Giannini Tremendao SL Head

This was made in 1976, and is a clone of the Fender Twin Reverb with master volume. All tube amp, including rube reverb and vibrato. Features are o.k., 2 channels (pure, vibrato+reverb), basic tone stack (bass,treble) and a weird master volume with a push-pull pot that seemed to give more gain on channel 2 when pulled, apparently stealing some signal from the reverb driver tube and reinjecting it directly at the reverb recovery tube. This sounds awfully muddy and is IMO a misfeature, so I rewired the amp like a non-master volume twin reverb (blackface model), and while at it changed some stuff to "blackface" the amp (especially the coupling cap). After the mods the already quiet amp became even quieter, and the tone improved a bit. But the best feature of this amp (and of course of any amp that uses the twin circuit) is the possibility of swapping power tubes around to get different sounds. I had tried 4x6L6GC (loud as hell and very clean), 2x6L6GC (nice breakup, but still loud for home use, perfect for studio or gig), and 2x6V6GT (very bluesy sound and especially good for home use, since 6V6GTs handle about half the power of the 6L6). You can also use 2xEL34, but it requres a minor tweak in the power tube sockets, haven't done it yet (have no EL34s), and it may sound more marshall-ish.

I use it trough a 2x12 open back cabinet that I did myself, the tone is pretty good, especially after the "blackfacing" I did. Before it it was very bassy, but now the bass is o.k. I use it with a strat clone (good clone, same wood, but lousy PUs), it sounds fine. Also use a kramer baretta with 2 quad-rail PUs, and it sound very muddy unless I coil-split them, then they sound very good too (no news here, the quad-rails are intended for heavy metal...). A cort viva series sounds beautiful in this amp too (all maple, 2 humbuckers). Well, it IS a twin reverb, a nice amp for blues and even rock. Classic fender poweramp distortion (but unfortunately only at high volumes, which can be VERY HIGH if you use 4x6L6). If you want metal sounds, use a tube-drive or metal-zone before it, sounds pretty good too. Still need to find out how it sounds trough a 4x12 stack, tough.

Well, it is almost 30 yrs old and still works, which says how well this stuff was made. Mine still have the original OT and PT, so I assume they are very good too. The only problems so far were a blown-up cap, and a smoked cathode resistor on the reverb driver tube, which are pretty common since this tube is run extremely hot. The rest is mint-fresh. You may gig without a backup amp, but surely you must carry some spare tubes, you never know when one will fail.

The company still exists, but I doubt they will repair an amp this old. I do all the servicing myself anyway.

I play guitar since the age of 10, so it is 20yrs, but not very regularly (plus I suck too, heh), and this is the best amp I have. If it was stolen (which i highly doubt, it is ugly as hell and very heavy - not fancy at all), I would surely buy another eventually (they are a bit rare, but you can find them with a bit of patience - the best ones are the broken ones, you can buy them for dirt cheap, and the repair is usually dirt cheap too). This one I bought working perfectly, so it was a bit expensive. If you find one - buy it.