Terry’s Latest: It’s that time again, finally the spring is here and the music has come full circle. The song you are hearing is just a hint of what is to come.
The Spring Southern States “Ghost” Tour Featuring The Massive Bugera Amplifiers Officially Kicks Off May 8th and 9th.
For the time and date of special events watch your inbox or email me at terrywhite1@live.com and either myself or my personal assistant will fill you in on all the details.
Stop back in as often as possible as more will be posted daily about special prizes and very special guests appearances.
Terry’s Latest Music Gear: I have to stop and say thanks to the Behringer Corp. The maker of the Bugera line of guitar amplifiers.
Here it is, my full review of the Bugera 6262 guitar amplifier.
Before jumping right into this I have to let you know that I have tested, used, tried, owned, or just played around for fun more than 50 different types of amplifiers over the last 25 years, all tube and solid-state alike and this is the first time in that 25 years that I am honestly impressed. And now I will tell you why.
Back in October of 2008, I decided that it was time to go out and purchase a new amplifier. I wanted an all tube design, but I also wanted to be able to play any type of music that I would choose and still use the same amplifier. Everything from Southern Rock, to the heaviest of Heavy Metal, and everything in between. Changing amplifiers in the middle of a set is not an easy task, and I have grown tired of having one amp that I can use for this song and have to either add an overdrive or distortion pedal for other type’s songs. So with that said I set out to find an amplifier that could do it all.
Well I found several that would fit that bill but the biggest problem was that all of them would have cost me anywhere from $1100.00 up to $3000.00 dollars just for the amplifier head alone. Well that was out of the question. Spending that much on just an amp head would leave no money for the many other things that are needed by any guitarists, like guitars.
Several months prior to my decision a company called Bugera had sprang up out of nowhere with an all new line of amplifiers that had been getting attention from all over the place. The amps were a big hit at NAMM that year, and the only local dealer kept telling me that I should try one of the amplifiers. He explained that because of the price of the amplifier that there was pretty much no way I could lose.
After weeks of thinking and hours and hours of research I finally decided to purchase the Bugera 6262 120 watt all tube head. Out of pocket cost to me for this amplifier was $529.00. That is one third at the very least and one fifth of what many of the amplifiers in this class were going for.
The Bugera 6262 is a dual transformer all tube design that boasts not 3 or 4 preamp tubes like most amplifiers on the market now. But 6 and yes that not a typo 6 12AX7 preamp tubes, as well as 4 6L6 power tubes that if you wish can be easily swapped out for EL34 power tubes. Just the flip of a switch, and a quick bias made easy because the switch and the bias connection and dial are right there beside the power tubes. But for now I have stuck with the stock 6L6 power tubes.
Before actually putting this amp into use onstage and being depended on I had to do some testing. For testing I used a very nice 412 cabinet that a friend loaned to be that was equipped with Celestion Vintage 30 speakers.
Now with everything I need for testing I bring the amplifier and the borrowed cabinet home to my small studio which is really only a garage that has been turned into a nice acoustically balanced room. Everything is triple grounded; even the mats on the floor are made of a sound proof material, with a non conducting rubber base. All of this keeps out any unwanted noise from anything in the room using an electrical current. And those of you that use all tube high powered amplifiers know what even a tiny amount of noise can cause in an all tube amp.
At first I thought that I would just play around and see how the amplifier sounded just here with only me, no other instruments, no band at all.
The 6262 is laid out very basic and straight forward, there is only a single guitar input, not the more traditional high and low gain inputs that most of us are use to having on modern amplifiers. All the knobs are what we call chicken head which really just a basic knob or dial that looks much like a chicken head. No shiny chrome plated buttons, and pretty lights. This amplifier is all business, nothing else.
For effects I use and still do use only a T.C. Electronics G-Major effects processor run through the effects loop equipped on the 6262, which can be controlled by a footswitch that comes with the amplifier, which also controls turning on and off the lead and clean channels as well as the reverb.
Everything plugged in and ready to go, I turn on the power switch leaving the amplifier in standby allowing the tubes to warm up enough for tone, I plug in my favorite guitar. A Schecter C-1 Blackjack FR that has been modified a little. I replaced the standard Seymour Duncan JB pickup with a Seymour Duncan TB-6. The standby light comes on letting me know it’s time to play. So I set the bass, treble, and midrange to my liking. And I turn the gain up only to about 7 thinking that too much more with that many preamp tubes and I will lose all my tone to nothing but overdrive.
Starting off with no effects at all I just play around with some of the old standby licks that we have all come to know and love some Ozzie, a little Van Halen and the like. And much to my surprise this amplifier sounds as good as or better than any of the Peavey 5150, or even the newer Peavey 6505+ amplifiers that I have tested. And keep in mind still no effects and the gain is still only at 7.
