Origin of Van Halen's #1 Marshall?

[DaveMcLain]

I'm curious if Mr Van Halen has ever told the story about where/when he got his favorite 100 watt Marshall amp. Was it his first Marshall amp purchase? Did he buy it from a music shop? Did he buy it cheap in bad/blown up condition and then do some repairs? Did he get a cabinet too at the same time?

[julkke]

I think it was a house amp at some club, he bought it secondhand

[jape88]

It came from the Rose Palace theater as a house amp, white knob could of already been on? ...but who really knows

[EJSLPlexi]

take this FWIW but everytime eddie spoke of this particular marshall he always made a point to say it had "unbelievable balls" and sounded "different" than his others.
being that this was a "house amp" no one will ever know what had already been done to it.
But if you believe evh's own wording i take it that it was one of the better 100 watters around back then.
blix had a 68 or 69 he made clips with of unchained and mean streets and that sounded incredible.
so i take it some were better than others for gain.

[jape88]

Was it actually Ed that said it came from the Rose Palace? the thing is the Palace had some great acts on there, in 69 Led Zep and many others so was this a common thing to have an amp sitting round? I can understand clubs but a big venue? The other thing is Ed starting gigging at Gazzara's in '74 but never played RP even as a support, how did he find an amp sitting round in the back? unless it was being sold from a store for the RP ...oh well another Ed story

[JimiJames]

Just like many manufacturers (including guitars & pedals) did with their production line when supplies run low and needed to be reordered. Meet the demand; ship it. Russian Roulette or Luck of the Draw, some were better...
As VG has mentioned in the past, there's a gain increase in different cathode & and a tone stack values where the gain is minimal and where the extra mids +/- would give a more perceived gain. So maybe that's where part of the magic lie's if some were better for gain.

[dirtycooter]

Well I know one thing......
We will never see the "#1 Marshall" replica like we did the $25000 Franky replica.

No way ..... No how...

I still think it was more of "how he used the amp" more than it being "something super rare".

Some amps have certain elements that are part of its dna makeup and make some impact tonally.
But if the dude usin it don't know how to make it fly then you got nothin.
It would be similar to givin a blind person a Ferrari or Lamborghini, or bein dickless and goin on a date with the hottest chick in the world

[Tone Slinger]

Ha Ha Ha , EXACTLY !

Yeah, Ed's 12xxx "Is what it IS, and AINT what it AINT", in other words, You take several of these Metro builds here and you will get as good (if not BETTER in 'certain' aspects) than Ed's 12xxx was in circa '77-'81, BECAUSAE the spec is the same. Granted, the trannies are slightly different and maybe certain caps/resistors may have drifted slightly, still, you get there with these accurate clones.

Ed DID have a GREAT example of a super lead, which is why we have worked so hard to track that spec/recipe down.

[rgorke]

And how it was recorded played a significant role in how it sounded on the albums.

[vanhalen5150]

I'm building one right now. Soldering in some magical stuff.

[chrisom]

I remember reading in one of the Guitar mag articles where they were marvelling over the fact that before EVH's plexi was the house amp at that club, it was owned by none other than....... the BEE GEEs! Seriously- I'm not kidding....

[VelvetGeorge]

I would ask Tubetramp, he was around back then and might know.

George

[Brian Wallace]

I agree with George, Trampy knows about VH.

[19sixtynine]

hey, the bee gee's used marshall PA gear.

[jnewlyn]

Rose Palace house amp has long since been known and confirmed many times over again. What you do with the amp is far more important than the amp itself if an amp is built well enough. Listen to the cats around here with the skills in their hands and home brew EVH amps. Nuff said.