Sample played using a Nik Huber Krautster II, bridge pickup; into a 4x12 cab emulation with Celestion Greenbacks via Universal Audio OX Box.
0:00 – Rhythm channel: bright switch, from off, to low-bright, to high-bright.
0:21 – BE Channel
0:28 – HBE Channel
0:50 – Gain Structure Switch: switched to low, back to BE channel
0:56 – …to medium
1:03 – …to high
1:08 – Fat switch “on”
1:23 – Back to HBE channel
1:49 – SAT switch engages
2:00 – HBE Master Volume adjusted upwards to compensate
RatingsPros:Outstanding build quality. Ridiculously good rock and clean tones, with superb versatility. Cons: Some players might enjoy a master volume on the clean channel, and I’d like to see external bias points for easy EL34 swaps—although both exclusions are conscious and valid design choices. Street: $3,495 Friedman BE-50 Deluxe friedmanamplification.com
| Tones:  Ease of Use:  Build/Design: Value:  |
Rock aficionados have heaped boatloads of acclaim upon Dave Friedman’s BE preamp topology—praised for years as one of the most delectable “modified-Marshall-style” lead channels around. This Marshall model 2203-derived circuit has been reconfigured into several Friedman models over the years, but it has typically appeared in beastly 100-watt iterations like the BE-100. The BE-50 Deluxe changes all that by packaging three distinct channels into a versatile 50-watt head that Friedman calls “my most flexible design yet.”
Knobs a Poppin’
It’s true: There are a lot of knobs on this thing. But approach the 3-channel design one step at a time, and it makes sense pretty quickly. There are two independent EQ stages: one for the clean channel, and one shared by the two lead channels. Each has bass, middle and treble controls. While the clean channel has a single volume control, the two lead channels—the standard BE channel and high-gain HBE—each have dedicated gain and master controls. All share a trio of output-stage controls labeled presence, response (negative-feedback-loop level), and thump (a resonance or deep control). The two-button footswitch (included) allows selection between the clean and lead blocks and the lead channel’s two gain levels (HBE is labeled “boost” on the footswitch).
The clean channel’s preamp is lifted from Friedman’s Buxom Betty, a non-master-volume amp that delivers bold, sparkling, American-meets-British clean tones that get a little crunchy when you push it hard. True to form, there’s no master volume on the BE-50’s clean channel, either, though it does have a 3-way bright switch to tailor the sparkle. A full-/half-power switch on the back panel means the two EL34 tubes can be run in pentode/full-power mode or in triode mode for a more club-friendly 25 watts. Four 12AX7s drive the preamp and phase-inverter.
The back panel is also home to the dual speaker outputs and a rotary selector for 4, 8, or 16 ohms. There’s send and return jacks with a return level control and bypass switch for the buffered effects loop, a TRS input for the two-button footswitch, a saturation (SAT) switch, and a 3-way gain structure switch. The last of these is a feature many players enjoy on Friedman’s Mini Dirty Shirley, allowing three base gain levels on the BE and HBE settings (think ’80s, vintage, modern), while the SAT switch noticeably increases harmonic saturation in those two channels when engaged. (It also drops the output level slightly—a factor that’s inherent to the design.) There’s also a “fat” switch on the front that adds even more lower-mid girth to the two lead channels, as desired.
Inside you see the handwired goodness we’ve come to expect from Friedman. As the knob count suggests, there’s a lot going on under the hood. But the layout is elegantly arrayed on a long, rugged turret board that bristles with high-quality components: U.S.-made Synergy “Royal Mustard” signal capacitors, ARS electrolytic caps, a mix of carbon-comp and carbon-film resistors, and other esoteric bits. On the other side of the box reside three U.S.-made Heyboer transformers. The only things missing from my perspective are external bias check and adjustment points to make output tube swaps a little easier—something many makers offer on amps around this price. The good news is that the BE-50 Deluxe still weighs a very manageable 30 1/2 pounds.
Beautiful Music
I tested the Freidman with a Gibson 1958 Les Paul reissue, a Novo Serus J with P-90s, and a ’94 PRS CE 22, through both a Port City 2x12 cab with Eminence CV-75 speakers and a Universal Audio OX Box for recording direct to Pro Tools. It floored me at every turn. This amp is insanely flexible. It sounds good with every stomp of the channel-selector switch, knob twist, or flick of a voicing switch. And if you can’t find the tone you need for classic rock, alt, grunge, blues-rock, or vintage metal sounds, you probably aren’t really looking—or listening. What’s more, the two lead modes are just as good at low-gain tones as scorching high-gain sounds.
