Marshall 1959HW Head

As modern amps go, this one is ridiculously simple. Four inputs (high and low sensitivity inputs for both high treble and normal channels). EQ section, and volume. Can select 4/8/16 ohm output. Uses 4xEL-34 tubes and 3x12AX7 tubes. The other "features" worth mentioning (since your are paying for them) are hand wiring and super authentic reproduction of a 1969 plexi head (including plexi panel and it even has an unused hole in the chassis - since in 1969 you could get the PA or tremolo model which used an extra tube, but Marshall used the same chassis for all these 100w amps)

This thing is viscious and EXTREMELY loud. I was testing it in the store and the clerk asked me to stop because he couldn't hear the phone (the amp was only at 5 through a 4x12). I had the good fortune to A/B it with a mid-1970s Super Lead that was also in the shop, and frankly preferred the re-issue - a bit tighter, not flabby, and slightly more musical. To my ears, with the right cab, it nails the vintage Marshall tone. Definitely has the "Marshall roar". If that is what you want, get the amp - it will do Hendrix, Page, Angus Young, etc. Great output tube distortion.

No issues. I pretty much dime everything (except Presence) and run it through an attenuator (saves my ears and my marriage), using the guitar volume to clean it up when needed. Lots of stories of issues, I can tell you mine is quiet, works as it should and has no issues whatsoever.

Never needed

I've been playing on and off for 20 years, but more serious now. I have an original Marshall Silver Jubilee 50 watt head/cab and love that - but just could not nail the 100w plexi tone with it. So, finally broke down and bought the 1959hw. Both amps are great, but different. I have a Les Paul, Johnny A Signature, a couple of Strats and an SG. It sounds great with all. Sometimes use a TS808, and a Fulltone Clyde wah - really no issues, everything just works and sounds as it should.

4 input marshall
made in 2005
bought new in 2005
plenty load
i have had 4 different attenuators and settled on the weber mass 150
which effects the tone the least.
it is made for two sounds crank it up to 8 and use your volume nob on the guitar to change the distortion level, or turn it down to 6 to clean it up.
i gave it a 10 because it does the two sound perfectly, which is what it was designed to do.

gibson les paul 68 custom authentic reissue w/ '57 paf's
play older rock
as with any amp, buy several different types of tubes and you will find one that is perfect.
i settled on the groove tube el34s and the groove tubes marshall high gain kit.
this amp is not noisy with good tubes
sounds exactly like it is supposed too.
will play marshall clean on 6 on the volumes as long as you don't dig in to hard.
turn it up to 8 or higher and the mids up past 7 and it will sustain notes for as long as you want and has that perfect marshall distortion, turn the guitar volume down and it will clean up.
have had most every high end amp from marshall, mesa boggie, and have played bogners and soldanos.
which were all very good, but i have not heard more depth and fullness of tone in anything other than this marshall 1959hw

i have seen all the bad service issues, but i have had this amp almost 4 years and play it 5 to 6 times a week.
i have never had any problems with this amp, ever.
don't throw it around and use good tubes that are biased correctly and u should not have any problems.
if you are playing for money or are obligated to play for someone else, you should always have a backup just in case.

never had to call them.
never had a problem.
i would rather pay for a repair, than ship it back to the factory anyway.

great amp would not want to have to do without it.
would like to have a bogner ectasy and a soldano slo 100 in addition to this amp, but their prices are ridiculous.
i only play at home and could not use it without an attenuator, the weber mass 150 is perfect.

