First off, a disclaimer. This article isn’t being written as a hard sell pitch. It’s not a list of reasons why Orange Amps are, in our opinion, magical boxes of wonderment. It’s an honest tale about how a bang average guitarist finally took the plunge and bought some proper gear, and the profound effect it had on his love for the guitar.

Cast your minds back to around 10 years ago. After a few years of not even picking up a guitar, a few mates and I thought it’d be fun to start a band. It made sense; I remembered the guitar being kinda fun, if a little frustrating. I’d always played without ever really practising, if that makes sense, so my chops were extremely limited. And, after hitting the talent wall, I drifted a bit away from the instrument. But the chance to start playing again, in a band made up of my best pals, got me thinking about it again.

One lad was a great drummer, with a canny knack of coming up with simple but incredibly catchy guitar riffs in his head. Another was a talented multi-instrumentalist who was more than comfortable on the bass. Our other pal didn’t have any experience playing an instrument, but he was a force of nature who would make a great frontman. And then there was me. Full of ideas, but little in the way of gear.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We had bonded over a shared love of certain bands. Raging Speedhorn, a cult British sludge band were a particular favourite. They blended ultra-simple Sabbath riffs with powerful, screamed vocals to incredible effect. Crucially, their songs were so, so easy to play. Nothing complex, just loud guitars and riff after riff after riff. Most importantly, they looked like they were having a good time doing it. A lot of metal is quite po-faced and takes itself very seriously. Speedhorn just looked like they were a bunch of mates making ridiculously heavy music and having all the fun. There was our M.O. right there. Damp Old Man was born.

Our drummer was in another band, so we quite quickly had access to a rehearsal space. I picked up a decent little guitar, a PRS SE with P90 pickups, for a good price. At the time I wasn’t a gear nerd, so I was sold more on the fact it had this amazing tobacco sunburst finish, rather than how well suited it’d be to the music. More on this later…

I had also been working as a broadcast producer so I had been trained on recording gear, and my laptop was chock full of software I could use to record us on. Using the PRS SE, through some amp simulation software, we were able to get a rough version of that full band sound we’d been looking for. Except it didn’t sound quite right. The amp sim was being pumped through an audio interface and into a ropey looking PA system. No amount of tweaking could get away from the fact that the guitars sounded like a chainsaw. Something was going to have to change.

 

The author reppin’ back in the day.

 

 

After the first few months of writing and practice, I knew I had to start taking this seriously. The band was writing some great stuff; heavy, catchy riffs with odd Dillinger Escape Plan style craziness. I was genuinely impressed with what we were churning out. We all were. The lyrics too. We had songs about Velociraptor uprisings, South American footballers and a girl we once knew who had a massive face. All Ivor Novello-worthy stuff, I’m sure you’ll agree. But no matter how hard I tried to push the amp sim/laptop/PA rig, it wasn’t working. Songs this good deserved to sound so much better.

I started searching around for an amp which would give us the tonal platform we needed. Being a journalist by trade, my first step was to research. I read every forum, watched every YouTube video and started to gain a clearer picture of what would, what might, and what definitely wouldn’t cut the mustard. A few brands and models started cropping up, including a strange looking company which made bright orange amplifiers. Surely a gimmick I thought, until I started looking at them in more depth.

This odd looking company had just released a model called the TH30. On paper, it promised the heavy tones we were looking for, with the right amount of power for the size of gigs we would do, and a solid clean tone for those moments when I wanted to wig out with delay pedals and the like. Plus, it looked properly cool.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I went down to our local guitar mega-super-market and, sure enough, there was a big section full of all kinds of these orange amplifiers. Being a large, busy store, there was no way I could plug in and get to stage volume, but I was able to have a tinker with it and from there, something switched inside me. I’d found my sound. I tried a couple of other brands and models, more to check I wasn’t going mad than anything, but nothing even came close to that TH30.

The first practice session with my new toy was buzzing. Finally, there was a balance between the bass, drums and guitar. The sound just felt fuller, more like what we had in our heads. The tones I was able to coax from the TH30 were the missing piece of the puzzle. We sounded like we had all imagined we would when we started playing together.

