Mojave Ampworks PeaceMaker Head

I bought this amp brand new from Victor Mason at Plexi Palace. I tried many other amps in his shop, but this was clearly the amp for me. We're not talking about fancy channel switching, effects loop, midi gadgets, etc. We're talking good old fashion pure hardcore vintage tone with some room for gain (more gain than a Marshall Plexi). This amp really excels at all styles that I play, from blues to 60's through 80's rock.

I used an old Strat and Paul. I also tried a guitar with really high gain p/u's. The Strat and the Paul sounded awesome, and I prefered the Paul. The high gain p/u's aren't a good match with this amp. This amp is very quiet. The clean is surprisingly good, and of course the crunch is incredible.

So far I've had no problems and the support has been great.

Dealing with Victor at Plexi Palace has been great. The other guys working there are cool too. I mean, you can crank these amps at ten with no attenuation for as long as you can take it, and they don't mind at all. There's a special amp room to try out amps, and you just crank away. Never seen anything quite like it, not to mention all the vintage amps and combinations available to try out.

I've been playing guitar for over 25 years, and this amp will be in my rig for as long as I'm playing!! I would definitely replace this amp if it were stolen or lost. This is a beautiful vintage type amp in the vein of a Marshall Plexi, but with a higher gain preamp. There is no other product on the market that is designed and sounds like the Peacemaker. I've pretty much tried them all, and this is the one. The construction is amazing, and I don't feel bad paying the $2500 because of the quality and tone. I'm very happy to say the least.

This is a 100 watt single channel (low and high impedence inputs) amplifier with a very unique volume setup. Ther are Bass and Treble volumes that you can mix to achieve a very wide range of tones. Very straightforward, no channel switching, so effects loop, just the purest tube tone you've ever heard. 4 EL34 power tubes and (get this) 4 12AX7 premap tubes! Very much in the vein of a modified marshall plexi. Some might say the amp is limited because of this, but for my needs it gets the sounds I want.

BTW - to get higher gain sounds, you've got to crank the amp and at 100 watts, it is brutally loud. This is power amp distortion, not brittle sounding preamp distortion, but to deal you are going to have to have a Hot Plate. This is an essential tool required for a non-master volume tone monster like the PeaceMaker.

I play and record original guitar instrumentals, heavily influenced by early Van Halen, Dimartini, Lynch, etc. I was originally drawn to the amp because of the very convincing early VH clips that Victor (the guy behind Mojave Ampworks) made and posted to the Plexi Palace bulletin board. I am a hardcore Roth-era VH guy and I've owned Marshalls that were modded by Jose Arredondo and Lee Jackson and tried many other combinations of gear to get close to the VHI and VHII sounds. With all my various live setups, I've come close, but something was missing. With this amp and my current gear setup, I can reproduce these sounds *exactly* (to my ears anyway, YMMV - for example, my picking attack is very hard, which is similar to how Ed used to play). My current setup is an old Charvel strat with a Tom Holmes H455 bridge humbucker (8.5k output, very important to duplicate this tone with the PeaceMaker) - pedalboard with all effects hooked to a true bypass switcher, effects are original (AC cord) MXR Flanger, script MXR Phase 90 and a Boss DD-3 delay - into low impedence input of the PeaceMaker - Hot Plate - H&K Replex (set for single head delay, vintage factor maxed) - Peavey Classic 50/50 tube amp - MAW 4x12 cab wired in stereo (dry out from PeaceMaker/HotPlate into one side, Replex/Classic 50/50 into other. This stereo rig *is* the VH early sound as far as I'm concerned. I would use two 4x12s, but I don't have the room.

This amp is amazingly quiet at high gain/volume levels. Frankly, it is quite shocking. I'm used to old Marshalls and even my SLO-100 was a hiss machine at high volumes. I don't know what these guys do to make them so quiet when not playing, but needles to say, I sold my noise gate.

With the VH thing put aside, this is a very versatile sounding amp that is incredibly sensitive to your touch. By picking lighter, very sweet, cleaner sounds can be produced. Similarly, rolling off the volume on you guitar cleans up the tone nicely for quiet parts. I've honestly never played an amp that works so well this way. In the past I would just switch between multiple heads for clean/lower/med gain sounds, but honestly, now I can get all these tones from one head. Additionally, you can get very brutal high gain sounds with the amp as well. I've got an EMG-equipped seven string and into the high impedence input of the PeaceMaker you can get some brutal nu-metal sounds if you are so inclined.

