Aiken Sabre Clip

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.

 

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.

 

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.

 

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.

 

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.

 

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.

 

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