Marshall JMC800
Rock’s best-loved amp gets another look...
it didn’t go down well with classic rock players but guitarists who were part of nwoBhm loved its tight, aggressive tone
Ask any non-guitarist to describe a guitar amplifier and the chances are they’ll use words like ‘big black boxes’, ‘gold panel’ and ‘white writing’. Because the amp most people have an image of in their heads is the iconic Marshall JCM800, one of the world’s most popular and widely-recorded amplifiers.
The JCM800 entered service in 1981 at the end of Marshall’s infamous distribution deal with Rose-Morris; without the huge mark-up Rose-Morris previously applied, the newly affordable JCM800 rapidly achieved popularity all over the world. The JCM800 was Marshall’s second range of master-volume-equipped amplifiers – in fact, the very first models, the 2203 and 2204 were repackaged earlier Master Volume circuits, followed swiftly by the channel-switching 2205 and 2210 models. These were the first to use diode-clipping – mixing valve and transistor gain stages to increase gain and distortion. It didn’t go down well with old-school classic rock players, but guitarists who were part of the new wave of British heavy metal loved the tight, aggressive tone of the newer hybrid amps, as well as other modern features like effects loops and channel switching. Very quickly, the new breed of Marshall was accepted and became an integral part of heavy metal all over the world. Later circuits were somewhat more refined (if such a word can ever be applied to a Marshall), attempting to bridge the gap between the new hybrid design and the purer tones of the earlier all-valve models. The aggressive bite of the original JCM800’s has written its own legend, and today rates as one of the all-time great guitar tones.