Haters are going to hate. I bought the Mercury edition. The amp is phenomenal. For a tube not tube or nano tube in this case. I love it and it is exactly as advertised. Versatile insanely portable and worth every penny.
When I bought a Line 6 Helix I spent 5 solid days (I’m retired) trying get pleasing sounds. No music came out. I was playing music the second I plugged in to the Amp1. Life’s too short for modellers for me.
A year on and I still love mine. It sits perfectly along side some great amps on stage and sounds as good as any of them live. It is the best modern amp I have bought in the last 10 years!
With the knobs on the side for tone and volume. The tones are endless. Plus using the volume on the guitar you get amazing tones. Fucking LOVE my Mercury Amp 1
I have one. This is a nice demo of what tones you can get with relatively minimal tweaking. The side controls tend to be something one sets up for your preferred voicings and then often remain untouched. The nanotube is in the power amp section, so the fact you had main master on high (7?) meant you were getting a nice bit of the tone that the nanotube adds when it gets pushed. (If you had a speaker plugged in with no soak that would have been incredibly loud!) It also has MIDI capability that opens up another level of utility, enabling you to switch channels. have different gains, boost and reverb settings, engage a built in power soak, have a 2nd master volume, and recall preset configurations, all of which are useful for covers or tribute band stuff. Used by Jennifer Batten, Ian Crichton (Saga) Jude Gold (Jefferson Starship) among others. The fact that you can take this in your carry on luggage is another big plus.
Really like your videos, so glad to see you checking out the Amp1! Got one about a month ago after flirting with it for a while and am pretty impressed with how it sounds. I think it nails the basics, you get beautiful cleans as well as the Marshall-y dirt with very responsive tone shaping options as well as an fx loop that allows you to run 4CM. And the ability to go direct. Would love to see you try to pair the Amp1 with the HX stomp!
Great video John! Could you please do another video with pairing the Amp1 & your HX Stomp? Would be interesting to hear how the Amp1 would help the real amp feel of the Stomp 👍🏼
I have a Mercury edition. If I read the manual correctly, the EQ is NOT saved with the preset. It certainly doesn’t seem to do so with my hardware. Please advise if I am wrong.
I have the amp 1 iridium edition and it’s replaced my Marshall jvm410h and silver jubilee. I use mine in conjunction with the quad cortex for effects and midi switching. It’s absolutely epic sounding ! So many people think this is a gimmick pedal. No. It’s an actual amp with bloody awesome tones !! And it’s 1kg ! AMP X HAS BEEN ANNOUNCED !
Yeah I've had the Mercury Edition of AMP1 for a few years now, just got the Iridium Edition in the 'Testing Weeks' from Bluguitar. I'll be holding onto the Iridium edition! Awesome tones and definitely not just for metal. Very versatile amp. The weight, features and no need for a load box are a big selling points. I run mine into the HX Stomp for cabs and FX, amazing set up with such a small footprint.
You know you can put it in preset mode, too, right? So each switch calls up one of three presets, so you could have Clean, Vintage, then Classic on different switches. With the Remote, you can store volume, gain, power soak etc
Yeah not sure which you had but there is an original silver - then a newer Mercury Edition with improvements. After that iridium - the clean and reverb are different and it's more high gain or boogie feeling. Just a tip - the controls on the side you should use first - then fine tune with the ones on top depending on the room. Also - you can boot up the unit in different modes - I like half gain mode - I feel it's more great usable range for a lower gain player. There's also a half power mode that allows you to drive the power amp harder indoors. All in all a lot in the box. Take time with it - the first time I looked at it I missed a lot. If it's good enough for Euge Valovirta that says a lot.
@@johnnathancordy it does. Lots have converted. Lots moved back from digital camps to get great usable tone in a simple package that can be used indoors or at a stadium and get back to playing rather than endlessly tweaking. Thomas is really in to something here. Reach out to him - he's great - I'm sure he'll send you everything he makes you want to check out and test.
Thank about it too - it's a 100 watt tube amp with an effects return. You could run helix right into the return minus your cab modeling and you have a powered Helix and then still a great simple amp when used separately. Think about how much all the other power amps are like Seymour Duncan and so forth - and they can't be used alone. Lots of possibilities!
yep, i love my amp1 while i do agree that the contour controls on the side are a bit fiddly, i've had my amp1 for a couple years now and have touched them maybe twice, so not that much of a concern
I was considering this recently - and may still go that way. Thomas Blug is great at voicing his amps and has some amazing ideas - his amp x is essentially an analog helix
I recently went to use my carefully set up pedalboard, based on the HX Stomp, a Plethora, and a few select drive pedals live for the first time. Plugged in and my homemade presets sounded awful. Didn’t have time to tweak it so grabbed my friends AMP1 and in seconds had a sound that was exactly what I needed for the song I was doing.
Thanks for the demo and great playing as always! However, I heard the same harsh and grainy top end there on high gain tones as with other videos. I guess that’s feature.
Hey John, you think you could do a demo of running a modeler into the FX return of the Amp1? The little mini tube is in the power section of the Amp1, so the idea is it might impart a more "tube feel" to the modeler, while also acting as a power amp. I'm interested to hear what you think about a setup like this. Just an idea!
@@scottanderson6807 right but the power tube thing is employed in the power section of the amp, as opposed to the preamp section, so it would still affect the tone of a modeler going in.
@@caseylockwood5512 Supposedly it is somewhere between the preamp and power amp. I’m not sure if it would work for you in that way or not. Sounds like a question for Mr. Blug.
When is the USA tour? You're up there with the greats. Amazing. Now if I can pay attention to the rest of the video. Sounds boutique-like. Pristing cleans.
I tried one a couple of years ago, but couldn't get a sound Iiked, but I didn't find out about the side controls until later. If I see one I'll give it another try, but I don't particularly like TB's own sounds, when I saw him demo it, and the demo went on so long I had to go before trying it. Also it was with TB's own speaker, and I wanted to hear it with other speakers. The power/size/weight/price ratio looked good at the time. The only competition seem to be from Quilter. The nanotube part could be a bit of a problem long term. I have legacy VFD units and most have dimmed considerably just from age, not use, but one of them is unchanged. The Amp1 unit may be ok, but it's not going to be an easy or field replaceable part, like an ECC83.
I have a great time with the Amp 1 mercury. Paired it with a Torpedo Cab M+, no need for a load box, sounds great. It’s a breath of fresh air after years trying to make modelers sound good.
@@ibanezman1025 it goes : amp 1 speaker out -> speaker cable -> cab M+ amp in (set level to -24 db). Thomas Blug stated that we can use any DI box that has a -20db pad to go from the speaker out into an audio interface to bypass the cab sim. I chose the Torpedo to get wall of sound and a more complete solution overall. You can use send out as well with a standard cable and no need to pad, but you lose the use of the master volume and the power amp. I wish the mercury had a cab sim switch like the iridium.
@@raphexe hm... interesting! I wonder where all the load goes in such connection? If you crank it, 100W of power, that's a lot! Somehow it should be decipated. You don't have any issues with that?
@@SergeiVlassov amp 1 doesn't need a load, you can go straight from rec out (not speaker out be careful ;) ) to an audio interface/console without a speaker connected. Rec out sounds good enough for clean to dirt tones, I use it more these days when I don't want to plug all the gear. I've read that pluging a dummy cable (just a cable going nowhere) in the speaker out while using the rec out does improve the tone, I have yet to try this out, sounds fishy to me.
