Danelectro Dirty-Thirty

The amp that I have experience with was purchased, new, in 2001. It was my first band that I was in and practice amps were the only things any of us had, I recall being floored by how cool my friend's Danelectro amp looked and thought it sounded cool, but as we spent time with our guitars and amps in a setting with other musicians, the candy coating on our eyes made us realize that our gear sucked. The Dirty Thirty is a single channel amp with the, "dirty/sweet" gain knob, volume, tone and a headphone out. I don't recall the wattage, but it isn't the 30 that the name leads you to believe. For a first amp, it had plenty of power, and the tone was unique, but it just wasn't that good an amp for practical purposes.

The guitars that we ran through this were our first guitars. I distinctly recall 4 guitars being run through this thing and all of them sounding very strange compared to my bass amp and the other guitarist' amp. An Epiphone Special 2, a noname strat knock off, a Yamaha Pacifica and an Epiphone Strat... all of them sounded very stiff and hard through the Dano. Even the clean tone on this sounded far less lucid than my 80's Squier bass amp and the Crate 15watt amps the drummer and other guitarist had. The Dano did have a thicker tone than the other amps, but just didn't sound that great... luckily we were a "punk," band and just put a Moreley Just Distortion in front of the amp, cranked all the knobs and ran that thing to death. It had enough volume to be heard over the drums by most of us, but not the drummer. We did try to use it as shows and had to do a few tricks, I recall we once played a garage show and we just mic'ed the amp, I also remember using a folding chair as an amp stand when we played in someone's basement. It did it's job, but it's a joke of an amp when I look back on it.

We, honestly, never had a single problem with this amp. We dragged our gear everywhere... school, each other's homes, parties, shows... everywhere. The first of our amps to go was actually one of the Crate 15watt amps. I played a show with the guitarists new band almost a year back, and he still had the Dano, also had a Vox (the cambridge 2x10 I believe), but he also ran his guitar into the dano for a thicker sound. He mic'ed both amps. So, 6 years of abuse, and that thing's still going. I'd trust it.

Never had any issues, but Dano is the strangest company in the world... so I don't know what to tell you.

A lot of people on here have flat out said, "this amp sucks," or "this amp is the greatest amp in the world," and they're both wrong. This amp is exactly what you'd expect in the sub $100 practice amp range, but it has a lot more character to it. I personally don't like it's tone and thought it was too quiet of an amp, but it has it's place with some people. It's really an amp that you've gotta really try before you buy it (it isn't like a Fender or Marshall where you just know it's gonna be great). Since the first year of playing bass/guitar, we've come a long way, but the Dano still has a place in my heart as a quarky little amp that thought it could, but couldn't without some help. The worst thing about the amp, though, is the lack of versitility... it's pretty much a two trick pony. First, it tries, poorly, to replicate the 50's tube tone and then if you crank every knob on it and put a distortion in front of it, you can saturate it so much that it's just another distorted solid state amp.

Not too many...doesn't really need them.

To me this is a fun little amp to play. Simplicity is the name of the game here. I play slide blues on a Thinline Tele through this, and miced up, it sounds great, I can't complain too much considering I have paid more for a fast food dinner than I did for this little guy.

No problems yet (three years running)

Haven't had to deal with them

Pretty simple amp, it has volume, tone, and "dirty sweet" controls, I play garage rock/blues, played harmonica and guitar through this little amp.

I really liked the sounds I got out of this amp, it could do a decent clean tone, but fiddling with the dirty sweet could get some real nice variety. Playing harp through it gave a great sound, with a modern green bullet mic, and a few other vintage mics you could wrestle a great tone if you fiddled with it. As for guitar, using an silvertone with humbuckers, it was pretty weak on the low end, but again, it could be made to sound versatile. Not a bad little practice amp.

This is a pretty poorly put together amp, The box contruction seems solid, the materials are good, goes for the vintage look, but the guts seem cheap and poorly laid out. Broke the input jack because the cheap plastic threads stripped out, Knocked it over a couple of times and the pots broke, just cheap parts. I replaced the input, and some of the pots, but eventually it just seemed not worth it to hassle with, sitting in parts on my shelf case i need it for something later.

bought it used, never tried contacting them

I have been playing harp for 7 years, guitar for three. I am no sound snob, but I miss the sound of this little amp, I wish it was better built, if I found another for $30 I would buy it. treat it gentle and it might last

I got this amp free in 2000 from a music store that had sold a Taylor acoustic/electric guitar out from under me after I had already paid for it. To make up for their mistake they gave me a deal on another guitar and let me pick out a small practice amp. I was very fortunate this amp was there. This little amp is a practice amp and not designed to have a lot of features, but instead is designed for ease of use. It has volume, tone, and clean/dirty controls that work well. It puts out 30 watts of pretty mean, quality sound and a tweak of the "sweet/dirty" knob brings you from Elvis to Nirvana.