Don't let folks convince you that this amp is a VH one trick pony. For sure, if you are into that tone, you *will* get it from this amp, but, geez, it is capable of *so* much more. Go play one and see for yourself.

Since I don't gig (strictly writing and recording in a home studio) I couldn't really say, but these amps are built like tanks. Far better than any Marshall I've ever owned and I used to gig those with no backup. The only issue I had initially was a noisy preamp tube that Vic quickly replaced. Amp has been perfect and incredibly quiet ever since..

Here is where Mojave Ampworks really shines. I am extremely picky when it comes to amps and tone and Vic has been accomodating at every step of my tone quest with Mojave Ampworks. When I decided to run my cab in stereo after purchase, Vic offered to re-wire the cab *and* swap out the speakers (impedence issues) at no charge! He did just that and also was very helpful in demoing the amp initially. Vic has been extremely patient with my pickiness and has been nothing but helpful in assisting me in getting the tone I wanted out of PeaceMaker. I've dealt with several *genius* amp maker/modifier guys over the years and frankly, they never seemed willing to take the time to listen (or even treat me nicely). Vic is an exception to this rule and a great, friendly guy to deal with.

I've been playing over 30 years and I've owned too much gear to even begin listing. For the music I play, the PeaceMaker is now absolutely essential. I wouldn't record without it. If my house burned down, it would be the second piece of equipment I'd replace (gotta get a guitar first...). Like I said before, I've owned vintage unmodded and modded Marshalls, Peavey 5150s, Soldano SLO-100s, etc and they never gave me what I was looking for. Bottom line, the PeaceMaker does what I need. Once again, if you get one, get a Hot Plate as well. This amp is too loud to play anywhere short of a hockey arena without one.

All tube, Hi and Low impeadence inputs which are sent to Bass and Treble volumes or channels. Bass, Low Mid, High Mid, and Treble. Basically a Marshall Plexi on steroids, no other features just like the real thing.

I have Les Pauls, and a fender strat with a humbucker, I have been using the Lindy Fralin p/u's in my guitar, it definitely seems that the lower resistence p/u's sound better with these amps 8K to 9K. I play various styles of old school rock and roll, and I have found that the Peacemaker is suited for many of those 70's heavy metal sounds. In addition to getting the Van Halen sound, yes this amp does reproduce that sound, it sounds good for other sounds of the 70's and 80's, Scorpians, Deep Purple, Judas Priest, etc.. I live in L.A., and I have owned two super lead plexi's which I took to Jose who moded heads for Eddie. This head smokes anything Jose did for V.H. trust me. I found the head to be more responsive than I had initially thought. It is very touch sensitive for volume and distortion, I can get a slightly cleaner sound by just hitting the strings lighter, and a more distorted sound by hitting the strings harder. When the volume is rolled off the amp does clean up nice, and still achieves a smooth distortion suitable for finger picking. Just like the real plexi this amp sounds good with the volume on ten, and the e.q.'s as high as you can get them. Because I live in this area I have been to Victor's store and I have heard his other heads. I particularly liked the side winder, which I plan to pick up for a little less radical sound than the Peacemaker.

I had one small problem with the amp which was do to a problem that the transformer company made. Victor quickly solved the problem and I have not had any problems since. I have had this head in the studio recording for 6-8 hours straight and it did not overheat or display any signs of fatigue. A real plexi would not be so reliable, I know, been there and done that.

I found Victor to be a very nice person. He was always willing to share his knowledge to help me get the sound I was looking for, aside from just buying his amp. He showed me that the lower resistence p/u's 8-9 K work better with his heads, also because his heads have so much tone and so much clearity, they are very sensitive to intonation inconsistencies, and fretting noise from the action being to low, he helped me get all that straitened out so that I could get the best sound I could from his amp. Victor demonstrated many different amps, effects, and configurations for using them. I found him to be very knowledgable and helpful.