The tone permutations offered by the feature set are almost exhausting to contemplate. Let’s just say there are a ridiculous number of voices available here. The presence control is focused and exponentially widens the tone possibilities. Response takes core tones from refined to raw. Thump does exactly what the name implies to low-end output. You might end up asking, “How did I ever live without these features?” And that’s before you discover that the EQ controls have significantly more range than most Marshall-inspired T/M/B stages. Some players are likely to critique the BE-50 Deluxe as too busy. To them, I suggest spending a little time finding your favorite sounds, set them, and forget them.
The clean channel sounds great and is extremely clean. With no master volume, it only breaks up when the volume is pushed way past 2 or 3 o’clock. But it’s simultaneously bold, thick and articulate throughout that range. It makes an outstanding pedal platform, and was utterly delectable with overdrive pedals.
The half-power setting is a little softer and browner in its response, as most triode modes are, but it’s much less so than on most other amps I’ve tried. And I rarely felt that the tone suffered. Full power is stouter, crisper, and a little more immediate. But if you need to dial down the decibels to keep a sound guy happy in a smaller club, you’ll still be smiling, believe me.
The Verdict
The BE-50 Deluxe is an impressive addition to the Friedman lineup. It might even live up to Dave’s claim that it’s “the best amp I’ve ever made,” which is really saying something. Frankly, my first spin with this amp left me a little dizzy with the options, and the discovery of a great sound around every corner. Once I recovered and discovered a few favorite go-to settings, I was convinced this is an amp to be reckoned with, and one you have to try out if the budget and the format fit your needs.
Watch the Review Demo:
- Friedman Amplification BE-100 Deluxe | Monsters of High Gain - Premier Guitar ›
- George Pajon—From the Black Eyed Peas to Cairo Knife Fight - Premier Guitar ›
- Friedman Small Box Overdrive Review - Premier Guitar ›
- Sammy Boller Guitar Gear Rundown [2024] ›
- Friedman IR-X Dual Tube Preamp and DI Demo with Sammy Boller & Dave Friedman - Premier Guitar ›
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For the first time in the band’s history, the Dawes lineup for Oh Brother consisted of just Griffin and Taylor Goldsmith (left and right).
Goldsmith’s lyrics spoke to me the loudest, with lines like “Well, you can judge the whole world on the sparkle that you think it lacks / Yes, you can stare into the abyss, but it’s starin’ right back” (a casual Nietzsche paraphrase); and “Oh, the snowfall this time of year / It’s not what Birmingham is used to / I get the feeling that I brought it here / And now I’m taking it away.” The way his words painted a portrait of the sincere, sentimental man behind them, along with his cozy, unassuming guitar work and the band’s four-part harmonies, had me hooked.
Nothing Is Wrong and Stories Don’t End came next, and I happily gobbled up more folksy fodder in tracks like “If I Wanted,” “Most People,” and “From a Window Seat.” But 2015’s All Your Favorite Bands, which debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Folk Albumschart, didn’t land with me, and by the time 2016’s We’re All Gonna Die was released, it was clear that Goldsmith had shifted thematically in his writing. A friend drew a thoughtful Warren Zevon comparison to the single, “When the Tequila Runs Out”—a commentary on vapid, conceited, American-socialite party culture—but it still didn’t really do it for me. I fell off the Dawes train a bit, and became somewhat oblivious to their three full-lengths that followed.
Oh Brotheris Goldsmith’s latest addition to the Dawes songbook, and I’m grateful to say that it’s brought me back. After having done some catching up, I’d posit that it’s the second work in the third act, or fall season, of his songwriting—where 2022’s Misadventures of Doomscrollercracked open the door, Oh Brother swings it wide. And it doesn’t have much more than Dawes’ meat and potatoes, per se, in common with acts one or two. Some moodiness has stayed—as well as societal disgruntlement and the arrangement elements that first had me intoxicated. But then there’s the 7/4 section in the middle of “Front Row Seat”; the gently unwinding, quiet, intimate jazz-club feel of “Surprise!”; the experimentally percussive, soft-spoken “Enough Already”; and the unexpected, dare I say, Danny Elfman-esque harmonic twists and turns in the closing track, “Hilarity Ensues.”
The main engine behind Dawes, the Goldsmith brothers are both native “Angelinos,” having been born and raised in the L.A. area. Taylor is still proud to call the city his home.
