Morgan Amplification

Volume and cut controls Bright switch Hand selected hand made Coupling Capacitors Mercury Magnetics transformers Cathode Bias 2 12AX7 2 EL84 GZ34 rectified Dimensions - Head - 17w 9.75h 7.5d UTILIZATION First my setup. I run a Fender Starcaster (the old kind) through a small pedalboard into the AC20 and then into a CAE 2x12. Keep in mind this is my actual touring setup for a pop rock band. (think U2 meets the killers) The AC20 is plenty loud for the venues we play, which are small clubs that hold maybe 400-500. This is essentially an AC30 design with a couple of tiny capacitor mods. You might say, 'what's so special about this?' Well these days it is hard to find a really well made AC30 style amp, believe it or not. Most people are trying to make their own thing, but the AC20 from Morgan is basically true to the original Vox tone with a different wattage of course. These are quality amps and look great too. I'm a big fan of Morgan's attention to build. This is a no frills amp if you haven't figured that out. Basically you are supposed to crank the volume and adjust the cut to taste. Easy enough? SOUNDS I usually run my volume a little past noon to where it's at light breakup. If I need clean sounds, I just ease up on the guitar volume. All you really need to make this amp sing is a good overdrive and maybe a delay of some sort. I am kind of a delay freak, so that's my recipe for this amp. The AC20 is tone wise, basically an AC30. It will do the U2 tone. It will do the Hillsong tone. What more do you want? My best advice is buy a fulltone OCD for it. That pedal along with a crowther hotcake really love the ac20. OVERALL OPINION It's not particularly cheap for an amp of this wattage or feature set. Seriously, you get two knobs. That's all guys. That's all I need. You should make sure that's all you need too. If you are in a top 40 band this might not be your guy. If you need the ac30 tone in spades...well this is the one. Highly recommended. Morgan stands by their stuff too. You will hear nothing but good things about this company.

- One knob - Light up M - Does not work with a battery - Only 42 made - Numbered UTILIZATION There's one knob. It's not even labeled, other than "Less" and "More". You turn it up until you get the amount of reverb you'd like. It would be nice to have more control over the effect, but it sounds good. There are plenty of other options out there if you want a vast array of verb sounds. The M lights up, which is really cool. Be warned, the pedal only runs off an AC adapter. SOUND QUALITY This does a replication of spring reverb. It does it very well. If you want to do other things, you'll probably be disappointed. My only issue with the pedal were that the knob goes from no reverb to too much reverb (at least for my tastes). It also gets a little nasty and over saturated sounding as you get to around and past noon. I assume that is by design. It really does sound like a spring reverb and it sounds very nice doing it. OVERALL OPINION A few of my amps do not have reverb and I was looking to add a little depth to the sound. I had heard it described as subtle, which was up my alley. Unfortunately, I didn't find it subtle enough for my tastes. I always wanted it to be a little less there, if you know what I mean. I will be the first to admit, I am not the biggest fan of reverb. That being stated, you can also assume that I am also not a connoisseur of fine reverbs. I mean, if an amp has reverb I use it sparingly if at all. But I do know what they sound like and are supposed to sound like and what good reverb sounds like. This sounds good if not great. Unfortunately, Morgan made these pedals as a very limited run which sold out a long while ago. The good news is that it appears that Morgan has licensed the designs to Rockett Pedals, so keep and eye out for the reissues.

- 40 watts - Four EL84 power tubes - Three 12AX7 preamp tubes - Defeatable EF86 preamp tube - GZ34 rectifier tube - High/Low power switch - Two channels - Mercury Magnetics transformers - Point to point wired UTILIZATION This is a EF86 based Vox inspired amp, but with a few twists. You have two different channels, one with a bass, midrange, and treble EQ with a bright switch on the volume and the other is the EF86 channel, that just has a relies on a global Cut knob for it's equalization. The global Cut knob and the lack of EQ's on the second channel can make things a little difficult. The EF86 tube is actually able to be switched on and off. This is especially helpful since as most Vox styled amp fans know, those tubes, as great as they sound, will go nastily microphonic on you the first chance they get. Nothing can ruin a gig like an unusable amp. It's also nice to be able to have the two different sounds available. Did I mention the M on the front lights up? SOUNDS The sound of the amp is greatly affected by the type of guitar being used. A single coil guitar sounds glorious through either channel whereas I really had to fight with the amp to get a good sound out of it with a humbucker guitar. The second channel (the EF86 channel) sounded jawdroppingly good with a Telecaster and practically unusable with Les Paul Custom. I found that the humbuckers just pushed the front end too hard. The amp is a bit particular when it comes to overdrive pedals, too (which would make sense considering the humbucker issue). A Tele into a Fulltone Fatboost into the second channel sounds to die for, though. OVERALL OPINION I was looking for an amp that had the sparkling tone of a Vox AC30 and that something else of a Matchless. I've always loved Voxs but I don't care for how they compress and mush out when being pushed. I always loved Matchless amps, but I never liked how they didn't compress when being pushed. I was hoping the Morgan Dual 40 would be a nice compromise, and in many ways it is a great choice. For me, however, playing a Les Paul Custom nearly all of the time, I had to continue my search for the tone in my head. As nice as the tone was with the Telecaster, I wasn't willing to make the leap to single coil guitars exclusively. If you do play single coils exclusively and are looking for something like a Vox but better and like a Matchless but lighter, cheaper, and a little different, Morgan amps are a fantastic choice.