eljodon
Member
Splawn Nitro features: 120 watts,(4) KT88, (4)12AX7 tubes,series Effects Loop with true bypass switch,Level switch(+4 db, -10db), Effects level,half power switch. OD Channel-Gain, Volume, Solo, Treble. Mids, Bass, Presence, Resonance. Clean Channel-Gain, Volume, Treble,Bass. Foot Switch- Clean, OD1, OD2, Solo. How does it sound? I was very exited for the amp to arrived, I heard many of the youtube videos and I really liked what I heard. I used 3 different cabinets, a Marshall 1960B with Celestion V30's, another Marshall 1960B with Scumbacks H75's and a custom 2 x 12 cabinet with Celestion 25 watts "Green Backs".For guitars I used my Les Paul standard with 57 classic pick ups, acustome made Strat with Joe Barden pick ups, a 57 Reissue Strat with Kinman pick ups and a Shecter Hellriser 7 string guitar with EMG active pick ups. This amp did not impressed me at all,it's very dark sounding and the mids are overly pronounced( around 450Hz to 600 Hz), I had to turn the mid control down to about 3 to make it half decent. The Treble control works in a weird way as you turn it up it sounds bright but the mids get's scooped, as you turn it to around 3 the high mids gets increased( around 2k). The Bass control barely does anything. The Presence control is voiced weird and the Resonane controll is useless. The amp does have a lot of gain which works ok for leads. I was able to make the amp sound ok with a 10 band Boss eq on the effects loop by cutting 500Hz by - .5 db, 1 khz by - 2 db, 2 khz by -2 db. I tried recording it in my studio using a Shure 57 and a Royer 121 Ribbon mic using a TG2 preamp, SSL X Rack compressor and EQ. I usually don't like using eq when I record my guitars and and instead prefer moving the mic's around until it sounds the way I like it, but I still had to cut 1 khz and 2 khz. I used a Aracom attenuator to try to get the power amp section working and it sounded ok. I got he best results with my 2 x 12 custom cabinet with Celestion 25 watt greenbacks since the are more scooped that my other Celestion speakers. Using the foot switch there was not much difference between OD 1 or OD2. OD 1 seemed a bit brighter giving my guitar a bit of a twang and OD 2 seemed slightly more overdriven. The Clean channel is also useless even when using my 57 Strat. Conclusion. I'll probably sell the amp, my 87' Marshall JCM800 2204 gets a beter tone than the Splawn with a OD pedal. I also have a Marsha HBE/BE smokes this amp and also my custome Marshall amp that was built for me. Maybe I got a bad amp since the ones I heard on youtube sounded way better. I've been playing guitar professionaly for over 30 years and I've own many amps, but the Splawn Nitro did not impressed me at all!