I was at guitar center the other day and decided to try out a Marshall JCM... 900 I think. I was just wondering why these amps are so popular. I get better distortion out of the drive channel on me HRDlx. By far some of the shittiest sounds I've ever heard in my life... not joking. Does anybody know any tricks on getting a good sound out of it EQ-wise or something. I was using an American Standard Strat by the way.
I concur, they're rubbish. I loooooove old Marshall sounds. There's nothing like a JTM45 or an 18-watter but all these DSL-wotsits and JCM-whatevers just don't do it for me.
But hey, they *do* say Marshall on them!
get yourself a JCM 800. The voice of 80's rock. PERIOD. After that they all suck.Also, the speaker need to go back also. The GT-65 was the last great one.Cabinets too.The 1960a reiisue is a decent cabinet with greenback reissues. I dont like neo-dyna or GT-75's.Bonus-since this IS the Fender forum -feast your eyes on this bevey of beauties
Last edited by jerryjg; 12-07-2006 at 05:59 PM.
IMO, the 900 doesn;t take single coils too well. I have one of those (4100) and a '75 JMP modded to Master/gain. The JMP takes the Strat well, the 4100 does not. They both sound good with humbuckers, though.
When I plug my Les Paul into that 4100...damn...
I have noticed some do sound better than others. It could be a tube problem, or something else, who knows.
It also depends on your ears, what sounds good and bad to you.
I think master volume Marshalls like HB's better than singles, though the sound of a single coil on the clean channel is something very different than a clean Fender amp. There's a grittiness to the gain of the 800's and 900's that can be like tinfoil in the teeth with a strat.
Just my own opinion...
I owned a JTM45 reissue that sounded amazing with any guitar I played through it.
"I'm gonna find myself a girl
that can show me what laughter means
And we'll fill in the missing colors
In each other's paint-by-number dreams..."
I have a friend that has a JCM 900 combo, 50w, 1x12.
It's got this grittiness to it when driven hard that I have not heard elsewhere. Doesn't do anything else particularly well, but that one gritty overdriven sound is great. Not too loud for 50w. Sub-par cleans.
IMELHO (in-my-ever-less-humble-opinion) it's a One Trick Pony, but it's a really fun trick. Wouldn't want to own it, but really fun to plug into every now and again.
I've got the TJM45 RI and it sounds great through this old bottom:
Drooooooool!
"I'm gonna find myself a girl
that can show me what laughter means
And we'll fill in the missing colors
In each other's paint-by-number dreams..."
Shakes head at prospect that someone actually prefers the drive channel of a friggin' HRD to that of a JCM900. Wow.
YMMV, of course.
Tone is in the fingers, eh? Let's hear your Vox, Marshall and Fender fingerings then...
In defense of the JCM 800-900 amps. If you get the chance to take one out and play it the way it was designed (turned up loud) they sound pretty decent--without the need to use the drive channel much--if at all.
I still think one of the best heavy-rock tones I've ever heard was on a live VHS of Ozzy, with Jake E. Lee playing his Charvels and SG Junior through a DS-1 into Marshall JCM800 heads. Fantastic! But then he was using humbuckers.
"I'm gonna find myself a girl
that can show me what laughter means
And we'll fill in the missing colors
In each other's paint-by-number dreams..."
JCM800's are fantastic, but only in the rehearsal studio we used to use them in...cranked louder than I'd ever have at a gig. Still, the best sound I've gotten. Wish I would have bought one when they closed...and an attenuator.
I have used all kinds of marshalls and currently still own my beloved 1973 50 watt head and cabinet
That bieng said it seems for every year thereafter Marshall tried to recreate the sound of its past glory by bieng fuzzier, so that by the time the 900 series came around they sound like an imitation of itself.
I like the sound of plexis and jtm's, but I too tried out a JCM 900 half stack for the first time in years at a PME shop a couple months back and much preferred my HRD's drive tone. The head might also have been dying for new tubes though.
I think the JCM 800's sound okay for the sound they were meant to get, but I almost never play in that style. If I do, I have a solid state amp that does it well enough.
Speaking of the Plexi, I traded my 50 watt Plexi (believe it was a 72 or 73, whatever was the first year they used the lit rocker arm instead of the toggle switch) for a Peavey 5150 head back in 98. Thought I had to have the 5150. Anyway, I was browsing eBay the other day and found a plexi just like mine and decided to watch what it sold for. Talk about make a man sick. I think the auction closed at a little over 3K for just the head. I bought it from a friend for $300.
--The music is all around us. I can hear it. Can you?
In defense of the JCM series
I recently saw Robin Trower for about the 25th time and he has switched from JCM 800's to 900's
Three 100 Watt heads and the same three tan 4X12 slant cabs he has been using since 1979
His sound just gets better and better
He has a very simple pedal setup and uses Custom built Strats with single coils
I cannot say enough about the sound this man produces on stage with a simple setup....Incredible!
I own a JCM 800 and an old MK-II .... both 50 Watters with EL-34 power tubes and although they sound different, they both sound great IMO
I dont care for the DSL stuff with all the knobs, switches and such.
Just give me Presence, Bass, Mid, Treble and Volume controls, thats all I need
The JCM900 is still a fine amplifier IMO.
I went back to GC the other day and plugged in a les paul studio into a JCM2000 TSL122. Wow, big difference there. Good for shred and sounding like Angus. All I need now is $2000 :)
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