@@raphexe yes, I am not surprised about inner dummy load being active when using rec out, I am familiar with such solutions. E.g. I had such in Laney IRT Studio. But I was very surprised to hear you use speaker out going to amp in of Torpedo CAB M. That is a bit surprising for me. You take 100 W signal that is meant to be drive a speaker, but you just plug it into Torpeda CAb that does not have any dummy load. I also have CAB M and use it with amps, but I connect Load Box to speaker out in Cab M. Interesting...
I owned the first edition of AMP1. Is pretty amazing what it can do considering the size and even price. Unfortunally I had to sell it but I would love to put my hands in a Mercury Edition. It could easily be my main/only option for a "real" amp.
I know some “professional “ guitarists are touring with these (hidden behind their plexis) coz they’re reliable and consistant… thru 2x12 or 4x12’s is how I’ve heard them and it’s got “that tone”
My UA-cam channel has some videos of Amp-1 with the Boss MS-3 effects. I've gigged this amp many times over the last four years and never had a failure. Freinds have heard my Amp-1 at gigs, bought their own, then they gigged theirs weekly and never had a failure either. Very reliable.
Not sure what's happening with the noise on the boost - I have a Mercury Edition and there's no noise at all, boost or not. In any case, I love my Amp1. Best amp I've ever had. To anyone curious, if your aim is to use this primarily with the direct / headphone out, don't bother. It's easily the weakest part of the unit and not very good. For playing as a normal amplifier into a real cab, it's friggin great. It's a little Marshall miracle in a box. I wanted a Marshall that could be played at ALL volumes and this delivers. It feels very direct and dynamic, like you'd expect from a proper amp.
Think it's microphonic feedback from the pickups? I didn't get any noise with this unit with the modern channel and boost on full myself - but then I onlyn tend to have the master on 2 max rather than 7 or 8!!
@@tonystartup3817 Good shout, that's probably it. I guess he's sitting pretty close to the unit itself, too. I normally play mine between 1 and 2 (3 when I had a house to play loud in). 😆
I have an old original model and really enjoy it. The only reason I don't use mine more is due to how noisy it is. I don't know if they are all as noisy as my particular unit or if I'm just so used to having a stupid low noise floor after using modelers for so many years.
It’s good no doubt but too pricey! Got a used one for a good price but over the headphones I wasn’t too impressed. I guess the external reverb you used makes a big difference. Will need to read more & tweak. Wonder if I can use additional IRs into this or maybe add it externally for it to sound great.
FWIW the back of the unit is plastic. the top of the unit is a plastic overlay on top of metal. The guys over at BluGuitar have gone around drop kicking them and showing that they still work etc.. I wouldn't worry about the casing.
I'm intrigued by the Mercury, but if I'm going silent stage, I don't need a 100W power amp. I use my Mooer Prime P1 rig, that said, I really dig the sounds I get from my Tech 21 PSA 2.0. I owned a PSA 1.1 back in the day, and it was one of my favorite preamps, tone sculpting machine. The PSA 2.0 could use a headphone out, and a DI out, but it still sounds amazing IMO. Old school analog that is often overlooked by many. IDK if it's the price or what, but if you learn how to use it, it's much easier than amp models and loading IRs etc., where you have thousands of options to sift through. After you've listened to several amp models and IR combinations, I doubt few can remember or compare them effectively or efficiently. I know the tones I want when I hear them. Sifting through dozens of amp / cab / Ir combinations is tedious. Blue Cat Audio Destructor, now in Axiom, or PolyChrome DSP is much more rewarding and efficient for me. I'd be curious about your take on the PSA 2.0. Still sounds good, but not as versatile as the older rack versions, but the size is compelling. Many great tones in the PSA, if you can use your ears without any frame of reference as a crutch. Cheers!
Love your demo mate! you have recorded all with a mic o you go straight into an audio interface? I ask you that because you use very high volume! and when I put it in my focusrite the volume input is too loud LOL
I have been watching a-lot of your vids lately with all the different modelers!! Blug is by far the best sound I have heard on by comparisons!!! Great for travel dates, if she is hot enough!!🥸
@@johnnathancordy John, on Thomas's channels there are literally hundreds of hours of videos explaining everything, tone matching, chatting etc. He does a 2 hour live stream every week where they go in to tones etc
I have the original edition of the Amp 1 and currently using it 4 cable method with the hx stomp. It has midi capabilities to using an adapter cable, so I change combinations of chanel and boost based on snapshots. Works well and sounds good!
Base tones sound really good, but there’s some high-end stuff going on - almost sounds like radio interference, or tube weirdness. Is that something to do with your setup, or the noise gate (it is apparent when you stop playing)? That would put me off. Anyone else hearing it?
@@tonystartup3817 Thanks Tony. Haven’t heard that in other UA-cam reviews, so figured it was something peculiar to John’s situation. Really like the sound f these units!
Great playing mate! Just wondering what you were plugged in to (you may have mentioned it, but I missed it)? I've got the original amp 1. At the settings you show in the video you would be in danger of blowing your window out. Also the clean channel on 10 would be like a cranked marshall on my rig, have you got low output pickups on your guitar? Sounds great whatever you are doing!
I got rid of mine, because I couldn't get a decent sound from my humbucker guitar on the clean channel, plus i didn't like the cab, it was boxy sounding! The overdrives are pretty cool, but it still sounds like pedals and not a tube amp! But maybe if you are just using it plugged straight in to the P.A its useful, but I have the iridium for that! The custom controls are shit! My friends broke! I think he change them after, but the first model has cheap parts!!
I've been gigging one of these for a while and I've just got a Stomp XL. How would you combine the two? Use Amp1 just as power amp? Stomp running fx and amp SIM into Amp1 return and then to cab -- stomp stereo out w/cab model to FOH? Thanks for the awesome videos.
Nice one John. This has been on my radar to try for years but never the opportunity. What i’d really love to see is how it might take a couple of drive pedals in the front on the cleaner amp settings, and also how the HX stomp might sit in the FX loop for the various delays, reverbs and wobbly sounds…
Funny you should say that. I've left John with a couple pedals too - fuzz Face and past FX TD-y tube driver type for trying with the amp 1 for trying out some EJ sounds. Let's see if John tries them
Great review. I might have missed it. What speaker/cab were you playing through? I have the Amp1 Mercury it's been great. It doesn't sound as dark or compressed as your demo tones (which I preferred to my results). I'm using the BluGuitar Nanocab, which is a very compact cab. Much as I like it's portability and overall performance, it's not as full sounding as I'd like, and your demo tones were exactly what I think are missing.
He's going in to a load box. Not sure what the speaker IR is though. One difference is that John has got the volume up really high. I bet you never play with the volume up at 7 or 8 with the nanocab?! Get a fair bit of fatness from the power section then
Anyone can suggest a power amp pedal to power up a modeler like Boss gt, me , Tonex helix etc… with enough gig power connected to a passive cab and a desktop audio studio speaker for home use and the possibility to use headphones. Since a multi effect pedal would do the effects maybe a simple powerful power amp pedal would do once it’s connected to a multi effect pedal/ stomp box. Happy to hear some suggestions on this.
Sweet and simple. Looks rugged. It sounds very usable to me.. just missing full tonal and fx shaping between presets. I guess that would take away from the simplicity though?
There's a bit of tweaking available between channels with the side control and these allow you to balance the channels between themselves. Only thing you can't do is extreme ends of the tone between channels but how often do you really need to do that? Could always stick an eq pedal in the loop if you needed to do that
@@tonystartup3817 - “how often..?” back in the ancient times of amps, switches, buttons, and knobs - ehh not much at all. In this digital modeling age, damn near all the time.
