New Amp: ENGL Retro 50 Head

I picked up this Retro 50 to further my goal of collecting all of the major ENGL tonal categories. This amp has a different design from any of the usual ENGL heads (like the Powerball, Invader, Savage etc) and the goal is a bit more of a traditional, modded Marshall kind of tone. After playing it, I think it achieves that goal - it’s very mid heavy, and a bit stiff. It has two channels, and each channel can make use of a footswitchable gain mode, and the highest gain setting even has a built in noise gate. The clean channel is nice and full sounding, with rolled off highs, while the distortion channel is definitely in that thick midrange-y Marshall crunch territory, but with a little less upper mids and more filled out bottom end. It really reminds me of a Splawn Quickrod in many ways, in both playing feel and tone. The high gain mode is quite excellent as well, although the low end doesn’t feel quite articulate enough for extreme technical metal styles, but I’d imagine by either rolling the amp gain down, or using the non-high gain lead mode, and boosting it with a bass-cutting pedal like a Tubescreamer or SD-1, would result in a usable tone.

Otherwise, it’s fairly lean on features - more akin to a Fireball than a Powerball, but the Retro does have separate EQ’s for each channel. Interestingly, it also lacks a presence control - not even a master presence or a knob on the rear panel. That kind of surprised me, even though the EQ controls have a wide sweep, there seems to be a little brightness lacking at times and turning the treble up alters the rest of the frequency ranges that it’s not a guaranteed solution. Still, it’s unique in its own way for an ENGL design and is a great tool to have available, but I don’t think it could be my only amp.

I also have to mention that I ordered both this amp as well as a Rivera Knucklehead Reverb 55w from Guitar Center Summerlin NV. I hate to rake anyone over the coals, but the Rivera, even though I paid for and reserved it, was not pulled from the shelf for days and someone local purchased that amp, and the GC store cancelled my order to sell it to them instead. On top of that, this Retro 50 was waiting for shipment for over 30 days since I ordered it - and that’s after I called and very politely asked for a status. I was assured it would ship out the next day, it didn’t, and I waited a whole week to call again - and my calls were ignored. After that length of time, it finally shipped the day after I left a 1 star google review for that location - I can’t believe it took leaving that review in order to finally get the amp shipped to me. I understand they were having some staffing issues, and it’s a busy store, but it’s a bit extreme to take that long, and I’m especially irked that they sold my Rivera since I was really looking forward to acquiring that amp to compare with my Bonehead.

New Guitar: Kramer Condor all the way from the UK

Picked up this very nice, white Kramer Condor from the kramerforumz classifieds. Shipping from the UK was pricey, and the box was a little damp upon arrival, but luckily there was no permanent damage and the guitar arrived in good condition.

Very desirable to me is the banana headstock with an R2 width neck - as opposed to the seemingly more common, wider, R5’s. This neck is well worth the purchase right on its own, I love the feel and playability, the frets are in great shape, and the R2 width fits my hand very comfortably. The body has a good amount of small dings and scratches and is definitely in player’s condition, but after handling this neck I can see why!

One of the more unique things about this particular guitar is that it is a Condor drilled from factory for a wider spaced “E” serial number plate. This was during the transition era where the banana headstock shape was about to be phased out for the pointy shape, but some early E plates like this one still had the old shape. Due to the position of the lettering on the newer style plates, the old method of drilling the strap button hole directly through the plate was not used on this guitar - instead the strap button was added just above it, and it’s a later black Schaller straplock style.

New Amp x2: PRS Sonzera and ENGL Straight 100

Picked these two amps up while searching for some deals on Guitar Center. Let’s start with the ENGL.

The Straight 100 has intrigued me for a while - it has a relatively stellar reputation, but they must not have sold that well as they are quite rare, at least in the US. There is some positive association with George Lynch, and it’s release in the late 80s as a dual channel high gain amp definitely brings an expectation of a thrash metal kind of machine.

