Aiken Sabre Clip

[Jarrett]

The Amp
The Clip
(If the links don't work try the ones at the bottom of the post. If they don't work, please let me know)

I put a Sabre clean clip in my MP3s. It doesn't capture the power of the amp well, but gives an idea of the clean sound I think. The recording is kinda soft, so you have to crank your speakers a bit.

The clipping is my crappy recording technique, not the amp. I hung a PV mic in front of grill cloth and straight into the computer. No alterations from the software. I guess it could use a little reverb, but I forgot to add it. Please forgive the clams, I was just making that up as I went a long for the clip.

That's a Tyler strat w/ Fralin Blues Specials (neck/middle) into the clean channel of the Sabre with the bright swtich on and running out to the Invader 1x12 16ohm Greenback open back cab. MV dimed, Treble @ 9pm, Mid @ Noon, Bass @ 11am, Gain around 3pm or so.

I tried but I cant make a clip of the lead channel that does it justice. It's massive though. Even at half volume through this openback/Greenback cab, it's shaking things in house. I had a picture fall down during one of the recordings. It's going to be scary to put this thing through a 4x12. It's an awesome amp.

 

[JonF]

Sounds very nice! Congrats on the new purchase!

 

[dbeeman]

I get

"bcvrf.yahho.com"could not be found" .....


on the clip

Must be working for others. Maybe some broken DNS thing on my side?

 

[Lonely Raven]

Nope, link times out for me too.

 

[straticus]

Sounds great!

Would love to here just the neck p/u (my favorite )..........

And the overdrive channel too!

 

[Jarrett]

Doug & Lonely, my ISP sucks. You might be able to get to the clip by going to the mp3 link at the bottom of my post. If not there, let me know and I will email it.

 

[gkelm]

Sounds nice. It the grittiness speaker breakup, or amp? Must have been really loud with MV cranked and gain almost all up! Is it cleaner at reasonable yet loudish volumes?

BTW, is 50 watts into a single greenie safe?

Greg

 

[Jarrett]

The breakup is my poor recording technique. It's the software input clipping. There was absolutely no breakup on this setting. The settings were as follows:

MV dimed
Treble @ 9pm
Mid @ Noon
Bass @ 11am
Gain around 9pm (3pm was a typo)
Bright swtich on

So the amp was just really warming up in terms of volume. It's a very loud clean channel with a ton of headroom. Mine doesn't start breaking up until gain hits about 3-4pm on the dial. I made sure to keep it well under half power for the safety of the greenback.

 

[gkelm]

Thanks Jarret...I read that but didn't connect. Looking forward to the dirty side. Looking to be perhaps one of the finest attempts at a Fender/Marshall two-sided monster?
Greg

 

[Jarrett]

This is the best Fender/Marshall channel switcher I've heard. By that I mean, imo, it sounds closer to a Blackface Fender (sans the reverb) on one side and closer to a heavily modded Marshall on the other than any other switcher I've heard.

I think once I get some reverb in the loop, it will be hard to discern this amp from a Blackface Fender. It's a bone crusher on the lead side. I was thinking it was going to be a Shiva, it's more of an Ecstacy/Uberschall on lead side.

 

[gkelm]

I think I just heard that one of these was going to be at a certain shop manana, so I may stop by. Would be great to hear it in all its glory.
Greg

 

[Brian H]

Well.....I'm waiting to hear the impressions left behind from today’s mini amp fest.
I don't want to go first.

By the way; played the Tone King after hours...very nice little amp.

 

[Jarrett]

Man, I don't even know where to start. Thanks to everyone that brought stuff and thanks to Brian and Clay for letting us occupy the the room all day.

First of all, if you are in the area you need to check out Charley's. Brian has worked it up into a nice little boutique shop with stuff like Bogner, Two Rock, Dr Z, SMF, Tom Anderson, Tone King, VHT, THD, Kendrick, etc. He has a whole shop full of cool pieces in there now, inlcuding my Tone King Meteor and V-Stack Classic on consignment.

