Marshall 1959 Super Lead

Update on my 1977 Marshall SUperlead . Ithas the "Home Tags " on it which fopr what its worth i think Ehngland wanted those amps for themselves. ITs not the year of the amp that im concerned about . It could be a 1969 plexi. 1970 metqalface. whatever. It is the sound and what you surround it with.
Green chiclets nd mustards with NOS SIEMENS
allthere,everything in place and biased perfect. I run a great pedal with it . IT is 110% mint

WHqt can I say. Ive heard plexis. 60 and 70s metal face on and onm and this asmp has it. Isdont care what plexi owners say. This amp does it for me. SO Do you buy an an amp because it is valuable. Mayber. because someone said tyhe nustard caps are better maybe. I buy an amp for sound. trhis has it all

no issuies

na

I have a matching 77 cab with it with rola G12m25s .some of them are bewat so you got to look out. mIne came with monster cable pro 1000 set to parallel. once dialed in i was in heaven. This amp along with my 1981 JCM800 2203 and its glory another mint y fresh amp are ALL I NEED> Iwouldnt mind a 1972 or a 68 but you buy what your budget allows. I got lucky . These amps are what its about. REMEMBER THIS ONE THING . Surround your amp i.e guitars, tubes, cabs ,whatever with quality gear and youll be fantastic suround it with crap and it wont deliver .
tx

Marshall 1977 Super Lead, letter J

I play stoner rock, metal blues, type of shoit.

LumpyLikeDaddy on Myspace

this is a single channel amp with high and low inputs

needs no more features, perfect as is. load and proud with its 6550 tubes

i run 2 amps in stereo, this one and an Orange OR80 built in 73' with a 77' Les Paul Custom and a 2005 Fender Tele

1977 super lead

this amp goose to 12, it's F**CKING LOUD.

iv been using it at home as a practice amp its VERY inspiring. it's such fun playing a hundred watt Marshall at ten at night. iv had a Tom Sholz power soak for years and never used it till a few days ago, its a great tool. it goes so low as to use head phones with the Marshall cranked. I'm running it thru a 1X12 vintage 30 at home. this amp is so loud I'm going to have to use the power soak live too, just to cut it down 3db's or so, just below brain freeze.

the sound is fantastic. it needs NO pedals. it hits ZZ-Top, credence clear water (i know they used Kustom, but still) and Hendrix tones with ease, the use of the two volume controls for shaping the tone is just great. the amp is pure rock and not good for clean's, but i use an Orange OR80 on the other side covers that. my sound is getting more versatile as I'm finding these great instruments. I can't wait to record with this beast.

it gets decent clean tones by backing off the guitar volume, what ill need to find is a reveres type of boost pedal, something that I can stomp on and have my the signal to the Marshall cut back a bit. like a volume stomp type of pedal, not the wah type. then my OR can take over on the clean side. these two will work so well together, where the sound is 180 degrees opposite to one another but at the same they mesh just right.

I run 2 monster amps , I hardly ever need a clean, but sometimes I like to get that Hendrix sort of sound, backing the guitar volume down to clean up the Marshall Super Lead hits it on the head, I rum the Marshall on 5 (both volumes) gets that ZZ-Top Tres Hombres type of tone to a T. I run the Orange as loud as I can get it but keeping it crystal clear, and that's pretty damn loud, but I still can barley make out the OR over the gain monster Marshall without the Big muff on, so when I want to go from insanity to castles made of sand, I would just need to cut off the muff from the Orange and boost down the Marshall. the Orange holds all the power on the clean drive I could ever want, while the Marshall just pours the smooth purple notes.

he amp is in GREAT shape like a 9 out of a 10, never seen one like it (for a 77')

no problems so far, just that the Ohms switch fell out the first time i took it out of the house. i was lucky to find in a parking lot the next morning, but only after i turned on the amp and was hitting the switches and checking the cables before i found the Ohms knob was gone, lucky i did not burn out the OT as i was pretty much strumming with no speakers as this switch/knob is within the speaker circuit.

never delt with them, but Marshall i bet is very honest company.

Amp was built in 1977. It is a SUperlead 100 with the gren chiclets and Mustard caps stock. Amp is 100% mint stock and near mint condition. All the basic Marshall ingredients. FOur inputs and a five band EQ. thats it.! Just look under the hood and youll understand what this amp is about :>)To me it can be clean boosted. YOu can run a 12ax7 pedal with it and bridge the channels. YOu can run it stock and link again with an attenuatorwhile cranking this baby to 10 if you wish. Many tones can be achieved, i dont buy into the one trick pony theory here.