Dammit John. Now I want one of those. When I saw Enuff Z'nuff recently I didn't see an amp on one of the guitar player's cab. After, I asked him what the hell he was playing through it sounded pretty good. He lit up and said "this will blow your mind!" He took me up on stage to see his rig. BlugGuitar...
He's using speaker out into a fractal load box. Not sure what IR he's using but I think I remember him saying that he was going from the load box into the hx stomp and using the stock cab in there
How would you compare something like this to the milkman 100? Love the tone of both. Looking to do a wet dry wet rig but not sure which amps to use for it.
i have the first edition which is the predecessor of the mercury edition. the mercury edition is easier to deal with they say and it even sounds slightly different and better? i played it for a couple of years now. i have the amp1 the fatcab and the remote control. it sounds pretty cool and it feels good to play. i don't gig and i don't play very loud. i don't know how it sounds fully cranked. but it sounds really pleasant, this is my honest opinion. i can compare it to a marshall dsl40c and a roland jc120 and the fender mustang. the mustang sounds a bit like a toy in comparison. the jc120 is a very hard thing to play. it forgives nothing. but the amp1 does. it's easy to make it sound good. the marshall is a little spikey but my first choice when it comes to humbucker guitars. my tele elite and the amp1 go really well together. the amp 1 takes pedals quite well. it's all subjective. the amp1 sounds great but not better than a real tube amp. the casing is made of aluminium i quess (almost certain). the knobs on the side are a pain in the ass. unuseable. dial them in once and never touch them again. you can not feel if they do rotate or not. i'm always having problems to find matching volumes between clean and distorted settings and still likle both sounds. the change of master volume or gain has an impact on the over all tone. kind of like a real tube amp would have? i don't like that at all. that's just me. i bought the remote control because of the power soak feature they advertise. it's very expensive and it does nothing for me. very disappointing. it's a little bit of a money making machine. very short cable from amp to cabinet. my honest summary. the amp1 and the fatcab sound good but they are not cheap and i really love the marshall dsl40c. if i needed to decide i'd take the latter. but this is really subjective. people do not complain about the amp1. so it's good.
I got mine second hand for 150-200 Euros. Never looked back. My go to amp with my 2x12 cab at home. Great for clean tones also a good pedal platform. Don't care what tube it is, just put a preamp pedal and connect to return, you got everything you need.
@@rgbplumbinghilton there are three versions actually. mercury, iridium and the "old" one which has no name and which i have. they say the iridium is easier to dial tones in or sth like that. which version you have is written below the fan on the backside.
I agree, I don't ever use modern channel as well, but given that it has other 3 fantastic channels I really don't mind the added voice. Perhaps some metal head will borrow it and find it decent enough to play on. It can be tweaked to sound better but remains fluffy and overly pumped, can't be revoiced. Vintage is magnificent in a band mix, classic is ...well classic.
Sounds fantastic ... across a huge range of tones. Always wondered whether I should upgrade to one of these, but I really don't need 100w. 15w would be fine ... shame there is no lower powered option. I did hear some odd artefacts in the clip, or was that just me. Eg a squealing sound at 19:04
The power being 100watt is no problem, easily plays at quiet volumes unlike a regular 100 watt valve amp. And you can always set it in low power mode (50 watt) or via midi access the power soak feature and turn it down all the way to 0.5watt. I prefer leaving it on 100 and turning the master down. Easily play at talking volumes The squealing I think is microphonic feedback from the pickups. John has the volume up really loud with a fair bit of gain
@@Pantalooj it does but you need the remote 1 pedal to easily access it. It is possible over midi but you need the midi adapter to use and something that can send midi CC commands
Every Wednesday (8-9 PM ,CEST) he has a live show "Academy of Tone", Blug will probably demo his AmpX (his newest rig) and older models with tips and tone tricks. So you can join with questions if you'd like. ua-cam.com/users/BluGuitarToneInnovationForGuitaristsfeatured Amp1 ME is awesome, I have one, also got his Blubox (IR box) and they are a perfect match for any situation.
TLDW: No. Don't buy it. Instead, spend thousands on large, heavy, tube amp heads and strain your back lugging these massive hunks of metal and glass around. Everyone knows something this small can't sound any good.
Thing about the side knobs, I though about how hard they are to tweak as well , initially. But after a while you will find your preferred spot for each one and you won't touch them at all. Don't forget there is a half gain mode as well which changes how it sounds. To switch it to LG mode, hold "boost" button and turn it on. To reset the amp , hold all three buttons when switching it on.
@@johnnathancordy John, with the foot pedal you can set the gain available anywhere, so you can run the gain up full on the Amp 1 to remove the effect of the bright cap and adjust the gain with the dial on the remote 1
I think it's a remarkable box. I dunno if you were aware but Thomas Blug used to work for Hughes & Kettner and amongst other things, designed the red box..
I dunno if you were aware but no, he didn't design the Red Box, ffs. Amp guru Jürgen Rath invented it in the late 80's. Decades before Blug even got involved with Hughes & Kettner (not as a designer but a presenter/marketing guy, btw. which explains a lot now that I'm thinking about it). Jürgen Rath, who was a real amp designer that actually designed circuitry, also modified & repaired Blackmore's amps - even developed a substitute for his beloved tortoise guitar picks, designed the H&K Attax, H&K Cream Machine, H&K Tubeman, H&K PCS50, the analog 4x12 speaker simulation for Behringer's GI100 and the V-Amp Pro and many many more. Rammstein used Rath-Amps on their first albums, many many more followed, his Rath Speaker-Box and Speaker-Box Pro were a Red Box on stereoids, et cetera. Back when Rath invented the Red Box, Blug's greatest achievement was strumming a few chords for an unknown German synth pop trio on only one of their 4 or 5 songs.
Well it certainly sounds good, and John Browne’s demo of the Amp1 Iridium also sounded great. If I was in the market I certainly wouldn’t turn my nose up at either of those units. As usual the hype behind Amp X will likely outweigh what is delivered but I guess we as a guitar community just accept that as the norm now *cough* quad cortex…
Sounds good. Mostly your playing helps but im finding myself swayed by the strangely toylike graphics and computer console aspect. Dont guitarists just like black with knobs that look like they were stolen from Abbey Road 😅
Last few days Im doing a research for smaller portable rig (but Im not that much of tweaker, so no multi fx) and I though that the best solution would be Iridium/ACS1 into small solid state power amp into real cab. So good gear for recording as well as playing. I saw Pete Thorn was using Iridium into Seymour duncan powerstage 200 into real cab, sounded pretty good to me. Now I saw this and few other videos of Bluguitar and all modellers started sound like shit to me. Dont know what to think now :D
@@tonystartup3817 Can you describe the main difference between two for you, cause I dont have the chance try any of them. Cause on internet, opinions on strymon varies. Some people saying its nothing like amp and some that its quite good. Thanks
@@domizidor not easy to put in to words. The iridium is fine. Sounds as good as any other modeller I guess for what's in it. The plexi model seemed to be a model of just a single channel of a plexi, probably the bright channel whereas so many of the classic plexi sounds are of both channels jumped with a patch cable. For this reason for me it was too bright and didn't have enough gain. I wish it had a reverb too. It has a room effect that's like a reverb and is really cool but not enough for a real reverb effect. It's basically a cool pedal platform in a pedal but I think it really needs to be used with a bunch of other overdrives unless you only want to play at low gain. The amp 1 can just do it all without having to add anything else and into a normal guitar cab sounds better in the room then the iridium into a frfr
@@tonystartup3817 thanks for feedback. I have 1x12 guitar cab with celestion and engl fireball head (im not a metal head that much but clean is very nice on that amp and that dirt channel is awesome, juicy and tight). So when Im thinking about iridium, its with use of real cab with IR bypassed, more like pedal platform. Just not that much examples on youtube for that, but its quite common that people stick some modeller into SS power amp into cab. It probably behaves a bit differently too. I already have some dirt pedals Im using (timmy, rat, fuzz factory), but agree that amp1 in therms of drive sound is winner, cause you could rely just on them + fuzz for me. Its all about convinience and compromises, cause head + pedalboard + cab = 3 heavy things, pedalboard amp + cab = 2 heavy things :D, and sometimes you could grab just pedalboard. I would say AMP1 is clear winner as small amp solution but also its double of price, I would say a bit overpriced. I hope I will have a chance to try these.
