Does the AD50 owe anything to Marshall?

[Ade]

Humour me for a moment good people.

I have an AD50 I run through a'70 Orange quad (see signature). I hear the AD50 was voiced a bit more "modern" than its brother, the Retro 50. My AD50 also loves my old Boss OD-1 and my Whiteface RAT. These pedals, particularly the OD-1 (and its successor the SD-1) are legendary for boosting cranked Marshalls (particularly JCM800s). The AD50 seems also to be a fairly simple and straightforward amp, running two 12AX7s and two EL34s (unlike the AD15 and AD30 that run EL84s - both of which I've owned and found a little more Voxlike).

I've limited experience with Marshalls. Does the AD50, in design, voicing or tone, bare any resemblance to its British brethren?

Ade

[Jondog]

In the grand scheme, I'd say it's owed to the Fender Bassman.

[Ade]

In the grand scheme, I'd say it's owed to the Fender Bassman.

Serves me right I suppose.

Ade

[langmurf]

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=50333

[kars0747]

interesting. A fender bassman is one of the best amps I have tried.

[Ade]

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=50333

Thanks for that. I know I've read that post numerous times before (I've probably read all the AD50 posts) but for the life of me I can't remember ever reading that reference to Marshalls in the first paragraph. Thanks for drawing it to my attention again.

Ade

[Jondog]

In the grand scheme, I'd say it's owed to the Fender Bassman.

Serves me right I suppose.

Ade

You got me thinking though, it'd be neat to hear an AD series amp with a plexi type layout, channel jumpering with a normal and bright gain stage in parallel.

[snickerpuss]

Interestingly enough, my tech recently did some work on a couple Orange custom jobs from Adrian Emsley which were essentially 50 watt Marshall Plexis with his PPIMV he seems to like. We a/b'd and jammed with them a couple hours. They sounded like more punchy, aggressive, and less smooth Marshalls, but wayyy different from both the AD50 clone at the shop and my AD140 Lead.

[a.hun]

Oranges and Marshalls really don't sound at all alike to me. Especially not modern Marshalls. Older ('Plexi' era) Marshalls had a bit more grunt in the lower mids than modern 'cutting through upper mids' ones, but were still nothing like Oranges soundwise.


Andy.

[Wendigo]

In the grand scheme, I'd say it's owed to the Fender Bassman.

Indeed, the first Marshalls were basically the Bassman design with 12 inch speakers and KT66 tubes I believe instead of the 6L6 (or whatever they had in them at the time)

[Jondog]

Yeah, Jim Marshall and his tech copied the bassman changing enough components to avoid the patent...that didn't actually exist! Marshall gets credit for taking it to 100 watts and inventing "the stack" of 4x12's