Photo by Jon Chu
“I have this working hypothesis that who you are as a songwriter through the years is pretty close to who you are in a dinner conversation,” Goldsmith tells me in an interview, as I ask him about that thematic shift. “When I was 23, if I was invited to dinner with grownups [laughs], or just friends or whatever, and they say, ‘How you doin’, Taylor?’ I probably wouldn’t think twice to be like, ‘I’m not that good. There’s this girl, and … I don’t know where things are at—can I share this with you? Is that okay?’ I would just go in in a way that’s fairly indiscreet! And I’m grateful to that version of me, especially as a writer, because that’s what I wanted to hear, so that’s what I was making at the time.
“But then as I got older, it became, ‘Oh, maybe that’s not an appropriate way to answer the question of how I’m doing.’ Or, ‘Maybe I’ve spent enough years thinking about me! What does it feel like to turn the lens around?’” he continues, naming Elvis Costello and Paul Simon as inspirations along the way through that self-evolution. “Also, trying to be mindful of—I had strengths then that I don’t have now, but I have strengths now that I didn’t have then. And now it’s time to celebrate those. Even in just a physical way, like hearing Frank Zappa talking about how his agility as a guitar player was waning as he got older. It’s like, that just means that you showcase different aspects of your skills.
“I am a changing person. It would be weird if I was still writing the same way I was when I was 23. There would probably be some weird implications there as to who I’d be becoming as a human [laughs].”
Taylor Goldsmith considers Oh Brother, the ninth full-length in Dawes’ catalog, to be the beginning of a new phase of Dawes, containing some of his most unfiltered, unedited songwriting.
Since its inception, the engine behind Dawes has been the brothers Goldsmith, with Taylor on guitar and vocals and Griffin on drums and sometimes vocal harmonies. But they’ve always had consistent backup. For the first several years, that was Wylie Gelber on bass and Tay Strathairn on keyboards. On We’re All Gonna Die, Lee Pardini replaced Strathairn and has been with the band since. Oh Brother, however, marks the departure of Gelber and Pardini.
“We were like, ‘Wow, this is an intense time; this is a vulnerable time,’” remarks Goldsmith, who says that their parting was supportive and loving, but still rocked him and Griffin. “You get a glimpse of your vulnerability in a way that you haven’t felt in a long time when things are just up and running. For a second there, we’re like, ‘We’re getting a little rattled—how do we survive this?’”
They decided to pair up with producer Mike Viola, a close family friend, who has also worked with Mandy Moore—Taylor’s spouse—along with Panic! At the Disco, Andrew Bird, and Jenny Lewis. “[We knew that] he understands all of the parameters of that raw state. And, you know, I always show Mike my songs, so he was aware of what we had cookin’,” says Goldsmith.
Griffin stayed behind the kit, but Taylor took over on bass and keys, the latter of which he has more experience with than he’s displayed on past releases. “We’ve made records where it’s very tempting to appeal to your strengths, where it’s like, ‘Oh, I know how to do this, I’m just gonna nail it,’” he says. “Then there’s records that we make where we really push ourselves into territories where we aren’t comfortable. That contributed to [Misadventures of Doomscroller] feeling like a living, breathing thing—very reactive, very urgent, very aware. We were paying very close attention. And I would say the same goes for this.”
That new terrain, says Goldsmith, “forced us to react to each other and react to the music in new ways, and all of a sudden, we’re exploring new corners of what we do. I’m really excited in that sense, because it’s like this is the first album of a new phase.”
“That forced us to react to each other and react to the music in new ways, and all of a sudden, we’re exploring new corners of what we do.”
In proper folk (or even folk-rock) tradition, the music of Dawes isn’t exactly riddled with guitar solos, but that’s not to say that Goldsmith doesn’t show off his chops when the timing is right. Just listen to the languid, fluent lick on “Surprise!”, the shamelessly prog-inspired riff in the bridge of “Front Row Seat,” and the tactful, articulate line that threads through “Enough Already.” Goldsmith has a strong, individual sense of phrasing, where his improvised melodies can be just as biting as his catalog’s occasional lyrical jabs at presumably toxic ex-girlfriends, and just as melancholy as his self-reflective metaphors, all the while without drawing too much attention to himself over the song.
Of course, most of our conversation revolves around songwriting, as that’s the craft that’s the truest and closest to his identity. “There’s an openness, a goofiness—I even struggle to say it now, but—an earnestness that goes along with who I am, not only as a writer but as a person,” Goldsmith elaborates. “And I think it’s important that those two things reflect one another. ’Cause when you meet someone and they don’t, I get a little bit weirded out, like, ‘What have I been listening to? Are you lying to me?’” he says with a smile.