@@domizidor yeah the price of the amp 1 has gone up over the last year. It was cheaper when I bought it and was expensive but not too expensive. I couldn't afford it at the current price new. I think as a lightweight grab and go solution it's better than the iridium, specially if you want to get anything comparable to the Engl. But then the iridium is cheaper, though there might not be much in it by the time you add a SS power amp. I have a ported 1x12 with a neo creamback which makes for a light cab. The amp 1 and this cab is a nice light solution
@@johnnathancordy once i started using it live, never looked back. Was gigging with an Axe-Fx, but never liked the cleans. Though the axe sounded good, but it never breaks up like the real amp. I do really love the cleans from the BluGuitar, specially with the Twin Reverb speakers. Since the twin is a combo, i have to use a DI box, like the bluguitar to the DI, then Through out is connected to the speaker cable. My problem with the Axe is, it sounds the same at every volume. The air push when playing live is much better with the BluGuitar. So BluGuitar sounds better, but ironically, the Axe feels better right hand wise. And the reverb from the amp doesn’t sound half good, as claimed by most youtubers. Well just my opinion. Btw, i have used many of your small bit phrases in many songs, stolen a lot from you🙈
Also, peak volume wise, it feels like a 25 watts tube amp. Not half as loud as the twin reverb, yet it is claimed as more than 100 watts. Also it feels like a plastic, when played with its inbuilt speaker emulation rec out
I tried every Amp1 model and I don't like them very much. It's mostly because of the marketing/technobabble. The marketing always sounds like it's more than a quite expensive more or less digitally controlled solidstate amp (designed by a Russian audio engineer, not Blug himself) that implements a hearing-aid tube for some compression in front of its Class D power amp that was re-branded as Nanotube (so that people would mistake a decades old vaccum tube with Korg's relatively new and innovative NuTube? At least that is what a bunch of people on the forums do) and it needs some expensive and proprietary addons to add basic or "professional" functionality like a secondary master volume or MIDI. And when I compared them to other amps they're ok but fundamentally, it's nothing new and I'm not saying it has to be but I mean, 20 years ago I was gigging with an already 15 or so years old solidstate amp that is easily as good sounding as the Amp1 if not better and tonally it's even more versatile but back then people couldn't even appreciate good (non-tube andor hybrid) amp design and now some of the same people are going head over heels for.. warmed up old coffee. I mean, it sounds fine but get yourself an AMT StoneHead and you can easily dial in the sounds of both, the Mercury and the Iridium - I've tried it. It's the same with the AmpX. "Neural Analog Amp" sounds like a bunch of hogwash. It sounds like it might be a multipath preamp like Black Widow Designs and Klonz did 6 or so years ago (and they're not the first) but it's more likely that it's just an Amp1 preamp paired with a relatively simple digitally controlled EQ (which is probably fixed pre or post dist instead of being variable) but then just call it an EQ, don't bs me with this "neural analog" marketing claptrap.
Hmm dunno what unit you did have but the majority of people Find this sounds awesome. And it does. Ampx… noone knows. Its not out… but one thing is for Sure. It smokes most other small amps in a heartbeat… if u connect it To A cab and can open it up on 3-4 at least you get sone georgeous sounds :o. Full. Dirty. Usable.
Why so negative about the amp, damn. It sounds great and it's small and portable, powerful and affordable. It's an impressive piece of gear and you'd be hard stuck if you try to find negative reviews about the amp itself. It's quite enough for it to be enjoyed and played. How much master volumes ,on Amp1, do you really need? Honestly , your comment sound like it's coming from Andertons HQ, where they deliberately skimped this wonderful little amp. Too much guessing and bile , if you ask me.
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Haters are going to hate. I bought the Mercury edition. The amp is phenomenal. For a tube not tube or nano tube in this case. I love it and it is exactly as advertised. Versatile insanely portable and worth every penny.
When I bought a Line 6 Helix I spent 5 solid days (I’m retired) trying get pleasing sounds. No music came out. I was playing music the second I plugged in to the Amp1. Life’s too short for modellers for me.
A year on and I still love mine. It sits perfectly along side some great amps on stage and sounds as good as any of them live. It is the best modern amp I have bought in the last 10 years!
You got that right. I'm so attracted to that damn little box. It's got some magic inside. Blug amp 1 Mercury!!!
I have the Silver Edition, and feel exactly the same.
It’s basically almost impossible to get a bad sound :)
With the knobs on the side for tone and volume. The tones are endless. Plus using the volume on the guitar you get amazing tones. Fucking LOVE my Mercury Amp 1
I have one. This is a nice demo of what tones you can get with relatively minimal tweaking. The side controls tend to be something one sets up for your preferred voicings and then often remain untouched. The nanotube is in the power amp section, so the fact you had main master on high (7?) meant you were getting a nice bit of the tone that the nanotube adds when it gets pushed. (If you had a speaker plugged in with no soak that would have been incredibly loud!)
It also has MIDI capability that opens up another level of utility, enabling you to switch channels. have different gains, boost and reverb settings, engage a built in power soak, have a 2nd master volume, and recall preset configurations, all of which are useful for covers or tribute band stuff.
Used by Jennifer Batten, Ian Crichton (Saga) Jude Gold (Jefferson Starship) among others. The fact that you can take this in your carry on luggage is another big plus.
Really like your videos, so glad to see you checking out the Amp1! Got one about a month ago after flirting with it for a while and am pretty impressed with how it sounds. I think it nails the basics, you get beautiful cleans as well as the Marshall-y dirt with very responsive tone shaping options as well as an fx loop that allows you to run 4CM. And the ability to go direct. Would love to see you try to pair the Amp1 with the HX stomp!
Great video John! Could you please do another video with pairing the Amp1 & your HX Stomp? Would be interesting to hear how the Amp1 would help the real amp feel of the Stomp 👍🏼
*You can set the EQ how ever you choose for any channel - just save PRESETS and recall via midi!*
I have a Mercury edition. If I read the manual correctly, the EQ is NOT saved with the preset. It certainly doesn’t seem to do so with my hardware. Please advise if I am wrong.
WHAT?? REALLY?...@@MS-Patriot2
I have the amp 1 iridium edition and it’s replaced my Marshall jvm410h and silver jubilee. I use mine in conjunction with the quad cortex for effects and midi switching. It’s absolutely epic sounding ! So many people think this is a gimmick pedal.
No. It’s an actual amp with bloody awesome tones !! And it’s 1kg !
AMP X HAS BEEN ANNOUNCED !
Yeah I've had the Mercury Edition of AMP1 for a few years now, just got the Iridium Edition in the 'Testing Weeks' from Bluguitar. I'll be holding onto the Iridium edition! Awesome tones and definitely not just for metal. Very versatile amp. The weight, features and no need for a load box are a big selling points. I run mine into the HX Stomp for cabs and FX, amazing set up with such a small footprint.