The only thing that I could say critically about the amp, would be that it really is a one-trick pony, you can't play the blues, the beattles and van hallen on it, but I did find that it is well suited for a wide range of heavy metal music. If you are looking for that plexi on ten sound from the old school heavy metal guitarists, V.H., Yngwie, Schenker, etc... this is the amp. I have found over the years that dispite the fact so many guitar heroes had this type of sound, it has been the hardest sound to achieve, simply because it can only be achieved on way. I plan to get his side winder for other styles of music not requiring a sound so over the top.

This amp is in the spirit of the old traditional Marshall amps. No channel switching or effects loop, no reverb, BUT simply a single channel 100watts of pure TONE. The amp has plenty of power and will most likely require a hot plate or something to attentuate the volume level. Treble channel control, bass channel control, 4 bands of EQ control.

I mainly play a host of Paul Reed Smith Guitars, but also played a Steve Morse Music Man, and a Jimmy Page Les Paul through this amp with great results. I play mostly straight ahead rock and roll (Eric Johnson meets Joe Satriani) style, and this amp nails the heavier tones I use. The distortion will not satisfy the modern trash players as this amp breathes through both the preamp and power amp section and responds nicely to a varying touch. The Van Halen Brown sound is easy to get with this amp, and that is the benchmark Victor was using when he designed it. Suprisingly, the amp also cleans up nicely when playing single coils or rolling off the volume control on humbuckers. Pumped through a 4X12 cabinet, this amp sings with a beautiful woody tone.

This amp is built with a great attention to details. The component layout and wiring are clean and simple which should allow for easy troubleshooting or modifications if ever desired. Victor is great to deal with in this regard as he looks to build the amp to do what you want it to do.

when I was looking to purchase this amp Victor allowed to stay at his shop as long as I needed to, to make sure this amp was for me. We took the head apart to look at the components and talk about the engineering design that went into making this amp. Victor knows his stuff and is very well respected across the country in maintaining, modifying, restoring, and servicing tube amplifiers. Check out Plexipalace.com to see for yourself. Also, I took my 2 year old son with me to demo the amp, and where else can you find a shop that has a room with a tv and kids videos and toys inside to entertain the little ones while you wail away looking for the holy grail of tone!! Customer service from Victor is top notch.

I simply love this amplifier. Does it cover every single tone...No. It's not a do-it-all in one box amp. BUT, the tones this amp produces are incredible. The amp is very 3 dimensional and breathes like a quality hand built tube amp should. The Van Halen tone is worth the price of admission in itself. I read the other review talking about ghost notes, and yes mine has some ghost notes present when playing single notes. They are very subtle and in the background, and go away when playing two or more notes together. I have a few old marshalls and vox's that produce more prominent ghost notes whereas these notes on the Peacemaker are much quieter. If you crave a nice, high quality, hand built tube amp that takes where an old marshall 100 watter leaves off and goes just a little bit further, then this amp is for you. It's a KEEPER.

This is for a brand new handmade Peacemaker from Mojave Ampworks. The features of this amp all revolve around its incredible tone. No effects loop, no channel switching or reverb, BUT the most incredible sound in a 100W tube head. This is in line with the older Marshall Plexi amps and will nail the Van Halen sound as well as other tasty treats. I love the features of being able to mix the treble and bass channels, the high and low sensitivity inputs,and also the 4 band eq section.

I play an assorment of Paul Reed Smith Guitars with pickup readings ranging from 8K up to 14K, both single and humbuckers. This range with the high and low sensitivity inputs on the amp yield a wide range of possibilities in sound. The bread and butter sound of this amp is the old original Van Halen brown sound. This amp ROARS!!! The distortion is not a modern thrash distortion, but a full bodied distortion that works excellent in both rhythm and lead styles. You will most likely want a hot plate or something to help attenuate the volume levels as this 100 watter is loud.

So far this amp is holding up well. The craftsmanship and attention to detail are all top notch and I have not experienced any reliability issues thus far.

Victor was extremely helpful when I was considering the purchase of this amp. I was welcome to visit his shop, play as long as I wanted to, and also received insight into the design and building history of the amp. He even had a room where I could have my 2 year old son watch kids videos and play around while I did my shopping. Where else can you get that?? Not at Guitar Center !!!