Taylor Goldsmith's Gear
Pictured here performing live in 2014, Taylor Goldsmith has been the primary songwriter for all of Dawes' records, beginning with 2009’s North Hills.
Photo by Tim Bugbee/Tinnitus Photography
Guitars
- Fender Telecaster
- Gibson ES-345
- Radocaster (made by Wylie Gelber)
Amps
- ’64 Fender Deluxe
- Matchless Laurel Canyon
Effects
- 29 Pedals EUNA
- Jackson Audio Bloom
- Ibanez Tube Screamer with Keeley mod
- Vintage Boss Chorus
- Vintage Boss VB-2 Vibrato
- Strymon Flint
- Strymon El Capistan
Strings
- Ernie Ball .010s
In Goldsmith’s songwriting process, he explains that he’s learned to lean away from the inclination towards perfectionism. Paraphrasing something he heard Father John Misty share about Leonard Cohen, he says, “People think you’re cultivating these songs, or, ‘I wouldn’t deign to write something that’s beneath me,’ but the reality is, ‘I’m a rat, and I’ll take whatever I can possibly get, and then I’ll just try to get the best of it.’
“Ever since Misadventures of Doomscroller,” he adds, “I’ve enjoyed this quality of, rather than try to be a minimalist, I want to be a maximalist. I want to see how much a song can handle.” For the songs on Oh Brother, that meant that he decided to continue adding “more observations within the universe” of “Surprise!”, ultimately writing six verses. A similar approach to “King of the Never-Wills,” a ballad about a character suffering from alcoholism, resulted in four verses.
“The economy of songwriting that we’re all taught would buck that,” says Goldsmith. “It would insist that I only keep the very best and shed something that isn’t as good. But I’m not going to think economically. I’m not going to think, ‘Is this self-indulgent?’
Goldsmith’s songwriting has shifted thematically over the years, from more personal, introspective expression to more social commentary and, at times, even satire, in songs like We’re All Gonna Die’s “When the Tequila Runs Out.”
Photo by Mike White
“I don’t abide that term being applied to music. Because if there’s a concern about self-indulgence, then you’d have to dismiss all of jazz. All of it. You’d have to dismiss so many of my most favorite songs. Because in a weird way, I feel like that’s the whole point—self-indulgence. And then obviously relating to someone else, to another human being.” (He elaborates that, if Bob Dylan had trimmed back any of the verses on “Desolation Row,” it would have deprived him of the unique experience it creates for him when he listens to it.)
One of the joys of speaking with Goldsmith is just listening to his thought processes. When I ask him a question, he seems compelled to share every backstory to every detail that’s going through his head, in an effort to both do his insights justice and to generously provide me with the most complete answer. That makes him a bit verbose, but not in a bad way, because he never rambles. There is an endpoint to his thoughts. When he’s done, however, it takes me a second to realize that it’s then my turn to speak.
To his point on artistic self-indulgence, I offer that there’s no need for artists to feel “icky” about self-promotion—that to promote your art is to celebrate it, and to create a shared experience with your audience.
“I hear what you’re saying loud and clear; I couldn’t agree more,” Goldsmith replies. “But I also try to be mindful of this when I’m writing, like if I’m going to drag you through the mud of, ‘She left today, she’s not coming back, I’m a piece of shit, what’s wrong with me, the end’.... That might be relatable, that might evoke a response, but I don’t know if that’s necessarily helpful … other than dragging someone else through the shit with me.
“In a weird way, I feel like that’s the whole point—self-indulgence. And then obviously relating to someone else, to another human being.”
“So, if I’m going to share, I want there to be something to offer, something that feels like: ‘Here’s a path that’s helped me through this, or here’s an observation that has changed how I see this particular experience.’ It’s so hard to delineate between the two, but I feel like there is a difference.”
Naming the opening track “Mister Los Angeles,” “King of the Never-Wills,” and even the title track to his 2015 chart-topper, “All Your Favorite Bands,” he remarks, “I wouldn’t call these songs ‘cool.’ Like, when I hear what cool music is, I wouldn’t put those songs next to them [laughs]. But maybe this record was my strongest dose of just letting me be me, and recognizing what that essence is rather than trying to force out certain aspects of who I am, and force in certain aspects of what I’m not. I think a big part of writing these songs was just self-acceptance,” he concludes, laughing, “and just a whole lot of fishing.”
YouTube It
Led by Goldsmith, Dawes infuses more rock power into their folk sound live at the Los Angeles Ace Hotel in 2023.