You know you can put it in preset mode, too, right? So each switch calls up one of three presets, so you could have Clean, Vintage, then Classic on different switches.
With the Remote, you can store volume, gain, power soak etc
Yeah not sure which you had but there is an original silver - then a newer Mercury Edition with improvements. After that iridium - the clean and reverb are different and it's more high gain or boogie feeling. Just a tip - the controls on the side you should use first - then fine tune with the ones on top depending on the room. Also - you can boot up the unit in different modes - I like half gain mode - I feel it's more great usable range for a lower gain player. There's also a half power mode that allows you to drive the power amp harder indoors. All in all a lot in the box. Take time with it - the first time I looked at it I missed a lot. If it's good enough for Euge Valovirta that says a lot.
It's an underrated little thing in my opinion - seems like this would work for loads of people?
@@johnnathancordy it does. Lots have converted. Lots moved back from digital camps to get great usable tone in a simple package that can be used indoors or at a stadium and get back to playing rather than endlessly tweaking. Thomas is really in to something here. Reach out to him - he's great - I'm sure he'll send you everything he makes you want to check out and test.
Thank about it too - it's a 100 watt tube amp with an effects return. You could run helix right into the return minus your cab modeling and you have a powered Helix and then still a great simple amp when used separately. Think about how much all the other power amps are like Seymour Duncan and so forth - and they can't be used alone. Lots of possibilities!
I’ve been gigging mine now for a few months and it’s great. It’s like it’s always been there 😎
yep, i love my amp1
while i do agree that the contour controls on the side are a bit fiddly, i've had my amp1 for a couple years now and have touched them maybe twice, so not that much of a concern
I was considering this recently - and may still go that way.
Thomas Blug is great at voicing his amps and has some amazing ideas - his amp x is essentially an analog helix
>his amp x is essentially an analog helix
nope not in the slightest.
I recently went to use my carefully set up pedalboard, based on the HX Stomp, a Plethora, and a few select drive pedals live for the first time. Plugged in and my homemade presets sounded awful. Didn’t have time to tweak it so grabbed my friends AMP1 and in seconds had a sound that was exactly what I needed for the song I was doing.
Thanks for the demo and great playing as always! However, I heard the same harsh and grainy top end there on high gain tones as with other videos. I guess that’s feature.
It is great amp, and it works like a dream to the guitars volume knob
Awesome review of a Badass! Amp👍
Hey John, you think you could do a demo of running a modeler into the FX return of the Amp1? The little mini tube is in the power section of the Amp1, so the idea is it might impart a more "tube feel" to the modeler, while also acting as a power amp. I'm interested to hear what you think about a setup like this. Just an idea!
The power amp is fully solid state
@@scottanderson6807 right but the power tube thing is employed in the power section of the amp, as opposed to the preamp section, so it would still affect the tone of a modeler going in.
@@caseylockwood5512 Supposedly it is somewhere between the preamp and power amp. I’m not sure if it would work for you in that way or not. Sounds like a question for Mr. Blug.
When is the USA tour? You're up there with the greats. Amazing. Now if I can pay attention to the rest of the video. Sounds boutique-like. Pristing cleans.
Here we go now. So this is definitely a easier option than menu diving. A much better comparison to the simplicity of the Original POD control.
I tried one a couple of years ago, but couldn't get a sound Iiked, but I didn't find out about the side controls until later. If I see one I'll give it another try, but I don't particularly like TB's own sounds, when I saw him demo it, and the demo went on so long I had to go before trying it. Also it was with TB's own speaker, and I wanted to hear it with other speakers. The power/size/weight/price ratio looked good at the time. The only competition seem to be from Quilter. The nanotube part could be a bit of a problem long term. I have legacy VFD units and most have dimmed considerably just from age, not use, but one of them is unchanged. The Amp1 unit may be ok, but it's not going to be an easy or field replaceable part, like an ECC83.
I have a great time with the Amp 1 mercury. Paired it with a Torpedo Cab M+, no need for a load box, sounds great. It’s a breath of fresh air after years trying to make modelers sound good.
How are you liking this through your Cab M+? Do you have to pad the input to compensate?
@@ibanezman1025 it goes : amp 1 speaker out -> speaker cable -> cab M+ amp in (set level to -24 db). Thomas Blug stated that we can use any DI box that has a -20db pad to go from the speaker out into an audio interface to bypass the cab sim. I chose the Torpedo to get wall of sound and a more complete solution overall. You can use send out as well with a standard cable and no need to pad, but you lose the use of the master volume and the power amp. I wish the mercury had a cab sim switch like the iridium.
@@raphexe hm... interesting! I wonder where all the load goes in such connection? If you crank it, 100W of power, that's a lot! Somehow it should be decipated. You don't have any issues with that?
@@SergeiVlassov amp 1 doesn't need a load, you can go straight from rec out (not speaker out be careful ;) ) to an audio interface/console without a speaker connected. Rec out sounds good enough for clean to dirt tones, I use it more these days when I don't want to plug all the gear. I've read that pluging a dummy cable (just a cable going nowhere) in the speaker out while using the rec out does improve the tone, I have yet to try this out, sounds fishy to me.
@@raphexe yes, I am not surprised about inner dummy load being active when using rec out, I am familiar with such solutions. E.g. I had such in Laney IRT Studio. But I was very surprised to hear you use speaker out going to amp in of Torpedo CAB M. That is a bit surprising for me. You take 100 W signal that is meant to be drive a speaker, but you just plug it into Torpeda CAb that does not have any dummy load. I also have CAB M and use it with amps, but I connect Load Box to speaker out in Cab M. Interesting...
17:50 terrible squeal in the back of the sound?
Probably feedback from the single coils, as with any amp.
I owned the first edition of AMP1. Is pretty amazing what it can do considering the size and even price. Unfortunally I had to sell it but I would love to put my hands in a Mercury Edition. It could easily be my main/only option for a "real" amp.
Oh man I got the Mercury and iridium and holy freaking smokes are they loud and versatile
I got the Mercury Edition with the HX Effects as a pedalboard with the 4 cable metod and its perfect!
Damn, i have same pedalboard 😀
Me too
I know some “professional “ guitarists are touring with these (hidden behind their plexis) coz they’re reliable and consistant… thru 2x12 or 4x12’s is how I’ve heard them and it’s got “that tone”
Got my AMP 1 when my Helix LT started freezing in battle with no instant remedy. I don't regret going 'back in time' to tube amp and pedals though.
My UA-cam channel has some videos of Amp-1 with the Boss MS-3 effects. I've gigged this amp many times over the last four years and never had a failure. Freinds have heard my Amp-1 at gigs, bought their own, then they gigged theirs weekly and never had a failure either. Very reliable.
Love the MS-3. I was using a jmp-1 in the loop of one! Does the ms-3 switch the amp1 seamlessly?
@@peterschaefer1665 Yes, it's seamless.
I have been waiting for this video, thanks a lot. I would be very interested in a comparison with the AmpMan, maybe Tony has that too? 😬
Nope sorry. Though they do look kinda cool
Not sure what's happening with the noise on the boost - I have a Mercury Edition and there's no noise at all, boost or not. In any case, I love my Amp1. Best amp I've ever had. To anyone curious, if your aim is to use this primarily with the direct / headphone out, don't bother. It's easily the weakest part of the unit and not very good. For playing as a normal amplifier into a real cab, it's friggin great. It's a little Marshall miracle in a box. I wanted a Marshall that could be played at ALL volumes and this delivers. It feels very direct and dynamic, like you'd expect from a proper amp.