With that in mind, I was extremely surprised at just how great the clean channel sounds on this amp. It’s very full bodied, modern sounding, and has some very usable switches to shape the tone, with great sounding spring reverb. The overdrive channel on the other hand, has a fantastic crunch mode which feels like a logical extension of the clean channel. Once the “lead boost” switch is turned on though, it really departs from those sounds and has a fairly saturated lead tone with a bright and cutting high end. It does not have a deep modern saturated sound, or heavy bass impact, since this amp predates that trend (likely started around roughly 1992-1993 with the Peavey 5150 or Mesa Dual Rectifier).

It’s very cool to hear the progression of tonal design in these early ENGL’s, since I’m lucky enough to have both amps on either side of this one - the E101 Digital Amp and the Savage. I’m planning to do a comparison video of all the ENGL’s I have, with the same riff, but I have a few more models I want to acquire and test before I put that all together.

This particular amp is the “standard” version, with a single button footswitch for changing channels, but there are some Straight models with a two button switch that allows channels as well as reverb to be turned on or off, or alternatively these special models allow the second channel’s lead boost to be turned on or off from the footswitch. This effectively turns it into a 2.5 channel amp, as you’ll have a clean, crunch, and lead sounds all available from the footswitch (crunch and lead sharing an EQ and other tone shaping switches).

Next, I have a PRS Sonzera 50 head. This was a bit of an unintentional purchase, as online the listing was for a Sonzera but the pictures were all of an Archon 50. With the inconsistency of Guitar Center’s listings, I figure I’d roll the dice and hope an Archon showed up for that ridiculously low price. Instead, the correct Sonzera arrived but I’m not too disappointed - it’s a pretty nice sounding amp and even though I didn’t get a 50% off Archon, I still think the price is pretty fair for the Sonzera.

So how’s the amp? It’s pretty decent, but I’ll admit it doesn’t break any records for me. It has a very nice clean channel, and is incredibly heavy with huge transformers. Disappointingly, it has some of the most sensitive master volume controls I’ve seen, and this amp is incredibly loud and difficult to manage compared to other 50 watters. Additionally, the reverb introduces a lot of background noise whenever it is set to anything besides fully on, or fully off. Luckily, you can set the reverb’s mix separately for both channels, which helps somewhat, but even on the clean channel setting the reverb to max is a bit too saturated. The distortion tone is thick and full sounding with plenty of gain for metal, and has an absolutely enormous amount of bass. In fact, it’s way too much bass, and I A/B tested this amp with my Bogner Uberschall, and the Sonzera has much more bass. It’s actually reasonably well controlled, at least in standard tuning, but it is definitely not an amp I’d call extremely clear or articulate, and it lacks the highs for that wall of sound rectifier type thing too (something the Uberschall can do if it so chooses). Obviously, comparing a $2k+ amp to a $500 amp isn’t quite fair, in some ways, but I find I’m using the Sonzera’s gain channel with the bass at barely 1 or 2. To make matters worse, the amp is completely anemic with the bass turned completely off, and it becomes quickly overwhelming very early in the sweep of the bass knob.

Overall, it’s a conflicting amp, and I see why these were discontinued and didn’t sell all that well. I’ve heard some great recorded tones on youtube of them, but there’s a few odd voicing choices and not enough of a stand out tone to make them worth recommending that much - but since they were only around $799 brand new I’d say they are a solid budget choice, as long as you can get around its limitations.

New Video: ENGL Savage 120 Mk 1 in-depth review

I have a lot of amps go through my hands here, and it’s a rare occasion that something really blows me away. Plenty of amps with glowing reviews and stellar reputations, once I finally get them, I find they have their special qualities or are otherwise on-par with other high end amps - but the Savage is truly a cut above.

After a little bit of tweaking and learning some of the unique controls, this has to be one of the best sounding amps I’ve ever played. I was expecting more of a modern metal, saturated or scooped style tone based on reading online but that’s not exactly right - I would describe it to be more in the modded Marshall sound realm. It is quite unlike the Powerball/Fireball or Invader that I have in the same room, with less deep bass and a much grittier upper midrange punch. That also makes a lot of sense based on when this amp was designed, all the way back in 1993. The Powerballs and Invaders are much newer, 2000’s era amps and they are voiced and have features accordingly.