The other, less expected effect, of getting a ‘genuine’ valve amp was how much it made me think about everything else in the signal chain. When you finally get something proper, something a serious player would use, it makes you want to learn how to use it correctly. I began reading up on different valve types, best practices for looking after it, and techniques on how to record the thing properly. Having an Orange Amplifier made me a better, more thoughtful, more critical player because I wanted to do this amazing piece of equipment justice.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For starters, the PRS SE had to go. It was an amazing guitar for playing at home, or without much gain, but for us we needed something more powerful. I replaced it with a Les Paul studio with humbuckers and, still to this day, I have never heard a sound so sweet. I’ve played through hundreds of combinations of amps, guitars, pedals and other gear since, but that simple combination of Les Paul into TH30 will forever be my favourite sound.

I think what I learned overall was the power of context. Don’t get me wrong, amp sims have their place. For home recording, the ability to plug your guitar into your laptop and gain approximations of thousands of real-world guitar sounds is, if you think about it, proof that future-tech is pretty damn cool. Solid state practice amps are great too, in the right situation. But for powering a bad-ass metal band, you need the right tools for the job. For me, I found them in my Orange.

PS – my tin-pot band, and the tones the TH30 produced, can be heard here, on the slight chance you’re interested. We’re now sadly defunct because life got in the way but the music lives on in spirit.

Ever wondered just whatever possessed you to pick up the guitar in the first place? There are probably loads of reasons but we thought we’d spend a few minutes and contemplate what we think are probably the most popular. Dare you admit to your ‘real’ motivation?

Money Makes the World Go Round.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Money is a very powerful motivator; just ask Walt Whitman (if you haven’t seen Breaking Bad where have you been?).  However unlike Walt’s route to a fortune, playing the guitar is somewhat more legal (it’s no less perilous though).  If you’re one of the lucky ones and make it huge then big bucks will probably come your way but that’s not to say you need to become a star to make a living from the ole six-string; there are plenty of session players out there…and that’s not to mention the countless number of ‘weekend rockers’ who supplement their ‘normal’ income with the odd gig or two through the year.  So if you’re in it for the money…get those gigs booked and let the good times roll!
I Wanna Live Forever

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The ‘Fame Game’ is another biggie as far as motivation goes. Hands up who’s imagined strutting their stuff, guitar in hand on a massive stage? Everyone has! The glare of the lights, the dry ice, thousands of screaming fans…sorry, got lost in the moment ‘en! But then fame is a very, very fickle thing…one second everything you touch turns to gold, the next you’re stacking shelves in the local supermarket. There are not many that can hold onto the limelight forever (and if 2016 is anything to go by there will soon be a lot less) so make the most of it while it lasts…if it ever comes along at all that is.

 

 

Get Your Rocks Off

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They don’t just call it ‘sex, drugs & rock ‘n’ roll’ for nothing. Sex goes hand in hand with rock music like peanut butter with jam (feel free to use whatever analogy you choose). In every teenage boy that’s ever strapped on a guitar there’s a little bit of him thinking ‘girls are gonna fall at my feet ‘cos I play’ (it’s not quite that straightforward but you can’t fault the positive thinking).

 

“Are You Cool? I am Cool!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back in the day playing guitar was seen as a bit of a ‘dark art’ and the realm of geeks and nerds. However, these days it seems that the guitar is cooler than ever and just about everyone and their brother plays or at least knows someone who does. That’s not to say that it’s a bad thing; the more guitar players the merrier as far as we’re concerned…but hopefully there’s not too many of you out there who are only playing because you think you should or because your friends do. There’s no denying that playing guitar is cool but there are so many guitars left unloved in the corner of a room or on their stand when they should be being played. For many playing the guitar will be a passing phase and that’s fine as long as it’s for the right reason i.e. you genuinely have the desire to play.