The amplifier was made in 2006 when I bought it . I hasd sent from Sam Ash. They charged me exactly $2,800 sollars plus all shipping costs and taxes. But more bout that later.
Marshalls are not spaceships. THe versatilility factor amongst them is archaic. Now when I say this Im not saying I want a Mesa BOogie which has 14132 knopbs plus self variacing and speed conditioning and a flux capacitor which travekls thru tim. THats the middle range model. THere are four channelks on the 1959HW. CHannel switching is an odd word totuse for a Marshal 1959HW or anmy Superlead Superbass P.a or NON MASTER vERSION of the genre. Mqnual switching like a ychtsman in a regatae boat race is al the call of the day here. Now, Ibought this thing and Man, @Was i EXCITED. In al honsety the 1959HW is a sarn good Marshall but $2800 bucks>? Now we are talking a few years ago and though dealers it necessary to rape the public with its price tag others have been and this is say without hesitation and not because the chose this but they hAD TO come DOWN in porice. Ive $2,000 for opnwe now,. Id say n ow a fair price no more.
IT will blow a holer in your wall. SO either buy an attenuator . THD is nice and i had one and uea i used, My bias drifted some but I found right tubes,. ANd no they werent NOS> I think NOS is a fairy tale. Cept for the PReamp and even those come to suspect and shot failry speaking. I mean face iot. How 80 year old are gonna survive the elelments when their is a vaccumm element involved. SPecially power tubes. Theyre crap. For a 10% better sound and possibly longer $800 for a set of XF2 Mullard shield issue arent IMHO opinion worth the float. I tried JJ's, GT M ullard reissues and so on. Swapping between the first two a few times when gigging out. A couple times I had ti rebias with my meter. YOu gotta listen and not just bias and say"ok thats it, its a prize fighter."Not the gaamer. Plus let a TEch look at it. Ive seen a few with loose bolts and the best of manufacturing quality. Maybe isolated . I dont know. ALLL TUbe 100% Non Maintenance free but its new not a 69' which your tech will visit on occassion and nless hes youll pal from back the day your gonna pay him for all servicing i.e TUbe Biasing mianly. THats $100 bucks modeslty, etc etc...

N ow onto the sound of the amp, It WITH the right outboard Pedal which in the end was my choice and then If I anted some attenuatuon but not a lot becasue it will compress your tone or change it or something is differant. THD is not the culprit though cause ive other companies attenuators BLOW UP my TRASNFORMERS. VAboom! like that. YOu gotta look. Its not noisy at all. Very loud not noisy, Unless your a Jazz cat who likes those drumsticks with 1000 metal hair on each one to "keep the noise down"
THe ampif pluigged due to it being a SUPERLEAD can and DOES IMHO sound best linked from channel opne to channel . May have my channels off but lower left and upper right. Pretty sure. I have Marshalls , older ones too that are Non Master and i use them linked, but not always. A ONE TRICK PONY, NO 4 or 5 yeah! But hey a lot of amps have one ound thats it. I cant say which ones but you know . It is BRITISH ALL THE WAY. Marshall chinced on the parts to a degree. Specially with the caps. They are average at best however doesnt run out and but Sozos. Just leave um in run the amp. OVER ALL I GIVE IT a 9 !!! IT sounds really , witha pedal. RUnning full bore with an attenuator howerver wasnt as impressed . but. How mnay play madison square garden. And if you can. Go buy a wal of EVH 12000 series 1969 Marshall amps and anything from 1967 to 1972 and even the later metal panel which IMHO are some of the bestBEST sounding asmps out there. Yeah, PCB boards I said it. SOme of the best and wsolid and man tone for days. The 1981 JCM8002203 . Well its every now just like the 1959HW but will in the with these particur two pieces end up in its higher spot than the 59. SO in the end. It sounds really sounds. NOT superaggressive. Member patterneed after a 1969. YOu can get it to give up some heavy hitting tones though. YOu run the right DISTOERTIONH thru it,. NOT Overdrive . SOme Fuzz boxes sound amazing to thru it. I like tha mp.

Well, Blew couple trannies but my gault. no probs. Little loose here and there and had to resauder. $23800 hunj and shouldnt have to so that but hey. ITs still a 1959HW. You pay forthe NAME !

na

OVerall ive said it all.youy weanna play it you gotta pay it.! For $2800 dollars though a buddy of mine just picked up a 1968 superlead PA that was MINT INSIDE and takes 120 volts. Ouytisde the cab was a bit rough but not bad at all and the amp compared to a 1959HW.weell...you get thpicture.

Purchased new in 2005, Features have been explained in previous reviews. Plain and simple, no clutter. As per usual with non-master volume Marshalls, volume 1 needs to be nuetered by clipping that raspy bright cap wire.

Sounds great, but ya gotta turn it up. I use both Les Pauls and Strats through this, and it's a sweet sounding amp for either single coil or 'buckers. Once you're in the zone with this amp, it responds well to pick attack.
I have a few different 4x12's, but the handwired cabs that go with it seem to handle it best. 9 in this category, only because I shouldn't have to snip the wire on the bright cap on an amp I paid 2800 beans for.