This is why I bought it. A friend had originally bought it off of EBay recently and sold it to me opting to buy another 50 watt Marshall for himself and his studio needs. THis amp is for the big boys and the stage IMHO. It is loud. TO get the tone you want you do need to at least turn it up to 2 on VOLUME II and 1 on VOLUME I with a TOnebone Hot British which is what I use with it. Tyhen crank from there to your desired volume. NOT for the faint of heart!

Let me just say it is aggressive and very power tubey. Articulate notes and a super fast picking attack are the words to describe this amp. THink Randy RHoads. He used these late 70s heads. Link the channels and run a BOne into their or run it stock for a Pageish tone with an Attenuator. It is tonal Nirvana! I LOVE THIS AMP!!And its even a PCB Board. There are three Mustards with one off the presence pot and the rest are those green chiclets. Wasnt sure how to recieve the chiclets or if I should eat them but this amp truly shines and will reward a good playing technique.

No problems yet. Having my recently bought NOS SIEMENS EL34s installed. It has four no name filter caps and two of those dark blue super toneful Dalys I may leave in their. If not ill replace all of them with ARS. They will suffice. I hear from people that the original Daly dark blue caps are the shiznit for that special filtering for your tone.

never called them

Overall, I have put 20 hours on this amp so far and have loved every moment of it. I have a BLackback Marshall G12M25 cab that getting rewired for it is out of phase at the moment. My buddies cab sounded warm and fat with this head and very musical. I say if your looking for a superlead vintage type and not wanting to spend $6k go for one of these. I am now looking for a clean 1972 Marshall Superlead pt to pt for my third and final piece for a while. THis is an addiction that can get out of hand if you let it. BUt isnt it fun :>)

My Super Lead is from 1972. It has the tone that all the great guitarists from the late sixties swore by. It is extremely loud and so mine has a self installed Master Volume (which was not done the way that Jim Marshall later(1975)did to this model).I have owned this amp for over thirty years and never had a single problem with it
even when I used to play it at full volume. I have two 1982 cabs from the late sixties which complete the total package.

I use a strat, A les paul custom and a flying v xpl. I play blues and rock styles. This amp has a clean sound when the volume is rolled back on the strat and gets very dirty when the guitar volume is up. I also on ocassion use a overdrive pedal to get sustain without using sheer volume to achieve it.

Thirty years and I never even blew a fuse on this amp. I have taken it to many a gig and it has never failed to function.It has never given me a problem.

I have never had to deal with customer service but due to the availability of these amps I am sure repairs and parts are quite available.

I have been playing for 38 years so I have a few different amps. I have downsized my equipment and am using a dsl combo for most of my rehearsals and jams as well as any smaller gigs.

Mine is a mid 1969 100 watt super lead with the metal panel, the cabinet is a bit battered but with all original parts etc. I have had it for about a year now and did a lot of work cleaning it up and servicing it. I traded a friend my upright piano for the head in filthy condition. I use it at 50watts with two EL34's (JJ/tesla tubes) through a celestion loaded 2x12 i built. A pity no reverb though. The head is big enough!

The sounds are very much in the 70's rock camp, the first thing you notice is that everything is very punchy and the amp has huge "push" the pick attack is so much more upfront and touch sensitive.(especially when dry)
The amp is on a whole quite dark, i can see why few people use the normal channel, and gets darker and smoother the longet its been on.
Clean tones are a bit flat but the fuzzy WARMTH as you go past 11 0 clock turns to ACDC crunch by 2 o clock, loud as hell and compressed, from there is doesnt get louder it just get more out of control. For more definition i would rather use a fuzz than turn it all the way up.
Most of the tonal variation will come from guitar and pedal settings as the amp controls are best at centre or with cut, boosting just adds noise. the overall tone leans very much towards Hot mids, i guess thats why the cleans are a bit flat. But at the right(or should i say wrong) volume, NOTHING i have heard gives the same organic, rich and natural distortion. Modelling feels like a letdown.

Fine, hand wired and built like a tank.

I have been playing for about 9 years and with guitar am mostly influenced by guys like Dave Gilmour, Eric Johnson and Angus Young. I write stuff influnced by King Crimson, Radiohead etc. I play two Teles: an 80s Tokai and new custom Tele with lindy fralins( 1x tele bridge 2x P90's ) and use a ouple of pedals: distortion, tremolo, analogue delay, Boss rv-3 and a Space Echo.
The volume makes it better suited to the second tele as the pickups are more controllable.
I have used this amp mostly for rehearsal, jamming etc. The only drawback for me is just the inconvenience: the weight, size and volume of this amp. Any volume setting past 4 overpowers a drummer (yes! mine is Half power!) and it only sounds good past 6. The head and cab also weigh a ton! for day to day stuff i rather take my peavey classic 50 around. I would only recommend it to people playing big stages.
To be honest, i would'nt pay a ridiculous price for an original, i have'nt heard the copies but by all accounts they are nice, i would recommend perhaps getting a smaller combo (20-30 watts) that can be cranked higher before the pain threshold sets in. Look, i love this amp but it is very impractical for me at the moment. Think carefully!

