Talk to Me About ENGL

[Frehley12]

I had a NEW Savage 120 back around 2005. Most expensive amp I bought at that time. It was a HUGE letdown. Constant issues with fuses, tubes, ohh and the red LEDs lasted a month before turning PINK. It spent too much time in the shop and me waiting. I fought for a return and full refund from the store that sold it to me even though I already had it for 3 months. It was granted. Never again will I look into Engl. Customer service was terrible too. I don't care if Paul Stanley uses Engl amps. That's not why I purchased it. Plus I don't think he was using them at that time. Scorpions too.

 

[DanTravis62]

I've been gigging with a 50w artist in my punk band all year.

Generally speaking, ENGLs sound good, and they are expensive, but they are not particularly well built, and a pain to get fixed if they're wrong.

The artist is my favorite because it's closest to a "classic" marshally sound, but almost all of their models sound great.

 

[thegame]

Built to last a lifetime of a mayfly

 

[FourT6and2]

I had SE founders edition and tried Fireball and Artist Edition. I prefer AE and FB to SE just for high gain. They are more raw and organic than SE fe. What I didn't like about ENGL(especially SE fe)is their tone shaping options. Most of them are just crappy buttons. I thought most of them are useless. When I engaged the depth boost or mega lo punch, amp becomes too bassy/muddy. When I off that button, sounds thin. It was hard to dial for what I like. I prefer knobs as tone shaping option. So, I can dial my amp out more precisely whatever cabs or speakers I use. I assume you are a Marshall guy from your amps clips. Then AE will be good choice. But, you won't satisfy with ENGL. I think your amps sounds better than ENGL. But, ENGL's cabs are very nice. I like their cabs more than amps lol

I am more of a modded Marshall guy these days. But for an amp like this, I wouldn't be going for that sound. I'm looking for an amp for modern metal, prog metal, and metalcore. Think Killswitch Engage, Tesseract, Karnivool...

 

[FourT6and2]

The Blackmore is a nice amp, I can say that much, and if the Artist was tweaked from there for Doug Aldrich it probably is nice too. Lots of the other Engl stuff sounds a bit off for me, but then again I´m more of an 80s rock guy and not in it for the chugs.

I'm in it for the chuuuuuugs

 

[FourT6and2]

They're cool for what they are for sure, a modern, processed sounding amp. Not very natural, warm sounding but fairly synthetic sound. The feel is also not great compared to other amps, they are very stiff feeling. I didn't care for the AE much, think I flipped it in less than a month. The post 2011 Savage 120 with upgraded iron was my fav. Stiff as a motherfucker to play but sounded pretty cool. FB100 was my second fav. I think of revisiting one from time to time but those paper thin boards with they're weird layout scare me...LOL

I like stiff. Especially for the sounds I'm going for with an amp like this. Interesting that you didn't like the AE but liked the Fireball, considering the other amps and sounds you gravitate toward?

 

[FourT6and2]

I think Euge's video does a good job at showing the differences here.



I have experience with a few Engls. I've owned a couple of Fireball 100s, Fireball 25, and my other guitar player owns a Powerball 2. I spent a short time with a friends Savage. To my ears, Engl has 2 types of high gain tones, one based around the Fireball (Ironball, Powerball), and one based around the Savage (Artist Edition, Blackmore). Then the SE heads I don't really have experience with, but from videos it seems like they combine tones from both sides.

The Savage based amps to me seem more Marshally. More of that kind of mid range. Not that they sound like Marshalls lol. While the Fireball based amps have a more 5150-ish kinda of gain to them.

The Savage is RAZOR sharp. I would have liked to spend more time with it, but the time I did spend, it was lacking low end for me. Maybe how he had it dialed in, he doesn't like a lot of low end in his tone.

The Fireball is very open and aggressive and huge sounding. The Powerball takes that and compresses it a bit more, making it feel tighter. The Powerball 2 has been my favorite Engl I've played. And I've spent a lot of time with it. You can hear these differences in Euge's video.

The FB25 is cool, similar in some ways to the 100, but you aren't getting the same low end response. And it pushes more mids.

