Fender Champion 600

haha, I'll keep that in mind. How does the BadCat compare to a Matchless?

I saw a guy playing through a Matchless Little Mosnter, mic'd click here, in a venue that fit about 2,500. He used a whole heap of effects though, and the mix between him and the other guitarist wasn't great, so I couldn't tell much from that.

Still ... au$3000 for a 9w amp ...

Matchless is now a mass produced amp, unless you get a vintage one. Badcat is the legacy of the original Vox AC-30.

Wattage on this kind of valve amp has no bearing on how loud it is. It has more to do with efficiency. In order for a amp to be twice as loud on a dB meter, it needs to output 10x the power. My band mate's 16 Watt Badcat is noticeably louder than my 50 Watt Mesa Boogie or his 100 Watt Marshall Combo. Also the Badcat weighs more than any single speaker amp I've ever tried to pick up.

The magic to a Badcat is the tone going straight into the amp... you can clearly make out the differences in individual guitars. When its clean the attack slaps you in the face....when its dirty it balanced and refined. They only way to know is to experience one.

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I did a bit of mucking around over the weekend with my Champion 600. I tuned my Line6 Podxt to un-effect that signal of my Telecaster into the Champion so that I could not tell the difference between the signal with the Pod plugged in (using the output settings on the Pod). The Champion's volume was on full blast. Then I "wired in" various pre-amp models including botique replicas like Matchless and hot wired AC-30s without cabinet emulation. At low volumes on the preamp, I was able to get what the Pod is supposed to produce. But to my surprise, cranked up I was able to over drive the Champion's amp circuitry with the emulated preamp and get some excellent tones. At a lower volume on the guitar I could get a chicken pickin twang out of the bridge pickup....wide open, a SRV balls out tone....On the humbucker neck position, a fat jazz tone at low output to a Santana style rounded lead at full blast. Even with just a Tube Screamer emulation I was able to get a nice, rich tube over driven tone......all this at a volume that did not wake up the wife and kid.

All this doesn't mean I don't lust after a Badcat!

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That's pretty cool, because I was doing the same thing over the weekend with my Vox AD30VT. I've written here before that the Vox's effects and amp models pretty much eliminate the need for pedals, at least for home use. But over the weekend I played my Nashville Tele on the "cleaner" amp models (ie Fender) using a TS-9 Tube Screamer and just fell in love with the tones I got. Frankly, a much more realistic and saturated tube overdrive than I can get by cranking the amp's gain settings or by moving to the Marshall amp models.

I tuned the guitar to open G and switched to the bridge pickup, and got very close to Keef's Honky Tonk Woman tone (although matching his touch/feel is another story). And using the middle (Strat) pickup I got some very good classic rock tones.

Using the TS-9 really opened up a new dimension with that amp. And I know I was having fun, because I lost track of time and was summoned out of the basement by my wife.

Great minds think alike!

I need this downturn to upturn so I can get new toys!

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