What are your favourite recorded solid state amp tones?

impmann

I'm amazed none of the metal heads have mentioned Dimebag...

RocknRollDave

impmann said:

I'm amazed none of the metal heads have mentioned Dimebag...

They have  

Pigknows

the smiths, the cure, the jam, the beat, buzzcocks, marillion (one of the best solo sounds ever), metallica, t rex, the sweet, feelgood, creedence, radiohead, queen... lots!

bingefeller

thomasross20 said:

I always did like the sound of the King's X stuff!
ZZ Top using SS amps is a revelation - is that true? They always sounded great!

Yes it's true about ZZ Top.  Billy Gibbons has also used those solid state ZT amps on stage IIRC.  

bingefeller

I've never heard a Pignose sound like this....

monquixote

Has anyone mentioned Brian May?

EricTheWeary

Obvious ones are Wilko and Daniel Ash (and  I love that link,  that Ash heard Wilko playing stripped down randb and thought that's the tone I need for goth).  Some of the BB King stuff was on Lab amps although which recordings I don't know specifically.  Loads of afro pop on jc120s. Back to Clappo -  didn't he record some stuff using a Pignose?  Some of the Dominos stuff. 

I had  a brief period of thinking Akira Takasati was the next big thing in guitar so if nothing else the OP is a prompt to dig some of that stuff out again - gathering dust for decades in my mental music collection.  I don't think I ever knew what amps he used but his guitar designs ( the Killer brand?) were the result of,  err,  a unique vision. 

lustycourtier

thermionic said:

Probably my favourite band ever, Welsh 80s post-punk legends Y Cyrff almost always played through two Peavey Bandits. I can't say for certain that they didn't use any other amps when they were in the studio, but all their records have that punchy clean tone which proved to me that you didn't need overdrive to sound exciting and edgy.



If they look familiar, Mark and Paul later went on to form Catatonia, and Mark had moved on to Marshall stacks (and a distorted sound) by then.

Must be a Welsh thing. The few times I saw the stereophonics live Kelly used a peavey bandit. I'm guessing his transition to matchless wasn't instant 

TTBZ

Bit more modern, the guy from Gnarwolves uses a Marshall Mosfet amp, and if it's what they used on their studio stuff then it sounds awesome.

thermionic

I have a bootleg cd of The Smiths where Johnny Marr appears to be playing the entire set through a JC-120. Not a fan of that sound tbh, makes me think of coming home from school on Fridays in the 80s and watching The Tube for 3 hours. JC-120s everywhere!

I always thought Steve Albini's sound, at least in Big Black was a classic solid-state sound, although it was probably a Bassman mixed in with a Carvin power amp somehow. Plus the Harmonic Percolator of course.

stratman3142

bingefeller said:

Modelling amps do not count nor do hybrid amps.  Has to be 100% solid state amp.

For me, it has to be Ty Tabor's Lab amp on the first four King's X albums.  

I never knew that Ty Tabor used Lab Series amps. I used an L5 for years, but it's long gone now.

Gadget

Anything on Def Leppard's Hysteria (all done with a Tom Scholz Rockman)