PEDAL TO THE METAL
WHY A PEDAL AMP CAN BE THE BEST BUDDY ON YOUR PEDALBOARD
From the earliest guitar combos of the 1930s to modern-day DAW plug-ins, guitarists have seen a parade of amps come and go. Some were excellent. Others – to put it kindly – were exotic. An astonishing variety of designs and approaches to amplifying guitars emerged over those decades. Each had its charm and raison d’être, but drawbacks and quirks also abounded. Most new ideas sought to redress earlier design flaws.
The combo was one of the more wonderful ideas. Portable and affordable, it paired the amp and speaker in one near-perfect little package. Its drawbacks – the lowish volume and limp low-end – may well have inspired another great innovation, the tandem setup of closed-back cabinet and piggyback amp. Putting the rock in rock ‘n’ roll, this design meant as much to the genre as the wheel’s invention meant to human mobility.
How it all began…could you have imagined where we are today?
A development that launched countless riffs, the guitar amp head perched on a 4×12” cab long looked like the be-all-and-end-all of the guitar amp’s evolution. Indeed, this iconic apparatus embodies the era of rock and guitar heroes like no other piece of gear. But then in the late ‘70s, smart people with soldering irons started to figure out how to make emerging digital tech work for musical instruments.
It all started in studios. Eventually, guitarists began to see the potential in 19″ outboard gear, especially for reverb and delay effects. It wasn’t long before amp heads, stripped of their wood shells and faux-leather robes, found themselves in 19” racks. Suddenly, separate preamps and power amps were hotter than Hades during a heatwave.
For a long time the standard on the rock stages of this world: the 4×12” box, with a mighty head as the crowning glory. An image that will forever be an iconic symbol of the heyday of rock’n’roll.
Players were free to mix and match at will, combining one brand of preamp with another make of power amp – and throw all kinds of third-party 19″ FX units into the sound-shaping gumbo. Was this the spark that triggered the GAS explosion?
For some afflicted with gear acquisition syndrome, the search for the perfect – and perfectly unique– sound became their musical life’s great quest. Many a guitarist burrowed down that rabbit hole of brainstorms and patch cords. Industrial refrigerator-sized sound machines loomed large in the guitarist’s corners of the big stages. Which peacock had the biggest tail feathers we’ll never know, but the competition made for delightful entertainment.
A rack straight out of a picture book – big, heavy, but blessed with endless possibilities for sound design.
Then the tide turned again. Digital technology grew smaller and smaller, yet started sounding better and better. In fact, it grew so small that entire setups could be shoehorned into a pedal – the end of the rack era had dawned. Digital stompboxes swept the market, soon to be followed by those oh-so-convenient lunch-box heads.
Then, when in-ear technology for on-stage monitoring became affordable for nonprofessionals, guitarists no longer had any need – or excuse – to bowl over their band-buddies with on-stage volume. Unless your gig had you playing massive stadiums, a 20- or 40-watt head such as the Hughes & Kettner TubeMeister 40 would deliver more than enough oomph. On top of that, this breed of amp was smaller, lighter and cheaper. Bingo!
As amp’s shrunk, pedalboards grew in size and sophistication. With so many and such sweet-sounding stompboxes available for this format, the task of building and tweaking one’s personal pedalboard could become a lifelong yearning-and-learning experience.
A familiar sight – a mix of a (very small) rack with a head – in this case a Hughes & Kettner Black Spirit 200 and a pedalboard with all kinds of effects – from the old analog Hughes & Kettner Rotosphere, distortion and compressor pedals, an EQ, to modern digital devices such as delays and reverb effects.
This was a new world where pedals had become THE sound and control center in the guitar’s signal chain. Amps had shrunk to fit. So why not make one of two? A guitar, pedalboard, pedal amp and perhaps a cab – which you might want more than you actually need – and you’re done!
The visuals are clean and compelling. With everything you need on one board, there’s nothing to clutter up the stage. Then there’s the customization opportunities: The modular setup lends itself to tinkering, fine-tuning and near-instant gratification on the modification front.
With arguments as persuasive as these, it wasn’t long before the first pedal/floor amps surfaced. They feature some nifty add-ons, one being an onboard speaker simulator that lets you feed the guitar’s signal straight to a mixing console or DAW interface. The send and return loops come in handy, as do other sound-sculpting tools such as multiple channels, booster effects, solo boost, and the like.
This more-on-the-floor mode of sound-sculpting is, admittedly, addictive – and even more so when you drop a pedal amp like the Hughes & Kettner AmpMan into the signal chain. And for those who wish to go smaller than compact, there’s always the Hughes & Kettner StompMan, a true mini pedal amp.
No larger than a Discman – anyone remember those – and weighing about as much as two Double Whoppers, the StompMan combines a Spirit tone generator-based preamp with a knob to dial in real power amp sag. That power amp pumps out up to 50 watts. It also features a Bypass button to remove the onboard preamp from the signal chain.
The Bypass lets you sneak other brands of boutique preamps onto your pedal board. Or, as a little tonal treat for the hardcore purist in you, you could do without a preamp altogether and go straight into a booster, overdrive or other distortion pedal. This type of pedalboard is the perfect playground for experimentation. With so many possibilities, time is your only limit.
The AmpMan is the perfect way to complete medium or large pedalboards in terms of power amp and preamp. Its additional functions, such as cab sim, FX path, solo volume boost and noise gate, complete the overall package. You can hear how the AmpMan “Classic” and “Modern” variants sound in typical studio desktop use here (only in German, subtitles available)
So what’s a guitarist to do? Combos, piggybacked cabs, stacks and rack-mounted gear are as legit as lunchbox, mini and micro amps. Each has its place and adherents. All see frequent use – often in combination with pedalboards. However, the floor amp is surely the solution of choice for those who worship at the pedalboard house of prayer.
Take, for example, the StompMan. Small and remarkably affordable, you could even use this mighty mite to put together an ultra-compact stereo stage setup with up to 100 watts. Imagine the possibilities for shaping sound on the fly with a petit powerhouse like this. The mind boggles.
Or you could opt for a Swiss Army knife-style floor amp that also puts all the bread-and-butter effects at your toe-tips. The Hughes & Kettner Black Spirit 200 Floor rolls all that and more into a particularly practical, compact and robust aluminum housing. That’s all-in-one convenience at it‘s sweet-sounding best.
Not the biggest size? With the StompMan, small and effective pedalboards with an output of up to 50 watts can be set up.
Today’s pedal amps are also great for your home studio and DAW. Their design is desktop-friendly, yet the knobs, switches and buttons convey that familiar old-school feel. You can tweak and twist to dial in satisfying results in a flash, without having to click your way through a maze of menus and sub-menus. Another plus is that many of these amps fit into a carry-on bag so you can build the perfect flight-friendly rig. Cons? None that we can see, apart from a touch of nostalgia when you look over your shoulder to see a headless cab.
What’s your take on all this? What does your solution of choice look like? Are you a traditionalist or a pragmatist? Visit our social media channels and tell us all about your experiences and preferences.
Watch Oliver Hartmann test out Hughes & Kettners two new pedal amps with different guitars and stomp boxes. All recorded with the built-in Red Box AE+
