Bass Amp Review

I began my musical career like many others – forming a band at school. One of the major problems in the early days – apart from learning to play an instrument – was getting some decent gear together. Money was always tight and whilst I dreamt of one day owning my very own Gibson Les Paul or Fender Precision bass, I had to make do with a whole host of budget instruments from Hondo, Kay, Satellite and the like.

It was a similar story with amplification. I distinctly remember the whole band playing through a single 15 watt amp and wondering why we sounded horrible. Then it became obvious.

Instrument amplifiers are built differently for a reason and it’s all to do with the frequencies they have to handle. For bass players we’re obviously talking low frequencies (particularly with 5 string basses). Strumming a low E moves a lot of air and the speaker design has to be man enough to handle it without distorting or breaking up. For that reason, whilst some guitarists play through bass amps to get a certain sound, it never works the other way round. Guitar amps are simply not man enough to handle bass frequencies.

Thankfully for the modern day bass player there’s lots of choice and there are many manufacturers around producing excellent products. The internet means that budding bass players can access a wealth of bass amp reviews at the click of a mouse. Let’s take a look at the different aspects you need to consider when choosing a bass amp.

Solid State or valve (tube)?

Valve amps traditionally were the domain of the guitarist rather than the bass player. In the past it was practically impossible for a solid state guitar amp to produce the warm, overdriven sounds of a valve-based counterpart but these days the gap is closing. For bass players it would be true to say that a solid state amp will suffice for most applications. They’re cheaper than their tube-based equivalents and generally sound very good, but many pro and semi-pro bassists prefer the sweet distortion offered by valve amps.

Really it all comes down to sound. Solid state amps don’t sound too brilliant when they’re pushed to their upper limits volume wise and start to distort. Do the same to a decent valve amp and the thing will really begin to sing. It’s horses for courses really and bear in mind that valve amps are pretty expensive. Another important point to remember is that most modern solid state amps have sufficient headroom to prevent distortion so in reality this probably wouldn’t be a problem. At then end of the day let your ears (and wallet) decide!