Amps I heard:

Aiken Sabre
Aiken Invader 18 watt combo
Bogner Shiva 6L6 Combo w/ reverb
Bogner Uberschall
Two Rock Onyx
Dr Z Z28 1x12 combo

Through:

Aiken Open back w/ Greenback (Invader)
Fender 4x12 w/ Vintage 30's
Swanson cabs w/(I forget the speakers)

Guitars:
Honestly I forgot what all
My Tyler Landau Classic
A couple of Tom Andersons
A Les Paul

Board Members:
Jarrett
Brian H
Dbeeman
Gkelm

All of these are killer amps. Tough to pick between them.

Dr Z Z28 1x12 combo - Neat little amp. Not quite on par with the others, imo. But a nice little round Fendery thing.

Uberschall - remains the undisputed king of bone crushing punishment. At least from all the amps I've heard. The Sabre actually sounded small compared to it.

Two Rock Onyx - First time I've heard one. Reminds me of the Custom Reverb that I played once. Nice Two Cleans. Probably the best Blackface type cleans of the day. Dumbly lead channel, not really my cup of tea. Cool amp though.

Bogner Shiva 6L6 Combo w/ reverb - my de facto go to amp. Every new amp I think that's cool has to line up against the Shiva to see the real deal. Nice Blackface cleans with deep reverb. Silky smooth OD. One of the best channel switchers ever.

Aiken Invader 18 watt combo - My new fave amp. It has some sweetness I just can't get over. The cleans on this amp, while not Blackface, are now my fave cleans of any amp. Big, fat, chimey, chewy, organic, all the BS terms apply. Something very cool in there. And the OD, while not as tight as the Shiva or Sabre, holds up pretty well. I A/B'ed this amp directly with the Shiva and preferred it. But either amp is a winner, imo.

Aiken Sabre - This is a tough one to call. It's a bit of a tie with it and the Shiva for me. The Aiken has more gain, but the Shiva has more volume. Sabre has nice Blackface tone, but no reverb. Sabre has nice OD with the boost and does a decent lower gain Marshall tone as well. Very versitile amp, but I like the Invader better. I am returning my Sabre tomorrow.

Thanks again everyone. That was a lot of fun and very entertaining afternoon.

 

[Brian H]

Thanks to you guys for coming over to the shop! Minus the crabby old broads in the back (Frank and Ken) we all enjoyed the mini amp shootout. It was great to finally hear these amps side by side and do a little comparing.

Now for my observations and opinions, and please…these are just my personal tastes I’m airing, I do not wish to hurt feelings or pass dispersions on anyone or anything (so keep your flame thrower down for now).
The Aiken Invader was very cool, and did quite a lot for an 18 watter. Very nice reverb, GREAT cleans, but the overdrive tone was not for me. Conclusion; I don’t like 18 watters.
Aiken Sabre; I was totally disappointed. This is supposed to be the Shiva/Ecstasy killer, and it is not. Nice cleans, but that’s it.
Uber…..well it an Uber, and it lays waste to all that stands…..you know the routine.
Great overdrive, not my style of amp PERIOD! Very shreddy, if such a word exists.
The Shiva stood very tall in my opinion, and it always does. Great clean, great dirty and loads of headroom. Great amp, and my favorite from this crowd (for today at least)
I do not wish to include any Two Rocks in my assessment of this particular amp showdown. Two Rock make some of the best amps in the world, and we were only dueling Aiken vs. Bogner vs. whatever for today. Two Rock does something completely different than these guys do, for some that’s good and for others that’s bad.

Next week: Dueling Roccaforte’s. Stay Tuned.

And thanks again guys for coming out.

 

[dbeeman]

I was suprised by the Invader vs. the Bogner vs. the Sabre

The Invader continues to amaze me with the cleans, and it ability to go from slight break up cleans to Glassy crunch with just the pick and maybe a bit of guitar vol knob.

