Originally Posted by: stahlhart... I do agree with you about these old Ampegs, though. This amp has got more power under the hood than its appearance suggests. And you're right, very clean power...

Ampegs were designed to deliver great clean sound, with lots of headroom. Everett Hull hated Rock'n'Roll, remember? So when an Ampeg is pushed into distortion, it doesn't sound like lesser amps that were intended to get buzzy. A distorted Ampeg sounds like something that has been pushed to the limit, and is going to utterly destroy anyone who is fool enough to ask for more. And because they were built with massive transformers and conservative tube utilisation, they are seriously loud by the time they get dirty. I still hold that the true test of a player's finger-tone is what they sound like plugged straight into an Ampeg.

But, if you want to do the pedal thing, Ampegs will cheerfully accomodate you. I had an absolute blast trying out a Digitech Bad Monkey with my VT-22. The only reason I got rid of that pedal is the nasty tone-sucking things it did to my sound when I shut it off. With true bypass, that would be my personal favourite stomp box.