I use a Fernandes Nomad w/ built in effects and it sounds great in this amp. I leave it set to clean and let the guitar do the work. Every now and then I'll run my Ibanez through it and turn up the overdrive between 2 and 3 and it sounds great. This amp is fiarly loud and although there's not a lot of low end (small speaker) you will be amazed at the amount of punch this thing has. If it wasn't for the fact that the speaker is small (it is a practice amp though) I'd give this amp a 10.

I've owned this amp for about 5 years and it has always worked true until recently. Over all the quality of the amp is decent. It has a soft, suedo leather covering that I actually really like, but it's prone to tears. The look of the amp is pretty cool. I'm a drummer who fiddles w/ guitar, but I play guitar on 2 songs w/ my band. Last week while setting up for a gig I plugged in to set my levels and I blew the fuse, at least that's what I thought. Come to find out the fuse is okay, but the transfomer is shot. Up until that time it worked flawlessly.

This is the sad thing. There were a few variations of this amp from Danelectro: The "dirty thirty", the "nifty fifty", and I believe something like the "hefty seventy". Well, if you go to Danelectro's web site there are no amps whatsoever and no contact info. So if it breaks you're on your own. Pretty poor service for a company still putting their name on merchandise.

I have a whole house full of gear from PA systems, to drum sets, digital recording studio, guitars, bass, synths, and a hundred other little things. This little amp was definitely one of the gems in my home. If you can find one of these babys I highly recommend you get it. For the money you can't beat it and it's way better than anything in it's class. I have played Crate, Peavey, Fender, Behringer, Line 6, and Drive and this thing blows them all away. Just take care with it and it should do the job.

Not many features, but not many expected. You get what you pay for.

Not very reliable. The plastic input knob will strip, and when you put in a plug, you can rip the volume and "Dirty Sweet" knobs right off the circuit board, as I did. It is fixable however. Better if you re-inforce it before it happens though. Other than that, I haven't really had the chance to break it yet.

Danelecto doesn't even have the amp listed on their website any more.

For a cheap amp, I think it's great. Replacing the volume pots was a bit of a pain, but I still like the little guy.

Amp is from 1999. Versatile...not really (but it's not a bad thing). Well suited for classic rock sounds. No real "features" to speak of: volume, tone, and "dirty-sweet" controls. No line-out, headphone, or effects loops--no problem. Simple operation--plug in and hammer it. Solid-state, vintage looks. Rated "7" for ease of use and lcak of pointless features.

Have used this with single-coil Strats and a Washburn with a P-Bass style pickup. Nails 60s garage tones. Think The Kinks' "All Day And All of the Night." Reached guitar nirvana with my Danelectro U2! It's as if this thing was made for the lipstick-tube pickups. With the bass, it did thump, and was okay for practice, but obviously couldn't deal the bottom-end. However, we did use it for a very small gig, and it rose to the occasion just fine. Like its brothers, the Nifty Fifty and Nifty Seventy, this amp isn't exactly loud. It would be well suited to practice, recording, and very small live situations (small churches, etc.). The "dirty-sweet" knob takes you where you want to go. Clean is a little on the weak side, but if you turn the "dirty-sweet" knob just until it's about to break up, the tone is nice and warm. Still, the clean sound is much better than any solid-state Fender amp I've ever played.

Reliable...? Well, as far as practice amps go, it should be fine. The leatherette covering seems a bit soft, so you might guard it for tears. Otherwise, it seems pretty solid for a little guy.

Danelectro is defunct...no wait, back in business...no wait, defunct...etc. Don't count on them to fix this. Either take it to a reliable shop, or buy another one.

This would make a perfect recording amp for vintage rock tones. With the right guitar, Malcolm Young is in this little amp. The modern solid-state amps are far better than their vintage counterparts. This is a fine example of that.

Features are as described. Pretty basic: SS combo with overdrive in a small package. It is plenty loud for a late-night bedroom amp. I give it a 7 based on the premise that any amp with a decent volume and tone control deserves a 6 and the overdrive bumps it up one.

This little bugger LOVES my Aims Tele-style, from clean and chimey to full-on twang to gravelly. It could be a great little amp (mic'd) for recording roots rock, country, punk, ska, and da blues. It far exceeds expectations based on cost and appearance.

I got this from a stoned-out surfer-teen at a garage sale...made the deal by sweet-talking his trailer court mom (cig smoking, pot bellied, heavy moustache, lots of wrinkles and a few tats...probably 37-38 years old and 20 years past prime). The amp looks like it has seen plenty of neglect and misuse: leatherette is a little grimy with some scuffs at the edges, and the nameplate is missing. If the accompanying guitar (a plastic Dano w/ lipstick pup) was any indication, its face was smashed and the jack had been torn clean out of it.

I have no idea.
The price of shipping this (or even driving it someplace) for repairs would doubtlessly exceed what I paid for it, so I'll never know. When (if) it dies, its husk and speaker will live on as a cabinet for a small tube amp.

