THD UniValve
Wednesday, August 31st, 2011Established in 1987 by Andrew Marshall (no, not part of the original legendary Marshall establishement), THD or “Total Harmonic Distortion” is a Seattle based manufacturer of an impressive range of tube amps and accessories.
As for credibility, in this industry, it simply comes down to who is using your rigs, and to name a couple of THD’s, you are looking at the biggest names in the guitar game!
Eric Clapton, Peter Buck, Bob Dylan and John Fogerty all have used THD amps…impressive! That’s not all though….you can add Prince, George Thorogood, Eddie Van Halen and Jimmy Page to that list…..so cop that!!!
This is a Class A Single ended amplifier head that has a single output tube that has the ability to be switched at anytime with almost any octal-based tube to achieve different tones without having to re-biase the amp in any way.
Well to start off, let’s talk about what Class A means….
This is basically when the tubes in the amplifier are run at full capacity, all the time. Most tube amps alternate between sets of tubes, splitting the wave load. So why would you actually want this? Well the benefits are many, but here are just a few:
The tones that the THD UniValve delivers are of a wide variety. Everything from smooth and crisp to a heavy overdrive with nuts the size of a gorilla! The built in Hot Plate Attenuator allows full output distortion at pretty much any volume. The THD UniValve has its own built in dummy load so you are safe when it is not plugged into a box, very handy for recording direct through a line connection.
The THD UniValve is not an amp for those with a weak heart, but it is not only for the nutsy as well. The variety of deliverable tones and textures is really quite unique and a testament to the Seattle based Andrew Marshall and his team.
Many players including Clapton, Dylan and Fogerty have cranked these baby’s up over the years, so as a litmus test, I reckon that pretty much says it all.
The verdict – diversity and quality are the two main focuses of the THD UniValve for me, I love it! for more reviews, go to Amp Critic.