try the blackstar ht tube head with the epiphone valve jr. cab, the head give you the ability to dial in sounds perfectly. You can honestly get the sound you hear in your head when your’e thinkin up a riff or whatever. And it’s only 300 and the cab is like 127 not too expensive and perfect for anybody. It damn good for recording even at low levels. Go to Musiciansfirend.com and look them up. Or you can just get the Epihone valve jr. which comes with the Head and Cab for 250, and its highly upgradeable. A steal for a beginner.

depending on the venue your playing, most the time you can use a 15 watt amp if you want and just mic it up to the venues speakers so it will be loud enough. Why not just get a marshall if thats the tone you like?

If you are being mic’d, you don’t need something that’s very loud. If you aren’t being mic’d, then yeah, you need something that will push some air.

I do own an Epiphone Valve Jr. It is a 5w all-tube amp. Yes, if it is plugged into a decent 4×12 or 2×12 cab it can put out quite a bit of volume, but there is a point where it starts to saturate and once you get past 1 o’clock or so on the volume knob you won’t be able to get any clean tones out of it. Not a bad amp, and if my buddy is playing his 100w Marshall MG head through his 4×12 and doesn’t turn up *too* loud, it can hold its own! But for live, non-mic’d performances… nah, I’d want more wattage. Yes, it is a great amp for modifying, etc, and if you did the octal mod to it, so that it could use a 6L6 or EL34 instead of the EL86 (EL84? whatever), it will be a lot louder, but that’s a mod that even I am not ready to do, and I’m not willing to spend the money for it either. The biggest criticism I have of the amp is that its loudness is based so much on its treble and upper mid response - once you try to get some decent low end out of it it runs out of headroom very fast and you just can’t get as much volume out of it.

Crate has the V series, and I’ve been very interested in the V33, either the 2×12 combo or head. Decent price, 33 watts, which is more than enough to be loud enough for what I need. For the price I could then spend some time upgrading the speakers (for the combo), tubes, components, whatever. 33 tube watts is plenty loud, as I’m sure you’re aware, but should be enough to sound good at low volumes as well, so it should work just fine with or without a mic.

So much depends on your cab… more speakers = pushing more air, and this is crucial in terms of your volume. There’s a reason why 4×12’s are so popular - not only the low-end resonance from the bigger speaker box, but more speakers = more sound dispersal, and that means that more people can hear you!

I would actually encourage you to try the Marshall MG series. I know you’ve said you don’t like solid state, but honestly, I’m a bit of a tube snob myself, and I’ve been very impressed with the MG ***when coupled with a decent cab!***

So I actually would encourage you to couple the 100w MG head with a decent 2×12, or even try the 50w 1×12 combo. It’s still quite loud, and has a decent size box, so it actually has quite a solid low end chunk - I went with my buddy to Guitar Center at what point and compared the two side by side, the Marshall MG with stock half-stack, and the 1×12 50w combo A/B next to each other. It was kinda funny, the 50w had more low end chunk….

I suggest looking up Avatar speakers… higher quality than the brand name stuff, ie the Marshall 2×12, and you get to pick your speakers. I love the Celestion G12T-75’s, I think they’re one of the best speakers out there for anything even vaguely rock-ish. Plenty of wattage, so they don’t break up easily (you keep your low end, even at high volumes!) and enough high end to cut through but not enough to get all hissy or whatnot.

Personally, I’m running a Crate Powerblock at the moment. It’s a solid state power amp, true, but I’m coupling it with a Tubeworks tube preamp, and that really gives it a good tube feel. I’ve got a Tubeworks power amp (solid state power amp with built-in tube preamps) on layaway, though, and the Powerblock may end up as my backup. =)

Don’t be too quick to knock solid-state, I guess is what I’m saying - many great players have used solid-state amps, and they sounded great (BB King and Dimebag Darrell are two who come to mind!).

Anyhoo…. good luck. It *is* important to play before you buy, or at least make sure the store has a good return policy! =)

Saul