Finally A Good Blues Rig!

I've been playing through a series of different solid state amps for some time now. I've learned how to get the best tone from them, but at the end of the day, they are not a vintage tube amp, and they don't have the tone that I really wanted.

Searching Craigslist and Ebay and other sources had yielded a number of different good amps to buy in the 5 watt range ( Champ 500, VHT Special 6, etc) but every time I'd call on one, it was gone. What I really wanted was a Kalamazoo amp like Greg Heumann sells.

A couple days ago however, a Craigslist add popped up for a Gibson Skylark GA-5T. Looking it over in the add, it sure looked like a Kalamazoo. Some Googling yielded that it was made in the Kalamazoo factory. I don't yet know however if it is exactly the same circuit. More Googling to be done on that.

So I headed out to the shop and they had the amp. It was/is in awesome condition. I played it and several other 5 watt amps and this one beat the others hands down in the tone area. Price wise, I think they had it underpriced by about half- that did not bother me a bit. I walked out the door with the amp and its in my woodshed now for some playing. I'm still learning how to get the most out of it, but its got tone for days!

 

Opening up the amp, I can tell first that the covers have never been off, and that its never been worked on. This amp is perfect, just like it left the factory.