guitar nerds, give me some advice

[jrdn]

okay so i've been playing shows for way too long using other peoples gear, hoping that one of the other bands will have something i can borrow and a lot of the time the other bands will be quite reluctant to let us use their heads, cabs are usually fine, it's just heads. so yeah, i was looking for some advice on a good, budget head to get. i play in two bands, one's kinda pop-punk mixed with twinkly shit.. i guess (http://www.facebook.com/mycastleyourcastle) and the others just pretty much generic screamo haha, i'm looking for a head that will be okay for both of these bands, i guess it's more important its for the first band but it would be nice if it could be good for both. would be great if someone could give me some advice yooooo

[Andrew]

What's your budget and what are some guitar tones you like?

[jrdn]

really not sure what my budget is yet, depends how much stuff i can shift, 400 quid possibly (£), i'm really not sure though. well for kinda poppyish stuff, think the promise ring with a bit more distortion... i'm trying to think of bands that i listen to that you can actually hear the guitar tones well ahaaa, well the jd circa seeing means more than safety and pg99 document 8 sorta weirdly overly distorted sound is pretty sick, i can't really explain what i mean, i'm so bad at this shit.

[Tinfoilfetus]

Try and look into Carvin they are affordable and you can get a range of tones.

[kevin]

carvin? ew

my main advice: buy something old and used. combos are a hell of a lot easier since you only have to carry around one big heavy thing instead of two, and you don't have to worry about impedance, plus it's usually cheaper. most all ampeg stuff is good, you can find a vt-22 in your price range (it's a 2x12 100watt tube combo, they're amazing). old fender stuff, old sunn stuff, some peavey stuff is good, univox made a lot of good amps, musicman, etc... some marshalls are good but there's a lot of junky ones out there. most new stuff sucks and isn't worth it compared to buying used

look around on craigslist if you have it wherever you are

[kevin]

and let's be honest old beat up gear gives you WAY more cred than some new piece of shit from guitar center

[Tinfoilfetus]

Carvin, ehh maybe I guess that would rely upon preference and experience, but my friend showed me "musicgoround, and they have a huge selection of listings on new and used equipment.

[kevin]

yeah music go round is a used music gear chain. this dude is in scotland though i think so i dunno

[jrdn]

thanks for the advice, I'll probably go for something used. i'm not gonna get a combo as, as much as I want one, i usually take the bus to the town the rest of my band lives in then we drive from there and we travel in a hatchback, usually have to hold most of our gear on top of us which is way uncomfortable.

[kevin]

if space is an issue i would definitely consider a 2x12 combo.. does it need to be excessively loud? 100watt tube combos are pretty f'ing loud, especially those ampeg ones

and stick with tube unless it's a sunn, their solid state amps are really a lot better than just about anything else