 

It’s All About the Music

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s probably one of the oldest cliché’s in the book and often comes under fire from those who would like to see us fail but more often than not the original motivation for picking up the guitar is the music itself. Now this is where things get a bit difficult to explain but if you’re reading this the likelihood is that you already know about the ‘thing’ that music does to us (best description we could come up with). It affects us deep inside and speaks to us…and if it speaks loudly enough it drives us to want to make music of our own because we watch or listen to our favourite band or artist and think ‘I want to do that’. It’s very difficult to put into words so we thought we’d paraphrase a bit of Star Wars (not sure if it really works but any excuse to get a bit of Stars Wars into a blog works for us) and leave it at that…

 

Just For the Hell of it! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Often overlooked by many who are asked why they started playing guitar…surely this is the most honest answer of them all; playing guitar is fun…or at least it should be. Of course there’s a lot of seriousness involved in learning how to play the damn thing and some of us will take it further with mind-boggling theory and technique but at the core of everything is enjoyment at the fact that we can play an instrument. Amen!

 

They say it’s always the quiet ones you should worry about. “There is no more fearsome sight than when a quiet man goes to war” goes the saying. And sure, there is something undeniably scary as watching someone who you were sure wouldn’t say “boo” to a goose actually flipping their lid. But we have a rather different proposal to put forward. Never mess with the loud ones. Particularly the ones with enormous citric stacks of unholy noise in their arsenal. Here’s the reasons why.

People who use Orange amps aren’t bothered about what you think. It’s not, for us, a cool gimmick or a fad. We choose to use Orange amplifiers for the purest reasons possible. Because they sound biblically immense.

 

 

We’ve seen fads come and go. Hell, we’ve created our own fads and watched as others followed. But when they trudge off to the next big evolution in amp technology, Orange people stick to what they know and what they trust.

Trust is a big thing with musical gear. There are those who buy, sell, swap and trade gear to the point of it becoming a hobby in itself. But Orange gear is for the lifers. The players who have that inimitable sound in their heads and won’t stop until they’ve made it their own. People trust Orange to give them a sound quite unlike anything else on the market. Those grizzled mid-range tones, and barking gains. It’s the sound of the player who knows their mind, the player who is completely un-messable-with.

 

You may also have noticed on our social media channels. Our personality on there reflects the values we preach as a company. We’re a straight up, honest bunch of people. We know what we’re talking about. We stick together. We know each of us has made that life choice to opt for one of the more unique musical equipment brands out there. Mainstream ‘stack them high and sell them cheap’ amps just don’t do it for us. We need something more. Something that attracts those nods of appreciation from others in the know. “Oh, you’re an Orange guy?” Never said without a healthy dose of mutual respect.

We recognise when others do well. The beauty of being a musician is the sheer amount of choice available to us. We know other amplifier brands that make some straight up, 100% incredible gear. We respect them, and we respect your prerogative to play whatever you want. But we also know that what we offer is more than just an amplifier. You want more than the tone you get when you plug in. You want to feel part of something, like you’re the only one capable of extracting your chosen tone from an amp. With an Orange, you get that.

 

This may be coming across as a love letter. A well-intentioned paean to what is essentially a multi-national corporation.  And you may be right. Orange exists, like any other private profit-making business, to make money. Maybe we’re not exclusively chasing paper but we’ve all got bills to pay, right? Besides, there are other examples of brands – we won’t go too much into it here – who use cheaper components or blast huge amounts of their budgets on marketing, but Orange doesn’t do that for the simple reason it doesn’t need to. Sure, the business needs to post a profit – we’re not a charity, after all – but the way we choose to go about that is by thinking about our people and the gear they’d want to use. Then, we design it, make it and put it into your hands. Pretty simple really. There’s no over-arching strategy to penetrate specific geographic markets or appeal to under-targeted demographics. We just make great gear and it’s always been a sound enough proposition for us.

 

There’s a definite cache to Orange. We know that. We hesitate to the use the word cool because it’s entirely subjective, but there’s definitely something different about us. Maybe it’s the typeface we use on our frontplates. There’s a definite medieval vibe going on there, like the font was lifted straight from the sign above King Arthur’s preferred mead hall. Whatever, it stands out and adds to the image we’ve carefully cultivated for decades now. But an image is paper-thin unless it has the credentials, heritage and reputation to back it up. I think after 40-odd years we’re comfortable enough in our own skin to say we do that.

The point we’re trying to make is that whatever reasons you have for using our gear, whatever caused you to choose us, you’re part of a unique sub-sect of guitar and bass players who won’t settle for conformist, vanilla mediocrity. We’re happy to have you.