I've also played an Invader and Thunder, but I don't remember them too well, so can't really comment. I still regularly play the FB25 and PB2 that my other guitar player owns. They're both great amps.

I think it's down to the Fireball or AE for me. Sweetwater has both and I believe they have a decent return policy. So maybe I'll grab both and keep whichever one I like more.

Here are some clips of the FB 25, though. They actually sound really good to me.

 

[SFW]

Had the Artist Edition of a hot minute. At the time I had a Savage 120 MK II as well. I didn't need both amps. If I could do it again, I would have kept the Artist Edition. The new version has a built-in noise gate that work very well at killing amp hiss without losing any sustain.

 

[angelspade]

Tried a few. Don't like the build quality...Don't like the sound quality.

 

[CrystalSky]

One of the few high-gain amp brands I've never tried. Tell me what you know.

I prefer amps with fewer knobs/switches/channels. Maybe that's why I've stayed away. But their current Artist Edition models seem more approachable. And this doesn't sound half bad.

I see an older version of this amp exists (with green lights/switch instead of blue)? Any major differences?

Then there's the Fireball E635, Powerball E645II, and Savage MK II?

Never played one, but Necrophagist sound is what comes to mind when I hear ENGL.

 

[DanTravis62]

Random artist 50w sounds with my punk band

Practice



Live



On a studio recording (it's engl artist both left and right on this one)

https://www.facebook.com/share/v/16CWwqugn4/

 

[WizardAmpIphoneClip]

Engl Savage MkII is sharp and delicious for anything remotely technical rhythm wise. I thought it was a little leaner in the mids and bass than the Fireball 100. The FB was a little thicc for some stuff imo

 

[Dale B]

The only ones I ever had were the original Powerball heads. You could play them at home with no problems. As soon as you gave them some volume, the feedback made the amps unusable when trying to play in the context of a band. I think they added the Gate on the second version.

The Powerball had a lot of low end, and it sounded cool. It sounded like a controlled 5150 that wasn't falling all over itself.

I remember checking the bias, and it was like 420 VDC on the plates with a cold 20 to 25 mA cathode current. There wasn't much sweep in the pot.

 

[MetalHeadMike]

I like stiff. Especially for the sounds I'm going for with an amp like this. Interesting that you didn't like the AE but liked the Fireball, considering the other amps and sounds you gravitate toward?

If you like stiff for certain things, Engl is a good direction. I just found the AE highly artificial-processed-synthetic sounding. As are most the Engls. The Fireball100 actually came off more natural sounding to me. I should mention, I was into different tones when I owned the FB100, it was like 12 years ago.

 

[mixn4him]

I had a Retro and it was really cool, the large foot switch was mandatory to access all the tones on the fly. Build quality was pretty bad, very thin circuit boards and lots of ribbons. I enjoyed the amp except the fixed Resonance setting. Probably could have modded it to remove it but ended up just moving it on…

 

[turtlefingers]

Since you are very good at electronics you wont have any problem since their customer service is non existent.
The ENGL SE is an amazing amp and all four channels are very good, but its master volume goes from whisper to bleeding ears, so it wasn't useful for me.
They weight a ton too, for gigs it was a pain in the back.

 

[Tone Monster]

Some of them can sound decent but MY GOD the build quality is alarming to say the least.

 

[MetalHeadMike]

I am more of a modded Marshall guy these days. But for an amp like this, I wouldn't be going for that sound. I'm looking for an amp for modern metal, prog metal, and metalcore. Think Killswitch Engage, Tesseract, Karnivool...

Fireball100 or post 2011 Savage120 MK1 form the models I owned for those tones and probably lean FB100 even though I preferred the Savage for what I was gong for. Maybe the PB2 or Smolski, but I've not played those.

 

[Kagami]

Never played one, but Necrophagist sound is what comes to mind when I hear ENGL.

dying fetus, everything michael romeo does and dimmu borgir are also engl sounds that come to mind for me. I want to grab a PBII and Savage at some point but just haven't jumped on them yet.

 

[FourT6and2]

Are Engls in the same family as SLO, Rectifier, 5150, Framus Cobra? If so, maybe I'm better off going back to KSR because I think KSR does that sound better.