I love it! I'd even gig with it. The distortion is most useful in the low range 0-3 out of ten. The speaker is surprisingly good. I can always use this as an outboard cab for one of my Class A homebrew/hi-fi conversions, if need be. This is a typical garage sale treasure: not a diamond but (maybe) worth having anyway.

Features... Well, that's something it doesn't have. It's got a "level" knob, a "tone" knob, and a "dirty sweet" knob. It's 15W and has a headphone jack. Mine was made in 1999. I can't complain too much on the options since it wasn't too expensive and was pretty small.

I've played it with three different Les Pauls (an Epiphone, a Gibson, and another Gibson) and with a stratocaster. It's noiser than you'd think a 15 watter would be, but noisy in an annoying way. The clean channel used to get distorted at high volumes. Now it's just distorted all the time. And I hate the "dirty sweet" knob. Distortion shouldn't sound like that.

It's too small to use in a gig, not that I would want to even if it was big enough.

One day I was playing the amp. I had only been playing for an hour and the volume was only up to about 50% and suddenly the sound went to hell. From that day on, the amp has had buzzing and distortion no matter how the amp is set. And the amp still sounds like crap even if I turn the volume up all the time.

N/A

I've been playing guitar for almost 4 years. I own a Tech 21 30W amp, an Epiphone Les Paul Studio, an acoustic guitar, a bass guitar, a somewhat crappy strat from 1969. Out of all the guitar related equipment I have, I like this amp the least. If someone stole it, they would actually be doing me a favor. The volume is good for the size, but the sound is crap. The only reason I don't give it a 1 is because it did work moderately "ok" for a period of time.

Not too damn much, but it's a practice amp.

OK, now for the main part of this little review. I do not own this amp, even though i've played on it plenty enough to know what it's all about(at least 100 hours). This was one of two trial amps in the music store where i work (sam goody). The other amp is a 15 watt marshall SS. Now, all of the kids who come in to try out guitars always get a hard-on for the marshall, and plug directly into that. When I first saw this little thing, i laughed my ass off, just because it was this brown, fake leather covered fake vintage wanna-be thing. haha. So, i plug into the marshall, and it blows (all non-hybrid SS marshall suck, btw). I was expecting more, because I own a marshall stack at home, ya know? So, i plug into the danelectro and start playing elvis tunes, just because it just seems right to be playing elvis tunes out of this thing, i guess. Suddenly, i notice that I sound pretty damn GOOD. "Wow", i thought, "this thing sure rocks for straight-up old timer's rock! but, how will it handle 70's classic rock?" So, i play some Zeppelin licks, some Floyd licks, hell, i even threw in some stones for good measure. Still sounded good with that mysterious dirty sweet knob on around 2. "damn", i thought, "classic rock sure does sound decent with this, but, how will it handle metal?" so, i threw down some metallica riffs, some slayer riffs, maybe a tool riff (or 8, i really like tool). crank that dirty sweetness up, you get some mean sounding shit out of this (stupid looking little thing) beast. "ok", i thought, "but, this isn't for a gigging person, i mean, the speaker is like 6"! but, beginners like easy punk and palm muted power chord stuff, so i decided to throw out some of that, just to see. Nirvana, got it. Green Day, got it. The Clash, got it. The Hives, got it.

Ok, now, you may be wondering what that whole schpiel was all about. Basically, don't expect a half-stack sound out of this, you won't get it. Don't expect a huge thumping bass sound, because the speaker is 6" small. This amp is light, small, cheap, loud, and has built in distortion capabilities. Shit, for $70, you can only get a distortion stomper that sounds about as good as the distortion built into this. The overdrive/distortion is the clincher here, because it's fairly decent sounding for 70 clams. If you have a child who wants to learn electric, buy this amp, it will cover their needs till next christmas(plus, it teaches them to coax distortion out of their amps without shitty pedals, thats right, you can eat your shit metal zones). if you want an amp that is really small and light, yet cheap, but still loud enough so you can be heard over drums, get this amp. Seriously, this amp is 20 times better than ANY other amp you will find for under $100. Then, take the money you saved by not buying a fender or a marshall SS practice amp and treat yourself to a new pedal or something. Go ahead, you deserve it, you frugal musician.

It survived in the store for two years with kids knocking it over and otherwise beating the shit out of it.

Who knows.

Remember, it's a practice amp, compare with other amps in this price range (<100 bucks), you won't find one thats better, i guarantee you. And the kids'll love it!

Bought one used & online. Arrived in non -working condition. Made like what it is - low priced junk. I don't understand a company that would have a high quality toggle switch for on/off and have plastic sheathed input & headphone jacks. Metal retaining nut + plastic covered jack = torn apart shit. Dont know how the sound, but if you buy one & actually have the audacity to plug & unplug your instrument into these jacks - don't count on much of a lifespan.

Amp has cutesy vintage look, but falls short in quality. I give it an extra point for looking cool.