Grumpyrocker

Judging by all the chat online the Bugera V22 has become a very hot talking point. That’s no surprise given what it offers for the price - so you’d think there would be plenty of reviews knocking around. Alas the big names - magazines like Guitarist - don’t seem to cover Bugera gear. One expects this is either due to pressure from manufacturers of rival gear or a misguided belief that Bugera clones gear in a way you’d never see from Marshall, PRS, Blackstar et al. It would be sad if either of things are true.

But what of the Bugera V22 itself? At first glance it certainly looks familiar. The styling is clearly influenced - if not downright copied - from Matchless. The control layout and options owe quite a bit to Peavey’s Classic 30. Yet in terms of tone the Bugera V22 is clearly its own beast. As Behringer’s Austrialian sales manager Gary Compson explains, "[The Bugera V22] has a clean channel, a distortion channel, a reverb control and not much else to distract you from getting to the business of making music. It’s not a clone either. It has it’s own sound, which is somewhere between a Fender Deluxe and a Vox AC30 - and that’s a pretty good place to be."

Read more »

Since selling my HT5 and getting a Bugera V22 amp instead there's one thing I've really lacked - a good Marshall-like tone. I love that midrange bark you get from a hot Marshall (or clone) but with no money for a chunk of Northampton's finest, I was at a bit of a loss.

I like the drives on my Line6 M13, you can get a good Duel Rec high gain sound from a couple of them. But nothing in the more British line.

Then a couple of months ago I bought a Marshall Guv'nor 2. Cheap as chips and does a really good impression of Plexi to JCM800 tones. I used it at the hotter end - my V22 will already do a good Plexi impression on the lower gain end of the drive channel.

Read more »

Pod Farm is Line 6's guitar and bass amp/fx modelling software supplied with a variety of its devices. The software is also available as a standalone version if you wish to register it with an iLok dongle. My copy of the original Pod Farm came free with the purchase of a UX1 USB recording interface. Since I bought the UX1 I also added several of the expansion packs - but the basic software came with plenty of amps and fx to play around with.

But onto the new version? Does it bring enough to the table to warrant the upgrade? Certainly my $49 upgrade seemed a complete bargain. But after the jump I'll discuss how the software compares to rivals such as Guitar Rig and Amplitube.

Read more »

I know I said I'd have a Bugera V22 review online last week, but I didn't get round to it. However that's because I needed to replace a power valve I accidentally broke (because I'm a clumsy idiot).

Anyway I have now replaced the power valves in the amp - EL84s in this case - and rebiased the amp. This is something of a right of passage for me as I've never done this before. But with my multimeter in hand it actually took moments and was no harder than changing a lightbulb.

The amp now has Electro Harmonix 12AX7 tubes in V1 and V2. There's a Groove Tubes 5751 in the phase inverter and a pair of matching Electro Harmonix EL84 tubes in the power section.

I've yet to play the amp at any volume (my baby son is asleep ten feet away from the amp) but one thing I've noticed already is the hum the amp always had in triode mode (half power) has now gone. The hum was always said to be a feature of the Bugera V22 in the half power mode - but it seems with the right tubes it'll go away.

Anyway, more testing ahead over the next few days then I promise I will actually finish my review.

My little dirty blues Bugera V22 demo is now available in YouTube video form.

A brief demo of the Bugera V22 guitar amplifier. The mic was a Behringer XM8500 (at the edge of the speaker cone), recorded straight into a Line6 UX1 and onwards to Cubase Essential. Just a quick improvised noodle to demo more rhythmic type work on the dirt channel. Gain is set just under halfway for the two rhythm tracks panned left (bridge pickup) and right (neck pickup). The lead track in the middle has the gain all the way up. No post- recording fiddling was done, the delay on the lead track came via the Line6 M13 which was set up on the amp using the four cable method. So this particular delay ran through the amp's fx loop. Drums by EZDrummer. The guitar a PRS SE Custom Trem. The amp wasn't cranked - this was recorded at neighbour friendly volume.

A few folks have asked for a demo of my amp, so here it is. This was just something I knocked together in ten minutes this morning - first a quick improv over a looped chord progression, then some dirty blues. My apologies in advance for the terrible playing.

I've never actually recorded an amp with a mic before - so it was a learning experience. The mic was a Behringer XM8500 (at the edge of the speaker cone), recorded straight into a Line6 UX1 and onwards to Cubase Essential. The clean demo has no layering, just one track in realtime. The second demo has three unedited tracks played over a drum sequence.

Clean Demo
A short clean demo of the Bugera V22 amp. The guitar is a PRS SE Custom Trem played through a Line6 M13 effects unit. The Line6 unit was only used for the looper facility. The reverb is from the V22 itself.

Dirty Blues
Just a quick improvised noodle to demo more rhythmic type work on the dirt channel. Gain is set just under halfway for the two rhythm tracks panned left (bridge pickup) and right (neck pickup). The lead track in the middle has the gain all the way up. No post- recording fiddling was done, the delay on the lead track came via the Line6 M13 which was set up on the amp using the four cable method. So this particular delay ran through the amp's fx loop. Drums by EZDrummer.

Heavy
Does the Bugera like pedals? Here's a very quick demo of a heavy patch from the Line6 M13. This is the Line6 Distortion model no other effects in use. The amp EQ is pretty flat, just tweaked on the effect itself and the guitar tone rolled off a little. There's a brief widdle with the Throaty Wah patch at the end. The recording came out a little bassier than it was in person. Clearly I'm not quite ready to produce a multi-platinum album.

A couple of weeks ago Line 6 finally released Windows 7 drivers for its audio interfaces. The fact that it has taken this long is completely ridiculous - but at least we now have drivers that work.

I've been using my UX1 interface for the past couple of weeks without incident, I've certainly had none of the white noise bursts that were plaguing use of the device before a proper driver emerged.

However while I do like a lot of Line 6 gear - the M13 in particular is brilliant - this whole experience has made me wary of trusting any of its hardware that would require good software support.

I doubt I'm the only one.

I've just completed my little Squier Bullet project. I've used this cheapo Strat to learn the basics of guitar modification as it's not something I've really done before. I'm quite happy with the resulting cheap yet good sounding guitar.

It was a regular SSS guitar when I bought it. I replaced with the pickguard with one that's cut for a humbucker and the bridge. The pickups are all from IronGear - two single coil Pig Iron models with a Rolling Mill humbucker.

The trem is a Wilkinson model with the solid steel block - this along with the addition of a graphite nut have worked wonders for tone and tuning.

So that's that done. No really major work - I've not had to modify the wood as thankfully Squier had already routed the body for a HSS pickup layout already. I'm not going to go further with a new neck or tuners of anything like that. But I'm very happy with the result.

For the guitarist keen on replacing pickups on their electric guitar there are a wealth of choices. Well known names such as Seymour Duncan and EMG are hugely popular with musicians looking to improve their instruments.

However many of this pickups can be very expensive and if you're working on a budget, or trying to improve a cheap stock guitar these pups can seem like overkill. Is it really worth putting £200 of active pickups in a £100 guitar?

What's needed in cases such as these is a range of pickups that vastly improve on the tone of cheap stock pickups yet at the same time doesn't break the bank. Such pickups do exist and some of the best are made by IronGear.

Read more »