Think it's microphonic feedback from the pickups? I didn't get any noise with this unit with the modern channel and boost on full myself - but then I onlyn tend to have the master on 2 max rather than 7 or 8!!
@@tonystartup3817 Good shout, that's probably it. I guess he's sitting pretty close to the unit itself, too. I normally play mine between 1 and 2 (3 when I had a house to play loud in). 😆
I have an old original model and really enjoy it. The only reason I don't use mine more is due to how noisy it is. I don't know if they are all as noisy as my particular unit or if I'm just so used to having a stupid low noise floor after using modelers for so many years.
Im having the same issue .. its got me wondering if they are all like that .. or are we unlucky ?
Same here. Viewing demos I don’t see this problem, but using it with high gain become very noisy.
And the decay tail, with or without noise gate on my Mercury edition has some unpleasant artefacts that are crunchy and unnatural.
Have you used the noise gate? It's on the side with the custom controls.
It’s good no doubt but too pricey! Got a used one for a good price but over the headphones I wasn’t too impressed. I guess the external reverb you used makes a big difference. Will need to read more & tweak. Wonder if I can use additional IRs into this or maybe add it externally for it to sound great.
FWIW the back of the unit is plastic. the top of the unit is a plastic overlay on top of metal. The guys over at BluGuitar have gone around drop kicking them and showing that they still work etc..
I wouldn't worry about the casing.
I'm intrigued by the Mercury, but if I'm going silent stage, I don't need a 100W power amp. I use my Mooer Prime P1 rig, that said, I really dig the sounds I get from my Tech 21 PSA 2.0. I owned a PSA 1.1 back in the day, and it was one of my favorite preamps, tone sculpting machine.
The PSA 2.0 could use a headphone out, and a DI out, but it still sounds amazing IMO. Old school analog that is often overlooked by many. IDK if it's the price or what, but if you learn how to use it, it's much easier than amp models and loading IRs etc., where you have thousands of options to sift through. After you've listened to several amp models and IR combinations, I doubt few can remember or compare them effectively or efficiently.
I know the tones I want when I hear them. Sifting through dozens of amp / cab / Ir combinations is tedious. Blue Cat Audio Destructor, now in Axiom, or PolyChrome DSP is much more rewarding and efficient for me.
I'd be curious about your take on the PSA 2.0. Still sounds good, but not as versatile as the older rack versions, but the size is compelling. Many great tones in the PSA, if you can use your ears without any frame of reference as a crutch.
Cheers!
Love your demo mate! you have recorded all with a mic o you go straight into an audio interface? I ask you that because you use very high volume! and when I put it in my focusrite the volume input is too loud LOL
What cabs sound good with this unit?
I assume you recorded this direct...?
Great playing!!
I have been watching a-lot of your vids lately with all the different modelers!! Blug is by far the best sound I have heard on by comparisons!!! Great for travel dates, if she is hot enough!!🥸
can any of these demos be done without the bloody reverb?
Have you ever tried any of the tech 21 fly rig stuff?
I liked the intro piece and playing very much. Never heard of this device, but it sounds pretty decent!
I think Thomas is a German chap - I've seen a few reviews online but not too much ongoing useage of it?
@@johnnathancordy John, on Thomas's channels there are literally hundreds of hours of videos explaining everything, tone matching, chatting etc. He does a 2 hour live stream every week where they go in to tones etc
I have the original edition of the Amp 1 and currently using it 4 cable method with the hx stomp. It has midi capabilities to using an adapter cable, so I change combinations of chanel and boost based on snapshots. Works well and sounds good!
Base tones sound really good, but there’s some high-end stuff going on - almost sounds like radio interference, or tube weirdness. Is that something to do with your setup, or the noise gate (it is apparent when you stop playing)? That would put me off. Anyone else hearing it?
I think it's pickup squeal. This is my unit John is borrowing and it's never done that to me but John had the volume up much louder than I set it
@@tonystartup3817 Thanks Tony. Haven’t heard that in other UA-cam reviews, so figured it was something peculiar to John’s situation. Really like the sound f these units!
I'm just sat nearish to the monitors so for the high gain stuff, that's all you're hearing!
Sounds good. Not cheap but sounds good. Probably robust. Nanotubes don’t really fail right?
Great video!
What setting were you using for the fx loop? Thank you 🙏
By the way, it is metal, the silver casing
Great playing mate! Just wondering what you were plugged in to (you may have mentioned it, but I missed it)?
I've got the original amp 1. At the settings you show in the video you would be in danger of blowing your window out. Also the clean channel on 10 would be like a cranked marshall on my rig, have you got low output pickups on your guitar? Sounds great whatever you are doing!
I got rid of mine, because I couldn't get a decent sound from my humbucker guitar on the clean channel, plus i didn't like the cab, it was boxy sounding! The overdrives are pretty cool, but it still sounds like pedals and not a tube amp! But maybe if you are just using it plugged straight in to the P.A its useful, but I have the iridium for that! The custom controls are shit! My friends broke! I think he change them after, but the first model has cheap parts!!
Should be fairly seamless for you. Thomas also uses a Strat SSS.
I've been gigging one of these for a while and I've just got a Stomp XL. How would you combine the two? Use Amp1 just as power amp? Stomp running fx and amp SIM into Amp1 return and then to cab -- stomp stereo out w/cab model to FOH? Thanks for the awesome videos.
It also makes a great power amp to run a modeler into.
Nice one John. This has been on my radar to try for years but never the opportunity. What i’d really love to see is how it might take a couple of drive pedals in the front on the cleaner amp settings, and also how the HX stomp might sit in the FX loop for the various delays, reverbs and wobbly sounds…
Funny you should say that. I've left John with a couple pedals too - fuzz Face and past FX TD-y tube driver type for trying with the amp 1 for trying out some EJ sounds. Let's see if John tries them
I have one and it takes drive pedals in front like a champ. Just like a "regular tube amp" does.
Great review.
I might have missed it. What speaker/cab were you playing through?
I have the Amp1 Mercury it's been great. It doesn't sound as dark or compressed as your demo tones (which I preferred to my results). I'm using the BluGuitar Nanocab, which is a very compact cab. Much as I like it's portability and overall performance, it's not as full sounding as I'd like, and your demo tones were exactly what I think are missing.
He's going in to a load box. Not sure what the speaker IR is though. One difference is that John has got the volume up really high. I bet you never play with the volume up at 7 or 8 with the nanocab?! Get a fair bit of fatness from the power section then
@@tonystartup3817
Great point, thanks.
Beautifully played 🙂
how do you feel amp section of this unit compare to helix???
Is this the Mercury Edition, or the original?
You should play it through a real cab! You will love it!
Anyone can suggest a power amp pedal to power up a modeler like Boss gt, me , Tonex helix etc… with enough gig power connected to a passive cab and a desktop audio studio speaker for home use and the possibility to use headphones. Since a multi effect pedal would do the effects maybe a simple powerful power amp pedal would do once it’s connected to a multi effect pedal/ stomp box. Happy to hear some suggestions on this.
Sweet and simple. Looks rugged. It sounds very usable to me.. just missing full tonal and fx shaping between presets. I guess that would take away from the simplicity though?
There's a bit of tweaking available between channels with the side control and these allow you to balance the channels between themselves. Only thing you can't do is extreme ends of the tone between channels but how often do you really need to do that? Could always stick an eq pedal in the loop if you needed to do that
@@tonystartup3817 - “how often..?” back in the ancient times of amps, switches, buttons, and knobs - ehh not much at all. In this digital modeling age, damn near all the time.
I sold my beloved SLO-30 and Bogner Xctasy. Yes, the AMP-1 is THAT good. But you really have to no to opperate it properly.