Especially when you consider the age of the amp design, the feature set is fantastic. Two effects loops, two channels with two modes each (clean + crunch 1 and crunch 2 + lead), each of which has a separate volume control and can be selected with a footswitch. It also has two master volumes and two presence controls, also footswitchable, and a “rough/smooth” switch that works on just the crunch2/lead channel. The default, and most versatile setting is “rough” which has a wider range and sounds fantastic, while the “smooth” setting drops a bit of gain while also chopping off some bass and treble, presumably for lead sounds. While I like the smooth setting, it’s definitely not the highlight of the amp, but it’s very cool to have the option especially right on the footswitch.

Speaking of the footswitch, I do not have the original ENGL Z-10 footswitch, with it’s very funny looking parallel-port looking connector. In a very interesting design choice though, this amp also has 3 1/4 inch jacks on the rear that allow you to use up to 3 separate 2-button footswitches, easily and commonly found, to switch the same 6 functions you could have used the original Z-10 for. Now that’s a handy feature - whether you lost the Z-10, or left it at home, or bent a pin - it’s cheap and easy to find 1/4 footswitches and could probably save your show if you toured with this amp.

Of course, being feature rich many times does seem to cause some compromises with tone, and while there are a few limitations to be aware of while dialing in this amp, it’s really an exception to that rule with some of the best crunch and high gain tones I’ve ever heard from an amp. Check out the video below for a demo of the available sounds and a walkthrough of the schematic.

New Amp: KSR Orthos 2

I saw this pop up on Guitar Center’s used listings one morning (I’m sure some of you are tired of reading that exact statement, but it’s how I get most of my gear!) and jumped on it. I have wanted a Rhodes Colossus for a long time, probably since I first saw that Keith Morrow video with the different Seymour Duncan pickups compared back to back. The tone was incredible, as well as the riff - like a 6505 with a tighter bottom, I thought.

Anyway, the Orthos 2 isn’t exactly a Colossus, but I can stomach the cost a lot better. I lucked out and ended up with a 100w version, with extremely heavy transformers and a very cool color LED lit front logo and metal grille. This LED changes colors depending on which channel, and which master volume you have selected, and even cooler, you can flip a few small dip switches on the rear panel and change which color each channel is. Want your clean channels to be blue and green, and the drive channels yellow and red? You can do it - or any combination of them. You can also do LED’s completely off, purple, white, etc by choosing a combination of RGB per channel. It’s a really minor feature at the end of it, but it sure is a cool one.

Another really interesting feature, is that technically this is a two channel amp. The first channel is for cleans, and the second for leads/overdrive. Nothing unexpected there, but it also has two master volumes. Also not that unique, but what is special is that each channel has a few switchable options, and which options are currently in the signal path depends on which master you are using. For example, if you are on the Lead channel, using Master 1, you can choose to have crunch mode engaged, bright switch off, and “feel” knob turned to something like “4.” Then, when you hit the switch to go to master 2, you can have the bright switch turn on, and the feel knob set to “6” instead. So even though it’s technically a two channel amp, and each channel has its own EQ section, you can get some different textures, gain amounts, and of course volume level by switching masters.

Speaking of the “feel” knob, this is a 6-way rotary control that has a drastic effect on the distortion tone. I am having trouble finding the rhyme or reason to each setting - it’s not as simple as “feel 1” is less gain than “feel 6.” I find that “4” and “6” seem to have the most saturation, so I really liked those when I first plugged in. Now that I’ve had some more time with it, I’m really liking the feel set on 2, especially with crunch mode engaged on master 1, for a classic rock tone without too much bass, then I leave the feel on 6 for master 2 (crunch mode is automatically off on master 2) and that’s my high gain lead channel. Talk about a great way to set up a “2 channel” amp, in a way that has effectively 4 usable sounds that all have a uniform sort of language when playing.

New Guitar: (Project finished) 1985-6 Kramer Condor

I’m a little behind posting this, but I’ve finally finished assembling and setting up my Kramer Condor. A while back, I traded some parts around with a friend over on the kramerforumz. I ended up with a transparent blue Condor body, D-series serial number plate (roughly correct for the body), and a case for it (which is HUGE by the way).

