the perfect amp

i can't even express my love for this amp, probably my favorite piece of gear of all time

It’s alright

Was pretty excited when I got one of these in a part exchange. Chorus and vibrato circuits sound fantastic, and looks the part too. You can pick these up for decent prices if you’re patient.

The sound, most of the time is way too harsh and shrill. Could never really shape the sound the way that I wanted to. Mine had a gated spring on there, which was cool at first, but drove me nuts after a while. It’s also really heavy and loud. Lets not talk about the distortion circuit.

In no way shape or form is this a "bad" piece of equipment, I did however get rid of mine; I can explain.

Right off the bat this amplifier is an icon and I have no negative bias towards it, I got rid of mine however due to a couple reasons. First, The model that I owned was an original from the late 70's, so it was the largest Fucking piece of equipment I've ever owned (i have speaker cabinets that are easier to transport than this thing!) 2x12 combo amps by nature tend to take up space but this thing weighed 100 lbs and took up 1/3 of my entire bedroom, eventually it became more of a hassle than recreation. Second, I much prefer high-gain distortion and overdrive tones as opposed to cleans and reverb, so by nature this amplifier is much more difficult for me to work with if I have no overdrive or distortion pedal. The unit itself however does in fact sound very good and produces a multitude of classic and rich sounding tones, the built in chorus and vibrato effects are phenomenal and really allow you to mold them into a very unique way that modern amps simply don't offer anymore. I haven't plugged into one of the re-issue models that are being produced nowadays, so I can't tell you if there are any differences in how they both sound; In retrospect I'm very glad I owned one for a brief period and got to experience one the most influential solid state amps ever manufactured.

Absolutely stunning

My go to amp for cleans, let alone the lush stereo chorus mode. Absolutely brilliant amp, an absolute staple

One of the Best Clean Amps

Much has been said about this, so I won't cover what has been said.

The older version is what you want. It is the standard in clean amps having been used on many recordings that you hear. The older one was extremely clean with no background noise. I point this out as I also owned a newer one. It developed a small hissssssss as it got older. My amp tech told me this was due to lesser quality parts. He was able to make the repair, but it never lived up to the older one.

It takes pedals extremely well.

Best amp i will be using on my whole life

This amp is loud asf!!! It didnt mud my guitar tone when its loud and my jazz chorus is now 36yrs old and no repair history still works!!

Preferred Settings + Usage:

Cleanest Cleans/Chorusiest Chorus

What attracted me to this amp was how clean and pure the tone is and how lush the chorus is. It does not try to be tube which is my least favorite thing about most solid state amps. It is just a big DI box with some nice color to the tone. The stereo chorus is almost always on when I play. It does a great job at adding a rich texture without getting in the way of anything. The reverb on the amp is nice and ample but nothing crazy. I am not much for vibrato but the vibrato can also provide some nice textures that mix well in the overall tone. The reason I did not give this amp 5 stars though was because the distortion is unusable. It is not a big deal for me because I have plenty of pedals but it was disappointing to find. The JC 40 has a really nice distortion effect though, that almost reminds me of a transparent overdrive, plus it is not insanely loud like this monster.

Best Clean and Chorus amp EVER

This is the sound I have searched to get the best metal clean sounds.

Read the review - there are caveats for the three stars.

This is a great amp but not very practical compared to the more recent smaller versions. Mine is an original 70s model and does NOT have the stereo input options or loop inputs found on later versions. It DOES have the original spring reverb. Cross-plugging inputs isn't an option. It's big, loud and only does stereo with its own inbuilt effects. Chorus has one setting. Vibrato is adjustable. Reverb is great. Distortion is a waste of time. I pair this up with an AC30 to blend different sounds. I live in Denmark and they aren't all that in demand here, so I got it for a lot less than a JC40 would have cost new - so if you can get one cheap, great. But for full price it's too much amp for most people. Nice to have but there are better options out there for most players.

From Gear Setup

I'm a child of the late 80's & 90's

I loved the sound of this fella long before I knew what it was. "Chorus on everything!" Phase? Yup, had one. After that nonsense pasted it was used largely on Keys and lived a very hard life on the road. I was juuust coming back around to playing guitar thru it and well, she's gonna need a trip to the doctor some TLC before that'll happen.

It's a staple sound for sure- The amp & it's Chorus. There is a matter of taste with these matters tho. Me? I LOVE this guy. For a mix of reasons. Sturdy bastard! Lord we were hard on it (it's actually sitting next to me, serving as an end table sadly). I will admit there is like a mix of conscious nostalgia for its sound and also just baked into me from the music of my youth.

They're not too hard to find & I'd definitely encourage anyone to go & see if it's a sound you dig. Lord knows you'll have loads of company. Good company in lots of cases.

Dammit. There goes my day. I'm fixing my Jazz Chorus dammit.