Is it loud?
I have an EVH5150 head.
Can this amp keep up with loudness?
great sound
Sounded great!
Heard these things sound great. I must admit one of my big hangups was it just looks somewhat goofy.
Dammit John. Now I want one of those. When I saw Enuff Z'nuff recently I didn't see an amp on one of the guitar player's cab. After, I asked him what the hell he was playing through it sounded pretty good. He lit up and said "this will blow your mind!" He took me up on stage to see his rig. BlugGuitar...
Are you talking about Johnny Monaco?
@@timothy5974 No. I think his name is Tony Fennell. Had a nice 68 Goldtop.
is this silver or mercury?
Is this amp actually giggable in a small to maybe medium club...100 to 150 people or so?
It’s 100 watts so should be able to handle it just fine.
Great sounds and awesome playing as usual. Could you let me know what you're using as a cab sim? Or are you miking a cab? Cheers!
He's using speaker out into a fractal load box. Not sure what IR he's using but I think I remember him saying that he was going from the load box into the hx stomp and using the stock cab in there
How would you compare something like this to the milkman 100? Love the tone of both. Looking to do a wet dry wet rig but not sure which amps to use for it.
It probably can tone match a milkman it’s already been demonstrated to tone match several boutique amps such as matchless etc
i have the first edition which is the predecessor of the mercury edition.
the mercury edition is easier to deal with they say and it even sounds slightly different
and better?
i played it for a couple of years now.
i have the amp1 the fatcab and the remote control.
it sounds pretty cool and it feels good to play. i don't gig and i don't play very loud.
i don't know how it sounds fully cranked.
but it sounds really pleasant, this is my honest opinion.
i can compare it to a marshall dsl40c and a roland jc120 and the fender mustang.
the mustang sounds a bit like a toy in comparison.
the jc120 is a very hard thing to play. it forgives nothing. but the amp1 does.
it's easy to make it sound good.
the marshall is a little spikey but my first choice when it comes to humbucker guitars.
my tele elite and the amp1 go really well together.
the amp 1 takes pedals quite well.
it's all subjective. the amp1 sounds great but not better than a real tube amp.
the casing is made of aluminium i quess (almost certain).
the knobs on the side are a pain in the ass. unuseable. dial them in once and never
touch them again. you can not feel if they do rotate or not.
i'm always having problems to find matching volumes between clean and distorted settings and still likle both sounds.
the change of master volume or gain has an impact on the over all tone.
kind of like a real tube amp would have? i don't like that at all.
that's just me.
i bought the remote control because of the power soak feature they advertise.
it's very expensive and it does nothing for me. very disappointing.
it's a little bit of a money making machine. very short cable from amp to cabinet.
my honest summary.
the amp1 and the fatcab sound good but they are not cheap and i really love
the marshall dsl40c. if i needed to decide i'd take the latter.
but this is really subjective.
people do not complain about the amp1. so it's good.
Hi John, have you tried this amp with the ampero stomp 2 as cab sim/ir in 4 cable method?
I got mine second hand for 150-200 Euros. Never looked back. My go to amp with my 2x12 cab at home. Great for clean tones also a good pedal platform.
Don't care what tube it is, just put a preamp pedal and connect to return, you got everything you need.
This sounds surprisingly good
Great playing and tone as always! Does Amp1 feels better ¨in the hand¨ been analog?
I'm not sure about feel, but I feel like the modelling alternative it might take a bit more effort tweaking wise to get there?
Amp sounds nice to!
I have just started gigging with a ME Blug. It is great sounding and powerful for its size.
is ME Blug code for something I don't know about or am I being stupid?
@@johnnathancordy it is the Mercury edition. There is an Iridium version for metal players
@@rgbplumbinghilton there are three versions actually. mercury, iridium and the "old" one which has no name and which i have.
they say the iridium is easier to dial tones in or sth like that.
which version you have is written below the fan on the backside.
@@BigEdWo yes I know but the current models are the 2 I mentioned.
@@rgbplumbinghilton that's true. but we do not know which one was used here. probably the mercury edition.
you sound absolutely gorgeous with this =).
You're a great guitarist!
Sounds pretty good, - except, the modern channel is not my cup of tea (maybe because of the used IR). Which IR did you use?
I agree, I don't ever use modern channel as well, but given that it has other 3 fantastic channels I really don't mind the added voice. Perhaps some metal head will borrow it and find it decent enough to play on. It can be tweaked to sound better but remains fluffy and overly pumped, can't be revoiced. Vintage is magnificent in a band mix, classic is ...well classic.
Sounds fantastic ... across a huge range of tones. Always wondered whether I should upgrade to one of these, but I really don't need 100w. 15w would be fine ... shame there is no lower powered option. I did hear some odd artefacts in the clip, or was that just me. Eg a squealing sound at 19:04
The power being 100watt is no problem, easily plays at quiet volumes unlike a regular 100 watt valve amp. And you can always set it in low power mode (50 watt) or via midi access the power soak feature and turn it down all the way to 0.5watt. I prefer leaving it on 100 and turning the master down. Easily play at talking volumes
The squealing I think is microphonic feedback from the pickups. John has the volume up really loud with a fair bit of gain
@@tonystartup3817 Thanks. Didn't realise it had a power soak feature, and good to know it still sounds good at lower volume.
@@Pantalooj it does but you need the remote 1 pedal to easily access it. It is possible over midi but you need the midi adapter to use and something that can send midi CC commands
What IR are you using? Very nice tones.
Stock cabs!
Every Wednesday (8-9 PM ,CEST) he has a live show "Academy of Tone",
Blug will probably demo his AmpX (his newest rig) and older models with tips and tone tricks.
So you can join with questions if you'd like.
ua-cam.com/users/BluGuitarToneInnovationForGuitaristsfeatured
Amp1 ME is awesome, I have one, also got his Blubox (IR box) and they are a perfect match for any situation.
TLDW: No. Don't buy it. Instead, spend thousands on large, heavy, tube amp heads and strain your back lugging these massive hunks of metal and glass around. Everyone knows something this small can't sound any good.
Damn...u can play!
Thing about the side knobs, I though about how hard they are to tweak as well , initially.
But after a while you will find your preferred spot for each one and you won't touch them at all.
Don't forget there is a half gain mode as well which changes how it sounds.
To switch it to LG mode, hold "boost" button and turn it on.
To reset the amp , hold all three buttons when switching it on.
Thanks for the intel - yeh I guess they're supposed to be set and forget type things - in any case the tones are pretty immediate and cool I thought!!
@@johnnathancordy John, with the foot pedal you can set the gain available anywhere, so you can run the gain up full on the Amp 1 to remove the effect of the bright cap and adjust the gain with the dial on the remote 1
I got one, best amp in the market.
... das klingt nach Verstärker und nicht nach Distortion Pedal.... nicht übel
*John the clean would not be spiky, that IS NOT a modeler pedal, it is a full on 150WATT TUBE AMP!*
Not it's not.
The Poweramp is a 100w Class D Poweramp.
Love my Amp1 - I have it on a pedalboard with a Fractal FM3 - sounds Killer! 🤟😎
I found one is $200 US in 2nd hand market. IT IS a God sent
I think it's a remarkable box. I dunno if you were aware but Thomas Blug used to work for Hughes & Kettner and amongst other things, designed the red box..
I dunno if you were aware but no, he didn't design the Red Box, ffs.
Amp guru Jürgen Rath invented it in the late 80's. Decades before Blug even got involved with Hughes & Kettner (not as a designer but a presenter/marketing guy, btw. which explains a lot now that I'm thinking about it).
