GUITAR BUYER (UK)
A powerful, sympathetic amp, delivering both high volume and a liquid tone
This is simply an extremely well-made and great-sounding amplifier, that can cover a wealth of styles with ease.
It’s expensive, but in this case the sound and performance justifies the price.

​

From Harmony Central.
First off, this amp continues to amaze me, this is the best sounding amplifier I have ever heard!! Have tested it side by side with: Fender Vibro King, an early sixties AC30, a ’67 Fender deluxe, a ’68 Fender Twin, assorted Mesa Boogies, the current fender Hotrod series( not bad amps for use with pedals) and every model of Marshall with a JCM in front. This amp smokes them all, the most transparent, warm, high fidelity sound I have ever heard. The Carr Rambler comes pretty close, but is not as versatile…
Right… This amp has been designed to NOT distort in the preamp stage. The fine folks at Carl Martin wanted to design an amp that would be able to take the high input gain of their “Hot Drive & Boost” pedals. As a result, you get glorious power tube saturation without that “squashed” preamp tube sound.

There are 3 basic sound I use with this amp, and I’ll rate each separately.

1. Clean – set amp to class A, rectifier to valve, bright switch engaged. This tone is just ridiculous – I will never play ANY Fender again – tops are super bright, but never harsh, even at extreme volumes. But it’s only when you plug into any other amp that you realise just how good this is – everything else sounds harsh and hurts in comparison. But it’s the low end that amazes me – rich, full and detailed, but never muddy, though when you crank to master volume it does mellow. This tone deserves a 10, but I’d give it higher if I could. (The reverb is unreal as well, almost as good as the Fender outboard units)

2. Blues. Set amp to class A, rectifier to valve, bright switch off. CRANK MASTER ABOVE 3’o CLOCK!!!! It’s the BEANO album!!! With my PRS custom 22, this setting just sings, cries and wails. You do need an overdrive to push it over the top, but the results are mind blowing. Loud as hell too, but heres the best part…. Roll you guitar’s volume knob back… And the clean to everything in between is so defined!!! Every note remains dynamic, even with massive saturation, the amp never seems to compress your sound, the tone is just so open.
10! 10! 10!

​

From Harmony Central.
I have a few others highend amps, and some good classics too.
This one is defently highend, it is almost like a super JTM45 in some ways.
It has big round bottom, and the mids have a very wide sweep, lots of nice soft highs, very pleasent but still with enough precense, use the bright and it can get you those cut your head off tones that some like for blues and some funky stuff.
I have used for a few jobs now, playing some cover rock stuff, used both the Class A and A/B plus with and without the tube rectifier, both setups worked great.
It fitted very good in the band, one of the jobs required some more focused highgain playing, so I brought along my old Marshall cab with 4 30 watts greenbacks, both as a combo and “head” it worked very well.
With the four 12’s it had a very focused and extremely fat sound, no mud or flabby lows, just that round huge bottomend and very woddy mids, dialed enough highs to make it cut well.
It is a pedal friend for sure, no wonder??
The cleans, well very rich and full, like a cross between an old Marshall and a Fender BF style amp, lots of depth in this amp.
You can set it to alot of useable sounds, it could go from chime to very fat and full, and about everything between.
As a combo it is quite versatile and covers alot of ground, it has pleasent personality and you can play and play and feel good about it.
When used as a head with a closedbackcab, it ads even more dimensions to its useage.
I think that I will order a head, when I have a robbed a bank or two that is.
It is an amp meant for clean sounds, you can get it to drive with the four 12 cab, but that is not what it was designed for, it is a clean base, and it can get you that very nice tube crispy sound with fatness to spare.
CM deserve a spot in the highend of ampdom, this one is an outstanding amp with loads of flexibility for the experinced player, even a newcomer would feel comfortable with this one.
One of my young students loved it from the first sight, had no trouble dialing himself into a prefered sound.
In the Class A mode and with the tuberectifier it is still a loud but mannageable amp, the tone is spongy and very pleasent, lovely sag and caresses your notes with a ring of warmth, and you can set it to play low and still get very nice sounds.
In A/B and with the silicon rectifier it tightends up and gets more bite, but still it can retain the inherited warmth and pleasent soft highs, and works great from low levels to earsplitting levels, it can be a very loud 50 watts amp for sure.
I am so happy that I bought this amp, and the wait was worth it.
My guitars are a Gibson with Morch pickups, one EJ Strat, a Customshop Ashbody Tele, one Kramer Baretta from 84, A Charvel San Dimas strat with one humbucker, Tokai 335 with SD Seth Lovers, and a few others pleasent companions.