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Amps

Drives a cab, drives an amp, sounds awesome!

A beautifully handwired mini amp that injects juicy tube tones into an amp or cabinet with a surprisingly broad range of uses. High quality.

Cleaner mode I setting can feel flat without an overdrive pedal.

$999

Silktone Micronaut
silktone.org

4
5
4.5
4

Already acclaimed for tube combo amps and their eponymous fuzz pedal, Sacramento-based Silktone recently released the clever Micronaut, a cuddly micro-amp with many more performance possibilities and range than its size or simplicity suggests. Despite the blocky dimensions and funky radio-age looks, the 9" x 7.5" x 6", 6 1/2-pound box houses a genuine tube amp, with tubes in both preamp and output slots. A single 12AX7 drives the former, while a single EL84 in the latter delivers approximately 4 watts of power. Coolest of all, perhaps, is you can use the Micronaut as an amp head, as a DI to your DAW or PA, or as a preamp to drive an amplifier.

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Tuttle and Strings first recorded together on Strings’ 2017 release, Turmoil & Tinfoil.

Photo by Alysse Gafkjen

Looking back on their latest releases, the two bluegrass phenoms and friends sit down with one another to talk musical heritage, stage fright, gear, and more.

In any music scene, it’s natural that talented contemporaries will find each other and form fast, harmonious fraternity. It’s no surprise, then, that Nashville-based bluegrass virtuosos Billy Strings and Molly Tuttle became close friends and collaborators as early as 2017—when they were both just 24—and, as is now somewhat common knowledge, were one-time roommates. Tuttle was first featured on Strings’ full-length release, Turmoil & Tinfoil, and a few years later, Strings guested on Tuttle’s Grammy-winning 2022 album, Crooked Tree, on the track “Dooley’s Farm,” while performing together often in the interim.

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A major redesign of a Bad Cat flagship yields a familiar but more flexible range of Brit tonalities.

A well-conceived reboot of a beloved amp. Great clean and lead tones. Tasty tremolo and reverb.

Shared EQ settings sometimes require compromises.

$2,099

Bad Cat Black Cat
badcatamps.com

4.5
5
4
4.5

Bad Cat has won over a lot of players in the time since the California maker built its first high-quality, hand-wired amplifiers in 1999. Then, the company was an unapologetic follower of the Matchless template (which itself borrowed more than a little from Vox). And in fact, the two companies have a lot in common. Bad Cat hired Matchless co-founder Mark Sampson to design Bad Cats at a time when Matchless was on hiatus, and Bad Cat amps from the period were even built with Matchless-branded signal capacitors in their circuits.

If Bad Cat were a bit derivative at first, they consistently evolved, regularly adding features and altogether new designs. The new lineup is totally revamped, however. And while they use old model names like the Cub, Lynx, Hot Cat, and Black Cat model names, each amp has new features and is built around circuit-board construction. Thankfully, the new Black Cat’s many British-flavored sounds are good enough that you probably won’t think too much about details like point-to-point versus circuit-board manufacturing.

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Compact size and convenience do little to diminish the potency of this Boogie, which also delivers a few Vox-y surprises.

A fun new twist on the legendary Rectifier template that offers impressive clean and lead tones— all in a size that fits into the front seat of your Mini Cooper.

I found the crunch voicing a bit congested at some control settings, and at lower volumes in particular.

$1,849

Mesa/Boogie Badlander 25 Combo
mesaboogie.com

4.5
5
4.5
4.5

Mesa/Boogie made its name with the Mark Series amps, which made classic rock players of many stripes stand up and take notice. But the company’s next comprehensive range, the Rectifier Series amps, became favorites for a very different set of players. With big, powerful heads coupled with stacks pumping efficient 4x12" and 2x12" speaker arrays, the Single, Dual, and Triple Rectifier models appealed to a host of big-stage rock, grunge and metal players, and the sizzling high-gain and thumping lows became a second, defining sonic template for the company.

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The guitar universe gathered momentum in a big way in 2022—which is easy to see in this year’s wildly diverse parade of Premier Gear Award winners.

Here's a look at 2022’s most notable new guitars, amps, effects, and accessories, reviewed by our editors and writers:

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