Jürgen Rath, who was a real amp designer that actually designed circuitry, also modified & repaired Blackmore's amps - even developed a substitute for his beloved tortoise guitar picks, designed the H&K Attax, H&K Cream Machine, H&K Tubeman, H&K PCS50, the analog 4x12 speaker simulation for Behringer's GI100 and the V-Amp Pro and many many more. Rammstein used Rath-Amps on their first albums, many many more followed, his Rath Speaker-Box and Speaker-Box Pro were a Red Box on stereoids, et cetera.
Back when Rath invented the Red Box, Blug's greatest achievement was strumming a few chords for an unknown German synth pop trio on only one of their 4 or 5 songs.
Well it certainly sounds good, and John Browne’s demo of the Amp1 Iridium also sounded great. If I was in the market I certainly wouldn’t turn my nose up at either of those units.
As usual the hype behind Amp X will likely outweigh what is delivered but I guess we as a guitar community just accept that as the norm now *cough* quad cortex…
Sounds good. Mostly your playing helps but im finding myself swayed by the strangely toylike graphics and computer console aspect. Dont guitarists just like black with knobs that look like they were stolen from Abbey Road 😅
I bet it would sound better through a real cabinet and speaker.
Sublime playing. Only just found your channel. Bravo
Last few days Im doing a research for smaller portable rig (but Im not that much of tweaker, so no multi fx) and I though that the best solution would be Iridium/ACS1 into small solid state power amp into real cab. So good gear for recording as well as playing. I saw Pete Thorn was using Iridium into Seymour duncan powerstage 200 into real cab, sounded pretty good to me. Now I saw this and few other videos of Bluguitar and all modellers started sound like shit to me. Dont know what to think now :D
I had the Strymon iridium at the time I bought the amp 1. I sold the Strymon as no longer needed
@@tonystartup3817 Can you describe the main difference between two for you, cause I dont have the chance try any of them. Cause on internet, opinions on strymon varies. Some people saying its nothing like amp and some that its quite good. Thanks
@@domizidor not easy to put in to words. The iridium is fine. Sounds as good as any other modeller I guess for what's in it. The plexi model seemed to be a model of just a single channel of a plexi, probably the bright channel whereas so many of the classic plexi sounds are of both channels jumped with a patch cable. For this reason for me it was too bright and didn't have enough gain. I wish it had a reverb too. It has a room effect that's like a reverb and is really cool but not enough for a real reverb effect. It's basically a cool pedal platform in a pedal but I think it really needs to be used with a bunch of other overdrives unless you only want to play at low gain. The amp 1 can just do it all without having to add anything else and into a normal guitar cab sounds better in the room then the iridium into a frfr
@@tonystartup3817 thanks for feedback. I have 1x12 guitar cab with celestion and engl fireball head (im not a metal head that much but clean is very nice on that amp and that dirt channel is awesome, juicy and tight). So when Im thinking about iridium, its with use of real cab with IR bypassed, more like pedal platform. Just not that much examples on youtube for that, but its quite common that people stick some modeller into SS power amp into cab. It probably behaves a bit differently too. I already have some dirt pedals Im using (timmy, rat, fuzz factory), but agree that amp1 in therms of drive sound is winner, cause you could rely just on them + fuzz for me. Its all about convinience and compromises, cause head + pedalboard + cab = 3 heavy things, pedalboard amp + cab = 2 heavy things :D, and sometimes you could grab just pedalboard. I would say AMP1 is clear winner as small amp solution but also its double of price, I would say a bit overpriced. I hope I will have a chance to try these.
@@domizidor yeah the price of the amp 1 has gone up over the last year. It was cheaper when I bought it and was expensive but not too expensive. I couldn't afford it at the current price new. I think as a lightweight grab and go solution it's better than the iridium, specially if you want to get anything comparable to the Engl. But then the iridium is cheaper, though there might not be much in it by the time you add a SS power amp.
I have a ported 1x12 with a neo creamback which makes for a light cab. The amp 1 and this cab is a nice light solution
Blue amp is not that good......I like the Red one a lot better......
Sensible. I prefer green
You can paint it any colour you like perhaps a nice shade of Parisian moonlight.
First comment, cos i own one ❤️
Do you dig Shane?
@@johnnathancordy once i started using it live, never looked back. Was gigging with an Axe-Fx, but never liked the cleans. Though the axe sounded good, but it never breaks up like the real amp. I do really love the cleans from the BluGuitar, specially with the Twin Reverb speakers. Since the twin is a combo, i have to use a DI box, like the bluguitar to the DI, then Through out is connected to the speaker cable. My problem with the Axe is, it sounds the same at every volume. The air push when playing live is much better with the BluGuitar. So BluGuitar sounds better, but ironically, the Axe feels better right hand wise. And the reverb from the amp doesn’t sound half good, as claimed by most youtubers. Well just my opinion. Btw, i have used many of your small bit phrases in many songs, stolen a lot from you🙈
Also, peak volume wise, it feels like a 25 watts tube amp. Not half as loud as the twin reverb, yet it is claimed as more than 100 watts. Also it feels like a plastic, when played with its inbuilt speaker emulation rec out
Christ that's rough.
Paired with an HX Effects it’s an awesome live rig!
I tried every Amp1 model and I don't like them very much. It's mostly because of the marketing/technobabble. The marketing always sounds like it's more than a quite expensive more or less digitally controlled solidstate amp (designed by a Russian audio engineer, not Blug himself) that implements a hearing-aid tube for some compression in front of its Class D power amp that was re-branded as Nanotube (so that people would mistake a decades old vaccum tube with Korg's relatively new and innovative NuTube? At least that is what a bunch of people on the forums do) and it needs some expensive and proprietary addons to add basic or "professional" functionality like a secondary master volume or MIDI.
And when I compared them to other amps they're ok but fundamentally, it's nothing new and I'm not saying it has to be but I mean, 20 years ago I was gigging with an already 15 or so years old solidstate amp that is easily as good sounding as the Amp1 if not better and tonally it's even more versatile but back then people couldn't even appreciate good (non-tube andor hybrid) amp design and now some of the same people are going head over heels for.. warmed up old coffee. I mean, it sounds fine but get yourself an AMT StoneHead and you can easily dial in the sounds of both, the Mercury and the Iridium - I've tried it.
It's the same with the AmpX. "Neural Analog Amp" sounds like a bunch of hogwash. It sounds like it might be a multipath preamp like Black Widow Designs and Klonz did 6 or so years ago (and they're not the first) but it's more likely that it's just an Amp1 preamp paired with a relatively simple digitally controlled EQ (which is probably fixed pre or post dist instead of being variable) but then just call it an EQ, don't bs me with this "neural analog" marketing claptrap.
Wow this has got to be the longest comment i have ever not read on youtube!
Hmm dunno what unit you did have but the majority of people
Find this sounds awesome. And it does. Ampx… noone knows. Its not out… but one thing is for
Sure. It smokes most other small amps in a heartbeat… if u connect it
To A cab and can open it up on 3-4 at least you get sone georgeous sounds :o. Full. Dirty. Usable.
@@xriz8409 nope, it doesn't
I can't even respond to this without laughing.
Why so negative about the amp, damn.
It sounds great and it's small and portable, powerful and affordable.
It's an impressive piece of gear and you'd be hard stuck if you try to find negative reviews about the amp itself.
It's quite enough for it to be enjoyed and played.
How much master volumes ,on Amp1, do you really need?
Honestly , your comment sound like it's coming from Andertons HQ, where they deliberately skimped this wonderful little amp.
Too much guessing and bile , if you ask me.