Yup, lots of Archon love all over the place here, but... no built-in reverb.Archon 50 and a really nice reverb pedal.
Archon 50 and a really nice reverb pedal.
Being a player who likes more vintage style sounds, the Sonzera would be my choice. However, if I played a lot of gainier stuff, the Archon is an awfully nice amp!
They’re both great amps.
The Archon has more range in it than I initially assumed it would.
My buddy has the 25 watt combo and was nice enough to let me fool around on it. The gain channel can do less distorted stuff, it’s just everyone who uses it seems to be rockin’ on it.
Good to know!
All I seem to hear on its gain channel in demos are metal tones, but I haven’t played through one yet.
Yeah, the gain channel has a lot of range. You can push the preamp on the clean channel and get a sort of edge-of-breakup sound. It's been a while since I went through the full range of things, but I seem to recall there was a bit of a gap between the highest gain on the clean channel and the lowest gain on the lead channel. Just a bit of the gain spectrum missing in there. That said, I didn't really try to see if I could hit that gap with the guitar's volume control - or, for that matter, pushing the output stage into distortion.
Nice to know the clean channel can be pushed to edge-of-breakup. Maybe the gap you mention could be filled in with a pedal?
I think of single channel amps as kind of specializing in those in-between tones, which is why they appeal to me, and as a result I have three of them. But I also have that Lone Star that’s got two channels, and I would guess that two channel amps have more appeal to most players (which is why they’re more popular!).
Just did some testing, and my experience with the Archon's clean channel, is that you have to wind up the master volume to get any breakup out of it, unless you put a particularly stout boost in front of it. Then you can get some quite respectable edge-of-overdrive tones out of it.
The gain channel (at least on mine), can be wound down enough to get them as well, but as the channel is very much voiced to take into account all the harmonic content of mid to high gain, you need to reduce the low and mid, and crank the treble to 11. Putting the same boost in front as the clean channel (in my case, the Chase Audio "Brothers") gets you some rather glorious touch reactive edge of overdrive biteyness that you might not expect.
Oh gods, yeah. I would never recommend an Archon for someone looking for vintage Bassman tones.I was wondering about how an amp voiced for Metal was going to also give a player saturated, warm breakup like a Bassman or Plexi.
Being the picky sort, I’m sticking with the idea of horses for courses.
Good to know!
All I seem to hear on its gain channel in demos are metal tones, but I haven’t played through one yet.
I always refer to this video Aristotle posted a couple of years ago when people ask if the Archon is a one trick pony.