What Guitar Amp is Right for You?
At ElectricGuitarAmps.org we want you to find the perfect Electric Guitar amplifier. But you need to know the answers to some questions so you can choose the perfect Electric Guitar amp. We know that these questions may seem difficult and you may want to answer one way but maybe SHOULD answer another. Just remember WE can’t possibly answer these questions because it is your guitar amp, not ours.
How will you use your amp?
One of the most important questions to ask yourself is how are you going to use your amp. Maybe you have a favorite brand and see yourself standing in front of a giant MARSHALL stack. But do you really NEED it is the question. So take some time to answer these questions… at least to yourself. Hey, I can’t hear ya anyway!
1. Are you going to need to tour in big concert halls?
2. Are you looking for a home practice amp?
3. Are you going to move it a lot?
4. Are you playing LOUD rock, metal or other distortion filled style of music?
5. Are you an advance or beginner player?
6. Will you be playing in a band?
You need to know the answers to these because they will completely change the definition of what makes a good amp for you. Let’s say you are a beginner. Well first you need a practice amp or maybe even a headphone amp. You don’t want to spend a ton of money on your First Amp either. You might not even stick with the instrument. You need to get a practice amp just so you have something while you build your chops. You need to get good enough to advance to playing with other people and later with a band. A 5W-20W amp with a 8” or bigger speaker will be great at home.
Maybe you are not an advanced player but you still will be playing live music with a band. This requires a bigger amp with more power. If you play rock music for example with a band you probably need at LEAST 1 or 2 10”-12” speaker(s) to project the sound. Live playing typically takes 50W-100W to keep up as well. This might be a Fender Twin or similar amp. It is a compromise between having a big enough amp to be heard and one that you can actually carry!
If you play in a band for money at night clubs all the time then you probably need another amp style. You might think about a stack approach where your speaker box and your amp are separate. The head stacks on top of the speaker. Let me tell you friend, that electric guitar amplifiers are heavy things…especially the tube ones. I personally have a 100W Marshall full stack where you have 2 speaker boxes with 4 x 12” speakers in each. It is a monster. The nice thing is most of the time I only need one speaker box so I can travel light. Yea …right. Sure it is one of the best sounding amps of all time in my opinion, but it is a giant pain in the butt to carry around. Moving that thing up or down a few flights of stairs is a disaster at 2AM! So choose your amp wisely. Make sure you need that huge monster. Some really fine guitar amps come with 2 x 12s or 4 x 10s.
Sound wise I am personally a big fan of tube amps. Unfortunately, they are heavier and more expensive than solid state amps. If you are going to play your amp to distortion then tube amps are the only way to fly for me. Solid state amps get extremely nasty at clipping. Try as they might, transistor amps don’t sound quite like tube amps.
Finally think WHEELS if you will be moving your amp quite a bit. A small practice amp doesn’t really have this problem but I can tell you from years of experience playing in bands that you will never regret getting amps with wheels on it. There are many times you can roll your amp up sidewalks or across dance floors instead of carrying the thing. Sometimes people buy ATA road cases and leave the amp sitting on the base with wheels when they play. Then snap on the case top and good to go.
So that wraps up our quick guide. Hopefully that was helpful. Look around our site and see our great selection of electric guitar amps. We carry Marshall, Fender, Mesa Boogie, Orange, Vox, Peavey and more. You should be able to find the perfect Electric Guitar Amp for you on these pages.
