Low wattage valve amp - advice and what have I missed ?

A Blues Jr will not give you a blackface tone.

If budget isn’t much of a concern *don’t settle*. Hold out to get something that will nail that sound in your head. It’s out there. Go get it.

 

I have the Tone King Gremlin, and it is perfect for home use. The two channels are great for blackface and tweed sounds. The tweed channel doesn't have a lot of headroom. But it really rocks. The black face channel offers plenty of headroom( unless you are using high output pickups ). With the attenuator, it can achieve great sounds at various volume levels. It is actually 8 watts, not 5.

 

I think I'm thirding the VHT Special 6 now. It's more versatile than most low-watt amps with a standard tweed-style tone plus a fixed Blackface-type tone stack that can be toggled on and off, a 10-inch speaker instead of the usual 8, and high and low inputs plus triode/pentode operation for four distinct power levels. Well made and very affordable new or used.

 

Silverface Champ all day. Such a little beast.

 

I had the special 6 ultra, the head not the combo. I added TMB controls and ran it through a 12, it sounded great. The power scaling was a cool feature as well.

 

Buy a used Mesa TA15. 5-15-25 watts so it will grow with you. Does BF Fender, Vox, Marshall, and Mesa amp tones. Most versatile amp ever made. No reverb or loop. Use a pedal. Love my TA15 and play it at home all the time. Great master volume.

 

Yeah, I agree. Blues Jr. is a Fender amp but it is really not the right one for the classic Fender sound. An old fashioned Champ would be your best bet, not sure how many of them are available over on your side of the pond though.

 

A Champ does NOT do BF cleans any better than a Blues Junior. You need at least a Princeton or larger to get the classic blackface sparkle.

 

If you play with a drummer with some dynamics, yes. However, you could run out of clean headroom. I haven't gigged that amp, but have gigged with a tweed Harvard (10watts). In a smaller to mid sized pub, it is doable. The 12" speaker puts out some good volume in that Gremlin. If you are playing with a loud band that play turned up 40+ watt amps, it won't keep up.

 

Second time tonight I've evangelized for this handy gem:

The Ibanez TSA15.

VERY versatile, fun, and for its price, great quality.

5 or 15 watts, switchable. Not very loud at its 5w setting, nicely louder at its 15 setting, but sounds great at 15 with its volume low, too. Dead quiet in terms of hiss or hum. Very sweet Fender-style cleans. Takes pedals great.

If you get the head version, match it with whatever speaker(s) you like, in a cabinet you can buy or build. Pairs with pretty much anything, as it has 2 x 8 ohm, 2 x 16 ohm, 1 x 4 ohm, 1 x 8 ohm, and 1 x 16 ohm jacks in back.

Simple, flexible controls. The onboard TubeScreamer (TS9 circuit) is quite flexible. You can dial in playing clean so it begins to break up only when you play harder, or turn up your guitar volume's knob. So that puts a lot of control literally in your fingers. It has a useful mids-boost switch, too.

Takes a footswitch for the TS9 and mids-boost, and has an FX loop, too.

I play about 15 different guitars through it over a month or two, and it takes me just moments to dial each one in.

Check it out, and good luck!