Now I’m impressed and call a few guys to come over with their instruments and let’s see what this thing can do with a ton of bass and some very loud drums. Remember this is a garage that has only been padded.
Some of the guys get here and just for kicks I turned the head around facing the wall just to see if they would even know what amp I was using. We go through several tunes and decide to go to stage level volumes. So yes I just had to dime that gain knob and crank the volume to about 6 (which I do not recommend in a garage).
Much to my surprise by turning the gain all the way up I did not lose tone but actually gained it. This is something that you would normally only get in some of the best boutique amplifiers, costing much, much more. Turning up the gain actually added great sounding bass as well as opened up every harmonic tone I would get from my Schecter Blackjack. We get about half way through a song called “Aint Talking Bout Love” By Van Halen and my drummer is screaming for me to turn the volume down because he hears me over his own drums, and the bass player is bugging me to let him plug his bass into this head.
Once we stop long enough for our ears to take a break I turned the amplifier head around for the guys to see what the amp was. All of them are just standing there trying to understand how this so called cheap little amp sounded like that.
Now try to remember that nothing has been changed, this amp is still all stock. It is using stock 12AX7 Bugera tubes, I have not changed anything. The only thing different really is that I used a 412 cabinet made by another company that is equipped with Celestion Vintage 30’s. And I only did that because at that time the Bugera 412 cabinet that I ordered with the head had not arrived yet.
Just for the fun of it, we call up another friend that owns a new Peavey 6505+ and invited him over with his amp. I challenged him to go head to head with this amp just to see how this would come out. And if I had not been there and tried this myself I probably would not have believed it. The 6505+ just could not keep up, the bass response was much less, and while the 6505+ did sound great and with the gain dimed there were still great harmonics it was just not the same as the 6262. Before leaving my friend asked if he could play on the amp for a little while and he sat there for almost 2 hours before I could get him to give it back.
Now I am in no way putting down the Peavey 6505+ it’s a great amp, if you want to pay that much for it. And out of 8 of us in that room everyone agreed that the Bugera just flat out sounded better overall.
We decided to take the amp out for a few small shows and see if anyone could tell the difference in sound. And much to my surprise that weekend I got more compliments that I had in the last 2 years combined. Some of the local guitarists actually wanted to know who I had sent the amplifier to and have it modified. I could not get any of them to believe that it was totally stock, that nothing at all had been changed.
Now down to brass tacks so to speak. For the next 3 weeks we punished that amp, hours and hours of playing at full tilt total melt down settings. And guess what, I did finally blow a transformer. But instead of complaining about the failure I decided to use this as a way of seeing just how well the company would stand behind its product.
A sent out a single email about the problem to the nice people at the Behringer Corp. Now even 24 hours later I had a response, and a very pleasant response. Instead of them telling me I had to ship it off to be repaired they simply asked if I had a dealer nearby that had a 6262 head. Well the only dealer close did not have one so I emailed and let them know. A day later I got an email with a tracking number and a prepaid shipping label telling me that a new amplifier was already on the way and to please pack up the one with the blown transformer and ask the UPS driver to pick it up as he dropped off the new one.
Now I have been doing this a very long time, and I can tell you that I have never known of a company to just flat out replace an amplifier just by taking my word for what I thought was wrong. With an all tube design you are going to have failures from time to time, that’s just the nature of the beast. You can’t predict vacuum tubes or even transformers. The technology behind tube designs has not really changed very much over the last 30 or 40 years. But I do not know of any company at all that will just replace an all tube amplifier, and defiantly not within only a couple of days of contacting them. Most companies insist that you ship or take it to an authorized service center got repair, no matter how long it may take.
So for me this is what I call a cant loose amplifier. The sound is there, the tone is there, the power is there, and probably one of the most important things is that the service is there. This company does stand behind this amplifier, and not just for the multimillion dollar stars, but for just the common guitarists like you and me.
So here is my final recommendation for the Bugera 6262.
If you are in the market for an all tube amplifier you would be almost nuts not to at the very least go out and try one for yourself. Most of the dealers are more than happy to let you play until your heart is content because they know playing on this amplifier will sell it for them.
Dollar for dollar I do not know of any amplifier out there anywhere made by anyone that can even come close to the Bugera 6262.
An all tube design, using 6 preamp 12AX7 tubes and 4 6L6 power tubes, a true serial effects loop, and one of the best onboard reverbs I have ever heard. And they even throw in the pedal to control all of it at no extra charge at all.
Ask yourself, what more could you want or need. This is a down to business, no frills, turn it on, and turn it up total melt down kick ass amplifier. Try one and tell me if I’m wrong.
There will be more to come on this subject a little in the coming weeks as we are currently making plans for some other testing with the 6262 head. And as soon as those results are ready I will have them posted as soon as possible.
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