Well, I run this head through a 16 ohm HotPlate, through either one cab or both. I don't dime everything, but it never really goes below 7 or 8. It's 2 and a half years old, still has the original power tubes in it, gets dropped and bumped around frequently and takes a general shit kicking. Why is my amp still alive and ripping heads off?
By the sounds of the other reviews, this thing should have blown chunks a long time ago. If someone goes through 2 or 3 of these, one has to wonder why. Bad attenuator, perhaps?
I know of a few of these that are the same age and working fine still.
They weren't all made on a Friday. I'm giving it a ten because it hasn't given up the goods yet.

Haven't had to deal with them, but I hear the distributor here in Canada is pretty abysmal.

Overall I dig this amp a lot. I'd like to run 2 of them together, if they weren't so expensive. If it got ripped off or blew up, I'd probably replace it, but I'd check out the new Vintage Modern series while shopping.

See previous entry

See previous entry

This is a follow up to the problems I had with 2 blown 1959HW heads (one blew an input transformer and the other the output transformer in a couple of hours). Marshall replaced the heads with new ones (took 6 weeks). The replacement heads had major problems, one did not work right out of the box and the other was put on a scope by the warranty person and shown that it could not be operated past 7 on the volume dial without damaging the amp. I walked away from this amp at this point and got my money back for the two heads and A&B cabs.

The warranty person and music stores involved were great! Marshall and their distributor in Canada (Ericsson) however, do not carry parts in Canada and are slow to respond to problems with equipment.

This amp has major electronic/design problems. I recommend that people do not buy this amp until they get the bugs out of it and are preparred to support the product.

This is a follow up on the 2 blown 1959HW heads returned to Marshall. Both went in a couple of hours.

See past comments

The first replacement amp out of the box did not work. I was shown on a scope that the second amp would fail if played over 7.

I waited 6 weeks for a new amp that didn't work and another that can't be turned up.

Yikes! 4 amps in 6 weeks. I walked away from this mess and got a different amp.

This is a review for a 1959HW (Hand Wired) 100 Watt Super Lead PLEXI.
The amp is amazingly versatile in tonal possibilities.
It has two channels, with two inputs each. It is very, very loud, more than enough power. Really straight forward with the control knobs (only 6) presence, bass, mid, high, volume 1, and volume 2, but these work together in seemingly infinite combinations to give many different sounds.

I'll start with the BAD and move to the GOOD. ***BAD*** It is quite a noisy amp! The first time I played it I picked up a radio station and it was so loud I could barely continue to play it. The "high" when cranked, is very fuzzy, lots of crackling. I was disappointed with the noise level! VERY NOISY AT TIMES. ***GOOD*** Amp can sound like anything. I use it to play Jazz when I cover John Coltrane tunes, it sounds great. I use it to play Hendrix and you can get insane feedback, it resembles sounds heard on The Band of Gypsy???s at the Fillmore album. Just like Led Zeppelin if you want it. It cleans up to give 50's tones. Can sound like late 90's grunge. It's very versatile. It can get a really, really "brutal" distortion, especially if you "jump" the channels together. It really blew me away when I cranked it. I wasn???t expecting such big, dirty distortion, yet with such resonant overtones. You can crank a jazz chord... something with tension ... and it distorts, but you can still hear all the notes. It's pretty cool.

I AM SO SAD ABOUT THIS AMP! I really love the sound, but for me it was COMPLETELY UNRELIABLE! In my opinion, this amp was built to sit on a shelf like a collector???s item trophy, and not be played. If you play it will break! I used to think mine was a "dud", a "glitch in the system", but I have read many reviews, and talked to many people in the industry who say the same, it's not reliable. I blew my output transformer TWICE!!!!!!!!! Two separate output transformers, on two separate occasions went bad and needed replacement. Both blew while running the amp "Hot"/"Cranked", just as the manual said to do. I had an output tube socket go bad. It needed to be re-soldered. A speaker in the 1960AHW speaker cabinet blew, and needed to be replaced. The cabinet fell apart and needed to be re-constructed. NO JOKE. All this really did happen and I have documentation. Marshall paid for all repairs but has been very distant when it comes to hearing my complaints. I am in the process of trying to get my money back for this amp that I have had in the repair shop more than I have had it to play, and I haven???t even owned the amp a year!