I have been playing guitar for over 20 years and there is nothing like plugging straight into a head and 4X12 cabinet and moving some air. This amp contains incredible tones and is a main piece (along with the Mojave Coyote) in my playing rig. When I need the perfect distored 'van halen-ish' sound, this amp delivers. It produces a thick yet articulate distored sound where you can hear individual notes in chords, and an incredible lead tone to boot. This amp will stay with me for many years to come. Thanks Victor for taking the time to produce a great sounding amp, the old fashioned way, with quality parts and engineering !!!

I have owned the Peacemaker for quite some time. I have the 1st production model that Mojave Amp Works put out in 2002. I have tested the amp extensively at home, recording, and in a live band situation and feel I can make an honest judgement of the amp at this time. There are many aspects to deal with. The most important being the incredible versatility of the Peacemaker. You can truly achieve the entire spectrum of tones from clean blues all the way through the highly elusive Van Halen tone. The amp has a low and high sensitiviy channel. The tones from the each channel are matched very well. The difference simply being more gain. Both channels allow you the ability to solo with thick, round sounding notes (without the piercing high end) as well as play fat, clear sounding chords even at high levels of gain. I practice straight into the amp on the low sensitivity and play out live in the high to compensate for signal loss due to a Phase 90, MXR Flanger, and a Cry Baby Wah. The tone of the amp still holds true to form. The most impressive feature of the Peacemaker to me is the ability to play heavy sounding distortion and leads (from VH, ZZ Top, AC/DC, Aerosmith to Disturbed, Rob Zombie, Limp Bizkit etc) and just by turning down the volume, achieving beautifully clean tones that are thick, warm, clear but not buzzy or glassy. There is no master volume so the amp screams and roars like a lion but a Hotplate takes care of that without suffering tone. When the amp is cranked down to 16 ohms on a Hotplate you will hear a bit of difference but in a live situation I have not needed to play below 12 or 8 ohms.

Right off the bat it is crucial to know that you should not play this amp with any high output pickups. This amp is built like the classic Plexi amps. I played EMG pickups through it and the tone did not come through. The pickups effected the tone too much. I have a Fender Strat with a Kent Armstrong humbucker that works perfectly with the amp. I have Tom Holmes pickups on order to compare but you can use any low output pickup (7.5 to 8.9 or so) that you prefer. I have read the review about the ghost note problem and I agree with what the Plexi experts say. You will hear them slightly as in the old plexis but not enough to effect your tone or send the amp back. It may just be a simple filtering issue that can be corrected. I have also played a JTM 45 Offset half stack that Marshall made only 300 of. Although I loved the Marshall and the tone the amp had, the Peacemaker clearly ate it for lunch. The Peacemaker goes well beyond where the JTM 45 Offset stops. The bottom end on the 45 did fart out at a certain point and although the high end wasn't as bad as on most Marshalls, that problem is non-existent with the Peacemaker. The Peacemaker, (although I heard was not built for this purpose) does handle all the heavy tones of todays extreme rock music but still holds on to the integrity of true tube sounding, poweramp distortion, non-master volume tone. If you have never played a non-master volume amp, do not expect to jump on this amp and treat it the same way. It is a different animal but this amp is what the others are trying to sound like!

There was a transformer issue at first but it was from the factory and not the amp and does not exist anymore. I have played the amp on live club dates (9pm to 2am), 3-4 hours of straight practice and the amp holds up like a champ. It is built like a tank and the craftsmanship is flawless. The point to point wiring is so neat and perfect along with the sparkling chasis that hours upon hours must have gone into the assembly. As in all old Plexi type amps that are run wide open I have been told you will go through tubes alot but it has been 3 months at the time of this review and the tubes are still fine! I don't think it is practical to ever to a gig with out a back up but I have not had to use one yet.

Plexi Palace took immediate and quick issue with and early transformer malfunction and I had the amp back in perfect running order within 3 days from the time it left my house. The amp is really simply but well built. I have shown it to techs around my area and everything is easy to follow and locate. The warranty is lifetime so feel free to jam away and open the amp up. The tone is awesome!