The hard part was finding the correct neck for a guitar like this - it should have an angled banana headstock neck - but those are just so hard to locate. Perhaps someday I’ll find one and swap the neck, but for now I went with an early ‘86 neck I had extra with a pointy headstock. I think the pointy look of the neck works really well with the pointy Condor body and with the black hardware gives it a really awesome look. Here are some pictures of the completed project:

New Guitar: 1988 Carvin DC200 Koa

I am always paying attention to used Carvin listings, specifically hoping to see some from 1988-89 with the “jackson” style pointy headstock, so when this popped up for sale I just had to have it.

It’s a DC200, which means it has the usual DC series features of this era (neck through body construction, ebony fingerboard, mother-of-pearl inlays, Carvin M22 pickups) but with a few special additions like standard block inlays, and a unique control layout. The default configuration has both volume and tone for each pickup (like a Les Paul), a 3-way pickup selector switch, and a separate coil tap switch per pickup. The last switch closest to the input jacks, which are stereo outputs, is a phase switch. The phase switch is only really noticeable when both pickups are in use, but it gives some really unique tones especially when combined with the coil splitting of either one or both pickups.

This particular DC200 Koa was ordered with gold hardware (an additional $40) and with the Kahler Pro tremolo. Since I currently have another DC125 with an Original Floyd Rose, it’s pretty cool to have both of the tremolo bridge options (a fixed bridge was also available). This would’ve been priced at $819 back in ‘88 and the most amazing thing I noticed out of all of this is that the UPS Shipment cost for this guitar, in a case, was $10. Wow!

Of course, the highlight feature is the Koa wood body wings on either side of the one-piece maple neck through design. Even better, the beautiful, glossy clear finish really showcases the fine grain of these woods and the unplugged tone is exceptional. Here are some pictures, and of course many more on this guitar’s page over in the collection gallery here:

New Amp: Orange AD30HTC

I’ve been on a hot streak of collecting amps, but I haven’t gotten a new Orange in a while. Since I mostly buy my gear based on how good of a price I can get, not necessarily what I want most, I’ve been looking at the AD30’s for a long time, ever since I played one in my local store (I didn’t buy it at the time since I felt it was overpriced).

Since first playing one, I’ve gotten my hands on the OR50, RV50III, TV50, DD50, and spent considerable seat time with the TH30 and Rocker 30, but I was still keeping my eyes peeled for this unique amp. Finally, after a long wait, I spotted this amp for a great price and snagged it.

The most notable different of this amp, compared to other Oranges, is that it is a Class A amp, and each channel has completely independent preamps, with two tubes each. The power section has a quad of EL84’s, as well as a GZ34 rectifier tube. This gives the amp a really distinctive feel, with the sag of the tube rectifier but the punch of a Class A power amp - not too distant from that of a Vox AC30, except the Orange preamp design and voicing is quite different. Both channels are identical, as far as I can tell, so you can set them up however you like - clean/clean, clean/overdrive, or two different levels of overdrive. The tone is bright, cutting, and a lot less like the “Fuzz” sound that Oranges are commonly associated with. You could get something close by manipulating the EQ controls (no presence or resonance, just a 3-band here), but where it really excels is bright, loud, classic rock tones. It really excels in the elusive edge-of-breakup tones and there are even situations I would choose this over a JMP or JCM800!

My Love-Hate Relationship With Guitar Center

First things first, thanks for everyone who helped me reach 1000 subscribers on Youtube. That’s pretty cool.

Now… let’s talk about Guitar Center, and specifically their used department. I purchase a LOT of used gear from GC and while I never expect a perfectly pristine piece, I do expect the bare minimum as far as packaging, testing, and descriptions - as well as honesty and transparency when something goes wrong.