The Sabre had a real nice blackface clean - different than the invader. The distortion side was quite different from the Invader too. I had hoped I could dial in the Invader's crunch, and then go on up. It certainly has more gain on tap, but I couldn't get it to sound like an Invader. I don't know much about hi gain amps, so I will leave the high gain sound eval to someone else.

What surprised was comparing the Shiva to the Invader. The SHiva sounded good clean, but the Invader seemed to have more "life' to it. On overdrive, there was no way I could hear the SHiva as the glassy crunch mode of the Invader. However, the Shiva has its own nice and very adjustable overdrive.



ANy of you guys around Dallas area should go by Brian's shop. Real nice setup, lots of good gear that you can actually PLAY ON for an extended period without the 12 year old next to you drowning you out.

 

[martie6621]

Brian, sorry I couldn't make it over after the tone-test at Randy's. We had fun in Marshall land with a (not too surprising) strong challenge to the 7Os metal face Marshall tone-ster from....... Randy's Top Hat Emplex. Why the 'Hats do not get respect from the boo-teek guys is curious to me. These amps deliver the goods dewd! I need to get one! Disappointed about the Aiken scorecard from you guys. Advance billing was it was the New Shitz. Looks like another challenger was put down by the Mighty Shiva. Shut up!

 

[riffmeister]

Originally posted by martie6621
......We had fun in Marshall land with a (not too surprising) strong challenge to the 7Os metal face Marshall tone-ster from....... Randy's Top Hat Emplex. Why the 'Hats do not get respect from the boo-teek guys is curious to me. These amps deliver the goods dewd!.......

Shhhhhhhh........it can be our little secret (I've got three at the moment)........

 

[Jarrett]

Andy, if you like the Emplexador, you may really dig the Sabre. As you probably know, I've owned two Emplexadors in the past and really dug the Vintage channel. To me, the Sabre is like the Emplexador with a better Modern channel AND with a good clean channel. All footswitchable.

We should have combined these efforts and lined the Top Hat, Roccaforte, and Marshalls up against the Bogners and Aikens yesterday.

 

[Jarrett]

Originally posted by dbeeman
What surprised me was comparing the Shiva to the Invader. The Shiva sounded good clean, but the Invader seemed to have more "life' to it. On overdrive, there was no way I could hear the SHiva as the glassy crunch mode of the Invader. However, the Shiva has its own nice and very adjustable overdrive.

This was the best part of the day for me. On a few occasions when I get an amp that I think is killer and line it up against a Shiva, it gets eaten alive. But yesterday, I really preferred the Invader to the Shiva.

In the clean department, it was decidedly better I think. The cleans on the Invader are quite surprising. But, I figured when we switched to the OD settings, that the Invader wouldn't be able to hold it's own. It did, but in a different way. It showed the Shiva as a kind of buzzy, flat sounding distortion. Very smooth sounding though.

The Invader was lower gained, but really alive and musical sounding. I was really happy that I prefered the Invader in both departments, because I walked in there thinking I would not. Another thing I REALLY like about the Invader over the Shiva is the weight. The Invader feels like it's 20lbs lighter than the Shiva combo. I had forgotten exactly how heavy the Shiva was until I lugged it into the demo room. On the otherhand, I had no problem carrying the Invader to the truck and back.

What I should have done is brought the Tim and Burn Unit pedals so that y'all could hear how rocking the Invader can become with the right setup. Now I am wondering if I need to check out the Intruder or Tomcat

 

[martie6621]

Jarrett, agree -we should combine for another tone fest. I would like to hear the Aikens along with the Hat Emplex and the Marshalls. We can line 'em up. Should be some good competition for the Bronze. Gold and Silver (Shiva and 2R) are off limits due to the home field advantage at the HH and Royal Lane venue



BH - What say you?

Andy