Mine is a 1972 Super Lead , Point to Point wiring, desirable mustard caps, I put telefunken ECC83's in the pre, and mullard EL34's in the power section. I also bias a little cold.

Pres,Bass,Mid,Treb,VOL1, VOL2 2 inputs (hi and low gain for each channel) Channel 1 is very bright, Channel 2 is very dark, bass like.

Mine has 3 switches on front, polarity, PWN on/off, STB on/off.


This thing is very versatile IMHO, those who say not are comparing it to the switch happy crap of today. So many damn switches and stuff that when your modern amp sounds like shit you blame yourself for not flippin one of the switches in the right position.....after spending a freakin weakend messing with setting you realize its the amp.


Not here this thing sounds amazing and you don't have to fiddle with a bunch of dials knobs, lean behind the back for more knobs, either.

I should point out that I paid almost as much for the tubes as I did the amp. The NOS telefunken/mullard combo makes a huge world of difference. You put crap tubes in here it's gonna sound like crap.

Use Strats, Teles, ES335, ES175, rickenbacker, and of course '59 reissue gibson les paul.

I also use a 1967 fender twin reverb (handmade pt to pt) and a 1967 fender super reverb (4x10 p2p wiring) for clean/tremolo/reverb sounds.

Have a bunch of footpedals too (MXR script logo Dynacomp,distortion+,phase 45, phase 90, arbiter fuzz face,and new stuff from pro rat, barber, fulltone, zvex,EH, bad cat, etc........)
I usually don't use any pedals unless I want to change my "sonic footprint" during solo's or just to vary things up a bit from song to song.

It can be clean at a resonable volume (say at 1/3 of the way between 0 and 1) and SUPER PHUCK N LOUD above that.

I use a THD Hot Plate and a JCM800 G12T-75 loaded cab. This thing goes from "punchy clean", "junky dirty", to thick creamy smooth buttery distortion that is impossible to articulate with words.

AC/DC, Free, Clapton, Hendrix, Zeppelin, tones are all in here.


Should also point out, no hum or noise, unlike others reported here. I would suspect if you are experiencing either to check the filter caps, they dry out every 5-6 years. Also in 1973 Marshall started to cut corners (remember the '73-74 world recession). They went from 5 filter caps down to 3 then 2. I wouldn't buy one unless it had 5.

My amp tech went through the schematic with me. It is a pretty simple circut, but that statement took a lot of reading and learning to be able to say. I have been combing ebay to pick up some of the components that wear out. The thing has been working fine for years , prolly still will (same with my vintage fenders)

Never had to deal with em, and I hope I don't cuz I've read and heard a bunch of horror stories. Plus they sold out and outsource practically everything to the slave labor camps of china.

I would never be evil to the chinese and buy a new one to perpetuate that rapping of the human soul to line one man's pockets (Jim Marshall)

been playing for a few decated, I would kill somebody if they even thought of stealing it, it is kinda irreplacable.

We all know the bare bones approach, so I'll skip it

Where is all this "One tone only" thing coming from. With the stock 12AX7s and EL34s, and a Power Brake depending on the output volume of the head, I can approximate anything from Edward to Keef to SRV. It depends on the guitar and your touch. that's the thing here, how you hit the amp. This head lets you play with dynamics. Now if you switch out the 12AX7's for 7025's you wind up with what can only be described as a Fender Bassman. More upper Mid crunch than a 12AX7. Great for serious blues. With the 12AX7s, great for Rock to Metal to thrash

Mines from 1969, still working. I've replaced the tube sockets with stock ceramics, But that's it

Never tried

Made in '74, covers the thing I'm able to play: Brit blues a la Clapton, Page, Beck, Blackmore, Green, Kossoff, Alvin Lee, Young & Walsh (not British - but hey!)

2 channels, no more. Completely original. How could I ask for more?

Switched to 4 KT66-tubes which delivers appr. 125-130 watt. Has the bite from EL34 but adds a more shimmering higher register... The high notes sing more...

Playing a Les Paul 1960 with Burstbucker 2 & 3 through it. It suits me perfectly.

Don't describe my style - just look at the aforementioned guitarists.

It's not noisy, it's very loud!

The amp does not provide any different sounds - my guitars do that!

Volume around 2-4, using a THD hot plate... Takes the volume down 4-8 dB

Very solid thing. Never broken down. Used it for app. 10-15 gigs latest year and a half.

My drummer is a electro-engineer... so he takes care of business!

Never had to contact them.