The only thing I can say is that they paid for my repairs. Marshall doesn't handle any of the warranty claims. All complaints, at least in the US, are handled by KORG USA. They have been very unaccommodating, cold, and unwilling to hear my complaints about my amp. I'm not sure if Marshall in England knows that the 1959HW is having issues, because they continue to manufacture parts that don???t seem to function properly when asked to perform. That???s all I can really say.

A FIVE. "Right down the middle" It sounds great, but if you want to hear it you have to turn it on, and then it might break. Pardon the dark sarcasm but in my experience it is true.

This offers what a good tube anp should - good clean tube power. Very little amp noise when not playing through the amp.

Excellent when it is turned up and the tubes get working! No distortion buzz common to many other new tube amps. I tried out many before buying these two.

The worst I have ever seen in 40 years. The first amp head I purchased lasted 6 hours before the output transformer blew. The second back up amp head I purchased days later went in 6 hours due to a short in the power supply transformer.

The local warranty technician is great but Marshall's parts for this amp (at least the one's I require) are not stocked in our city or in Montreal (stocking point for all of Canada). I must wait 4-6 weeks for parts - sorry but in my book thats not service. There is also no guarantee that substitue parts will do any better than the original parts. Perhaps a recall is in order. So local support gets a 10, Marshall support for stocking parts gets a 0!

When the amp is at 10 the tone is the best I have heard in years - well done! Too bad the amp can't perform at full volume for more than a couple of hours. For all you players that currently own this amp beware - if you turn it up you may loose it. Great tone but unreliable and may not be able to operate at loud volumes. What do you say when you finally find an amp that gives you the tone you've been searching for but then blows up when you use it?

traditional non-master volume marshall.

Vintage tones. Awesomely Loud in an good way. A little hotter than i expected. Reminded me more of Humble Pie's "Rockin' the Fillore" than say Cream. I thought it was a great sounding amp before it blew up. But after having two of these blow up on me within hours of purchase i have switched to George Metropoulos and one of his plexi replicas. After hearing both i have to say they are not even close. The Marshall is considerably more noisy, not as harmonically rich, and just plain not as good. The thing is i am not a boutique amp sort of guy in any way. I have never played a show without a Marshall in my backline, and have been a life long Marshall advocate, but i will never buy or use anything from them ever again.

Terrible. Terrible. Terrible. I went through three units. Two blew up after playing for under 10 hours. Totally unreliable. Granted i pushed the amp hard and the volume was consistently set to 8 or above, but this was ridiculous. After spending nearly $3000, you would hope to play the amp for a week.

Marshall has zero integrity..

I read some of the bad reviews of this amp on harmony-central and for some reason thought they were crazy or didn't know what a real marshall sounds like. Believe the hype. This amp is garbage. If you are serious about getting a handwired Marshall, go straight to Metro Amps and get the real deal with great support and for less money. Like i said, i will never but Marshall again after this experience.

2005 model. Fantastic. Anyone who thinks this should have reverb or switching doesnt get it.

Alive. With an OD pedal and the guitars volume knob theres no great rock sound you cannot make with this amp. Full and super responsive. The greatest thing about the sound is due to all the things it is not - no crap lile channel switching and push pull pots, reverb ... just a simple and great circuit. Thats why these sounded good then and now.

Some people are complaining about the bright cap. This is hilarious. Marshalls never sounded good turned out. They are tinny weak farters until you crank them. Then its heaven. Dont buy a Marshall to play on 5. Thats a waste of time and money. Get a hotplate, pull two tubes, do what you gotta do to reduce volume but for the love of god do not comment on a Marshall until you run it like its meant to be run.

So far so good. No problems yet. I agree with other that the workmanship is sloppy.

Never dealt with them

I've been at it 23 years. I've owned many expensive amps and guitars. The current JCM800 phase makes me laugh. I used to have 6 of them from playing in the 80's. People somplained about the lowered aulity of them at the time now they are "classic" and sought after.

Plexis are better sounding by far. More dynamics with just the use of the guitar vokume knob. Forget vintage as well. This is made as good as any old Plexi. I've actualy used the old ones. Some of them sound quite mushy. The good ones do not hit the market. THis 1959HW fills the void.