Amazing. I’ve posted more in the last two days than in past several months… Oh well, being sick and at home allows me to do some catching up… 🙂
As you know, I just purchased the BOSS Katana 50 amp, and yes, I’m very excited about it. Despite feeling like crap, I played the amp late into the night. And no, I wasn’t tweaking it. I was just playing whatever came into my head for the pure enjoyment of playing and hearing – to me, at least – great sound. And for those of you who lurk the online forums, no, I actually didn’t read the forums for others’ opinions before I went and made my purchase. In fact, it didn’t even occur to me to look there.
But I did peruse the forums this morning and ran across several threads about the Katana. As expected, opinions on the amp were a split-decision. But one comment made me think:
Unlike this guy, I won’t be moving out my tube amps. They’ve become trusted, lifelong friends whom I’ll keep around till I die. But the salient point that he made was the phrase “finally crossed my threshold of acceptance.” To me, in other words, he was saying the amp worked for his needs.
And that’s the point with getting ANY gear. A for me, after literally spending tens of thousands of dollars on gear and selling off a bunch of stuff, I’ve learned one important lesson about gear purchases: Whatever I consider buying has to work for ME.
I used to get all hyped up about this or that new thing that people were buzzing about. I’d get so excited that I’d place an order, get the gear, only to find out when I played it that it just didn’t work for me. And that could be – and actually was – a fairly expensive endeavor.
Now with my much more limited budget, I’ve had to control those urges and first form a very good picture in my mind of how I’d use the gear in question; and be completely honest with myself and take the time to evaluate just how I’d use it, and perhaps more importantly, just HOW MUCH I would use it.
Take, for example, a flanger pedal. I love that sound. I even have an old BOSS flanger. But it has never had a permanent, much less a regular slot on my board. I’ve run across some very nice boutique flangers, but I won’t get one any time soon because for what I play on a regular basis, it would never get used.
Back to the Katana 50, I could’ve easily walked away without the amp if the sound and dynamics didn’t fit my tastes. And no, I didn’t really get into the higher gain modes of the amp because what I’ve been looking for specifically is a clean headroom platform in a combo for my pedals. So I made my decision to buy it based on what I could achieve clean. So the eval was quick. When I got home, I plugged my pedal board into the amp, tweaked the EQ and voila! It worked perfectly for my intended application!
So cheap or not, this was a great purchase for me and I couldn’t be happier. But I also have several drawers full of pedals that serve as a reminder of what doesn’t work. 🙂
Guitar Gear 
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