To date, I have placed 110 orders with GC since 2016 and totaling… a lot of money. I have gotten some great deals, I’ve splurged on a few things I really wanted - but the most notable thing is that out of those orders, 34 of them had a MAJOR problem, and yet another 26 had a minor issue. That’s 55% of orders that required either a return, partial refund, or some other extra step to make it right. I’m very go with the flow - not too anal about anything - and I’m not afraid to pick up a soldering iron or do my own little tweaks, setups and repairs, so for me to say there is an issue with only 55% is probably on the low side compared to many other buyers.

I want to define those categories - here are some examples of “major” problems I’ve had with GC orders: Shipping damage, broken headstocks, broken tubes, missing tubes, amp missing fuses (?!?!), broken bridge, trem arm bent into the socket, missing footswitches, missing case, other items listed in the description not included, electrical issues. “Minor” problems I’m more forgiving - that is for things like the broken caster wheel on my 4x12, shipping damage that was the fault of the carrier and not the packaging job, missing power cable, minor dings/dents damage not disclosed etc. I used to only classify things as a major problem if it resulted in a return, partial refund, or professional repair but lately - I’ve also been including any time I get an order cancelled without notification as a major problem. Maybe I’m getting old, but if I spent $1000+ on an item, and it’s cancelled 8 days later and all I get is an automated email telling me “sorry that YOU cancelled your order” I’m not going to be pleased, and it’s become such a pattern that what was previously a small thing has become a major problem.

Here’s a video I made discussing this very issue:

For those who don’t know, this is how GC’s used section works. Anyone can bring a used piece of gear to GC and trade it in, where GC will give you roughly 40% of the value of the item. This value is based on the knowledge of the GC employee you are working with, looking at their system - which means if you have something rare, special, or boutique… or worse, damaged, barely functioning, etc, they may not know how to properly price or test the item. This is why I’ll see high end USA Kramers listed for $500, and other times you’ll see a Striker worth 200 bucks listed for $1200, incorrectly called a Pacer in their system. Sadly this also creates an environment where the disingenuous will do a shoddy repair or trade in whatever they can in poor condition, and there are no strings attached once the item is traded in.

To top it off, GC sometimes lists items without pictures, and since the prices can sometimes be extremely aggressive, it means a lot of times you have to do a “buy first, I’ll return it later” kind of attitude if you are hunting for a piece of gear and it pops up online. That is the one saving grace for GC right now - their 45 day return policy. Usually, this return policy also refunds the shipping cost if the item is damaged in transit or otherwise not as described, but sometimes you have to make an argument for it.

There is also a problem with the shipping - guitars and amps from certain stores are well packed and tested before shipping out. Others don’t really put much care into it and will ship you a guitar or amp with a single layer of bubble wrap around it in an oversized box so it rattles around with 6 inches of room around it for a cross country trip - even if UPS gave it the white glove treatment it would still be likely to get damaged when packed like that!

There is also a trend - and I don’t want to sound paranoid - but it’s happened multiple times where I order something that is a very good deal and it either gets cancelled with no communication, and if I do call the store I get some kind of flimsy excuse. I have heard on three separate occasions that an amplifier “caught on fire” before they could ship it to me. I’m not saying it’s impossible, but in all my years of gear collecting and all the amps I’ve owned, I’ve never once seen an amp catch fire that wasn’t a simple fuse replacement. It’s just very suspicious… I once ordered a Splawn Nitro for $724 and had it cancelled for this reason. I find it hard to believe that the amp wasn’t sold to an employee or a local at the last minute and they just lied to me.

Here’s a highlight reel of guitar center mishaps - and these are only the ones I remembered to take photos of and doesn’t include anything that I plugged in and found out was broken later (like the Mark IVA I got last week):

I’m not saying I’m going to stop buying from GC by any means. Sometimes it is the best way to get a killer deal on a unique piece of equipment, and their shipping charges are inexpensive and returns mean there is always a safety net. I just hope someday to see even the bare minimum of effort put in - it would solve a lot of these issues. Just remember - when ordering from GC - always take screenshots and pictures when it arrives, don’t be afraid to ask for a full refund including shipping, and never depend on them for anything you truly NEED, for example if you are a touring or gigging musician, never expect used gear to work out of the box from GC. It’s just the reality of the situation right now.