I have been playing the guitar for 27 years and have gone thru almost every type of amp out there. I have had Marshall Plexis that sounded great (as a young punk I unknowingly let them go), JMP combos, Marshall heads with master and non-master volumes, Boogie heads, the whole processing craze of the 80's (hope that nightmare is gone for good),Fender Twins and so on. The Peacemaker simply captures the best features of the old Marshall Plexis and combines them with the best features of the "new rock tone" of the Boogie Rectifier amps. It is like I got my old plexis back better than ever. I feel the amp really captures the tone of the VH 2 and Fair Warning but at the same time allows the new "extreme tone" to be obtained. You are not stuck with one sound or tone. Remember, the heavy VH sounds and the new Puddle of Mudd, Limp Bizkit, Sevendust sounds are achieved through tone and not uncontrolable gain, tubescreamers, and distortion boxes. Let the Peacemaker amp and your hands do the the work! The Peacemaker is made for the player who plays with their heart and soul. The tone will come out in this 100 watt monster!

Well........

Victor Mason called me upon reading this review. He was very apologetic of what happened with my amp. He admitted that things could've been done differently. IMO, that took a lot of heart and I appreciate it. We had a nice conversation and I felt a whole lot better afterward. That's why I am writing this follow-up. I would do business with Victor again.

One channel. Based on a Plexi Marshall. Controls include: Bass, Low Mid, High Mid, Treble, Bass Volume, Treble Volume, Low Sensitivity Input, High Sensitivity Input. Power section is 4 Svetlana EL34's. Pre-amp is 4 Tesla 12AX7's. No effects loop, line outs, etc. Just a straight-ahead sigle channel amp with no frills. The way it ought to be. I must add that I really liked the idea of the separate mid EQ's.....very cool feature.

This amp was supposed to be able to capture the EVH "brown sound". That is why I bought it. However, I could not keep the amp and had to return it. Here's why.......

Upon first plugging into the amp, I could tell that it was capable of getting killer tone. But, as I turned it up and began to play, I noticed extremely audible ghost notes: an additional note underneath the fundamental note that I was playing. It literally sounded as if I was playing through a harmonizer. I was very dissapointed. I called the builder of the amp, Victor Mason, and asked him what was wrong. He said to "ignore the ghost notes" and that "every old Marshall sounds like that". I wasn't so sure.

I contacted 2 of my former instructors, both of whom own original, well cared for, mint Plexi Marshalls. They were insistant that while the amp should produce subtle ghost notes, it shouldn't be as noticeable as what I was experiencing. They both agreed that the amp either had a poor filter cap or was not filtered properly to begin with.

I called Victor again. He commented that maybe I "didn't want the old VH tone" and that this amp "gets that tone perfectly". I was a little upset at this because I could tell the amp had a great sound but I could also tell that something was wrong. Sadly, after one more call, I ended up sending the amp back for a refund which Victor graciously offered.

One thing of note: This amp will not totally reproduce the old VH "brown sound" nor will any amp for that matter. There are many other factors invloved to getting that tone. Victor recommends buying a THD HotPlate, an Echo unit, a separate power amp, and another cab to go along with the Peacemaker to achieve the tone. I just don't want to get into all that extra equipment.

I only had the amp for 4 days but I could tell the workmanship was top-notch. The construction was flawless from the perfectly applied tolex to the beautiful stainless steel chassis.

I have mixed feelings on this. On some occasions when I called, he seemed too busy or had to go right away. Granted, I'm sure he is extremely busy and gets a ton of phone calls every day but at the same time, I was spending a lot of my hard earned money on his product.

Also, the arrival of my amp was later than the time that was projected. This was partly due to the fact that he builds the chassis in California and his partner builds the cabinets in Virginia. So, he had to ship the finished chassis to VA so it could be matched up with a cab. I had asked for a tracking number as soon as it shipped. I finally recieved the tracking number....on the day I received the amp. No biggie, I guess. It just seemed as though the lines of communication weren't very consistant.

I have been playing for 20 years now. I have owned a Peavey 5150, a Bogner 101B, a Bogner 100B(Steve Vai head), an Egnater TOL100, a Mesa Triple Rectifier, Mesa TriAxis/2:90, and other cool amps such as a Silvertone 1482, a Gibson G5AT, and a '73 Fender Bassman 100.

It upsets me that this amp didn't work out because, as I stated before, it seemed to have a great vibe to it. It had a nice woody, brown characteristic to the tone. But, the ghost notes "stole the show" with this amp. They were just too much.