Any gear geek attending a Wilco show recently has probably noticed guitar
wizard Nels Cline playing through a mysterious
red amp head. Cline’s amp is a prototype
handbuilt by gear guru Tim Schroeder,
who also tackles the formidable task of
maintaining Wilco’s enviably overflowing
stable of gear. (Full disclosure: Schroeder
also writes a regular Tech Tips column
at premierguitar.com.) Not long ago,
Schroeder visited the band in their rehearsal
loft to look over their road gear before a
tour. He brought a new amp he’d built
and solicited the band’s opinion. Cline—who’s known to prefer relatively clean,
medium-wattage amps like the Jess Oliver
and Marshall JTM45 he’s used in recent
years—plugged in and was so smitten he
bought the amp on the spot.
Schroeder used Cline’s input to design
and build the DB7—a 6L6-driven, 45-watt,
amp similar to Cline’s original—which is
graced with elegant operational simplicity
and tons of headroom. We checked it out
and, like Cline, were blown away.
Top-Notch Build,
Streamlined Features
The DB7 head is handbuilt from stem to
stern using point-to-point wiring and a
thick-gauge aluminum chassis. The first
gain stage is driven with a 6SC7 tube—a variety that’s not common on modern
amps, but which powered early versions of
the Fender Super and Deluxe. There’s also a
pair of 12AX7s in the preamp section.
The front panel of the DB7 is refreshingly
simple. The single-channel head
sports one 1/4" input and Volume, Treble,
Middle, Bass, and Presence controls. A
footswitchable boost control adds a little
midrange for soloing, and a 3-way bright
switch offers flat, bright, and hyper-bright
modes. (The latter is designed for situations
where a guitar requires extreme high end to
assert itself in a busy mix.) The rear panel is
equally streamlined, housing just a power-cord
jack and 1/4" outs for 4-, 8-, and
16-Ω speakers.