Been playing for 15 years, I have a telecaster which I never use with Marshall, playing it through a Fender Pro Junior, a MKII Tone Bender, a wahwah, boss digital delay... A Danelectro DC3 for slide and chord stuff... My drummer converted a 150 Sound City amp into to a Marshall Super Bass amp, switchable between 50, 100 and 150 watts... That gives me Kossoff-tone for real! =)

well,after reading some of these reviews it is clear that there are two divided camps on features. it looks like the nay sayers give the superlead a bum rap here because at low to mod volumes without master vol and bells and whistles like the mesa's and the like they claim no comparison. fair enough if you play small clubs.but if you play arenas and theatres,these bells and whistles are useless. you will end up cranking the amp anyway no matter what brand and it will sound better than it does in a small setting and hands down in this mode the superlead will sound better as it is in its element. so it depends on what your doing and where you are doing it. now everyone is entitled to thier opinion but i play large and medium size venues and if you are playing in a rock band that predominantly features guitar tone ala the black crowes or cream or allmans or ac/dc style music all the way up to some newer style music and all of the retro stuff out now, after owning everything from hiwatt to ampegs to tremoverbs(fine amp) to oranges and most of the boutique amps i still like the superlead. when you are playing concerts the fewer effects the better for most guys and girls and if you are in small clubs you will probably need them or an attenuator with the superlead so the bells and whistles amps might work better for some. i just use a smaller marshall combo or take two valves out of the superlead and use a 2x12 cab. but unmistakeably the best feature of this amp is THE TONE!!! oh i use a 72 superlead and a 74 superbass,one set up w/ 6550 tesla's and the other with nos amperex bugle boy's both used with all 4 valves.

i use a myriad of different guitars with the superlead and it requires almost no re-adjustment between them. a properly set up marshall will do this. that goes for most quality amps. my guitars range from les paul jr's, std's and customs from all years as well as tele's and strat's, vintage and re-issue. most with stock pickups,some with vintage paf's. the superlead is perfect for what i do which is rock lead guitar and ryhtym, as there is another lead guitarist as well. as for noise, my amps are properly set up and maintained so they don't make noise, except for the ever present single coil curse but i am able to be far enough from the amp to minimalize this a great amount. again, a well cared for amp of good quality will not buzz. these amps will go from clean enough to that sweet in between sound to saturated distortion just by the vol control on the guitar.(especially the lp jr's).

most touring musicians would never be without a backup amp and if you push any amp hard for extended amounts of time it will eventually fail. they will fail invariably without preventative maintainence and regular valve replacement. when an amp fails it is usually the result of this.

the warranty on newer marshall amps is 5yrs which is pretty good and i have used it on occasion. dealing with the u.s. distributor is useless so i have my own personal amp tech so problem solved. just remember, keeping these amps in top shape requires spending $$$ so if that is cause for you to be upset then buy a solid state amp and be happy. if you go this route i would suggest a lab series,hh electronics,roland jc120,all fine sounding amps.

i have been playing for 40 years. i will always have a pair of superleads in my arsenal. other gear is as follows; 64 and 65 bassman tops,vox ac30 and ac15,fender twin reverb w/jbls,hot rod deville,marshall jtm60,etc.ive compared the superlead to almost everything out there at one time or another. i love all the amps i own or i wouldnt own them but not much excites me like the sound of a well cared for early 70's superlead after all these years.

marshall super lead 100wat model 1959
my amp is from 1986 the only year i could find on it...so i don't know it could be way older then that.
i like the simple way it works ...treble mid bass and two volume knobs and that's it ...all you need anyway...the only thing i miss is a little bit of reverb but i got a pedal for that.
got 4 jack inputs which i got looped so i can adjust the amount of low end...it really fattens up the sound...without making it muddy..
i got a master volume put in and new EL34 tubes the thing that attracted me to this amp is the simplicity of it...less stuff, less stuff can break....

i've got a bambu cb 625 with one EMG 60 pick up in the neck position
got the amp stacked on a ENGL 4x12" (celestion greenback) stereo cabinet.....i tried it through a regular marshall cabinet but i really didn't like the sound it was a bit too dry for me.....this cabinet has a little more breath/air in it...which makes the tone come out full and round....
the thing above all else is the LOUDNESS of this amp...it's unreal ..live i hardly ever turn the volume up further then 2...so it may be a bit too heavy for my use ..although it's a save feeling of having a little more then you actually use...volume wise...there could come a day i'll need it...i play stoner/rock but with a lot of dynamic in it so i need to go from full on ditortion to a nice round clean alot and this amp does that nicely...although i had to get a grip on the crudeness of this amp...it's mainly just LOUD...so it took me a while to get the right settings and pedal hook ups.

i've been dragging this amp with me from gig to gig and never had it cop out on me ...i play without any back up so it better keep working.

it was second hand so no use for that...

if you like an authentic sound this is the one...there maybe better amps but i think every marshal super lead is unique in it's sound..
for me thus far the best sound