So... Fender Frontman

 

[Wound_Up]

I completely agree. Simplicity is best for a student.

Not a chance. When I started playing 3 years ago, my Mustang II was a godsend. It allowed me to add effects and learn what I liked without breaking the bank buying pedals.

If you like Metallica, you aren't going to be very inspired playing Metallica through a clean amp with no effects.

IMO, a modeling amp is EXACTLY what a new player needs so they can test out sounds and tones without spending tons of money on pedals they end up not using.

I was able to do it for $50. You can't beat that with a stick. You can barely buy a single good pedal for $50 much less a 1x12 amp and 14 different effect types and 50+ different effects. You know what, kept me wanting to learn? Inspiration. You know where it came from? Being inspired by the tones I was able to get from my amp. You get almost no inspiration from a clean amp with no effects.


If I'm trying to learn to play Nirvana, no effects is the last thing I need. Same goes for almost any band or player, whether the player spoken of uses effects or not.

Id never tell a new player to stay away from fx when they start out. Especially not after my own experience in the 3 years I've been playing. If it was 1965? 1975? Sure. That'd be sound advice. But it's not. It's 2023.

Just curious. When did you start learning to play?

 

[Brent Hutto]

Not a chance. When I started playing 3 years ago, my Mustang II was a godsend. It allowed me to add effects and learn what I liked without breaking the bank buying pedals.

If you like Metallica, you aren't going to be very inspired playing Metallica through a clean amp with no effects.

IMO, a modeling amp is EXACTLY what a new player needs so they can test out sounds and tones without spending tons of money on pedals they end up not using.

I was able to do it for $50. You can't beat that with a stick. You can barely buy a single good pedal for $50 much less a 1x12 amp and 14 different effect types and 50+ different effects. You know what, kept me wanting to learn? Inspiration. You know where it came from? Being inspired by the tones I was able to get from my amp. You get almost no inspiration from a clean amp with no effects.


If I'm trying to learn to play Nirvana, no effects is the last thing I need. Same goes for almost any band or player, whether the player spoken of uses effects or not.

Id never tell a new player to stay away from fx when they start out. Especially not after my own experience in the 3 years I've been playing. If it was 1965? 1975? Sure. That'd be sound advice. But it's not. It's 2023.

Just curious. When did you start learning to play?

Fifteen years ago I had a very short and unsatisfactory adventure, trying to learn to play electric guitar. The biggest problem was my technique (trying to adapt nylon string classical playing to electric guitar, a very bad idea). But the coup de grace was the well-intentioned online advice I received, instructing me that I should do nothing else until I could get a good tone out of my Telecaster's bridge pickup, straight into a 5w Champ style tube amp, using heavy gauge strings.

It's hard to overstate the horror of listening to carefully tended long fingernails digging into a set of 11's, twanging the hell out a Tele bridge into a single-ended Tube amp while trying to play Celtic fiddle tunes with lots of open strings. Nothing about that ever had a chance to work!

That said, this time around I immediately went with light strings, a pick, a clean solid state amp and some delay and light modulation effects while playing on the neck pickup. I'm getting some good sounds but if I turn off all the pedals and plug straight into the amp it most certainly does not improve my tone.

 

[Billy3]

Whatever you decide. Having a headphone jack is a must for a beginner in your home.

 

[Tim S]

FWIW, the OP bought an amp for his daughter and wrote about it in post #153, so additional suggestions are probably too late.

 

[Fiesta Red]

I’m not joking when I make this suggestion:

Fender Rumble 40

Weighs nothing.
Takes pedals well.
Reasonable price.
Loud enough to jam or gig (if that ever happens) but sounds good at low volumes.
She’ll have a (practice) bass amp on-hand if she ever leans toward the lower octave set.
Simple learning curve…I mean, bassists can figure it out!
Can be used as an acoustic amp (I know, I’ve done it).

 

[Gregorski]

I have a THR30 mk2 and a Blackstar HT5. The Yamaha blows the blackstar away for sound although clearly will never be as loud. And it’s soooo easy to use. The black star is going to be replaced as it’s just bland on clean and horrible on gain

 

[AndrewG]

Don't know if it's been mentioned already, but I have a Blackstar Fly3. Sounds very nice for a tiny amp. Works off batteries or mains and is inexpensive.

 

[Jbnaxx]

This sounds crazy but….. a Katana Head. It has a built in speaker that sounds pretty good and checks about every box there is.