My old HiWatt, 50 watt 1/2 Stack
Boy was this HIWATT thing freaking HEAVY!!! It was such a bitch to lug around. But I loved my HIWATT 50 watt, !!!I vividly remember being in the band for “GOD SPELL” at St. John’s College in Brantford. The music director for this production, who admitted to only be able to play the stereo, use to help us load the BEAST onto a dolly and moving it back and forth from the music room to the gym for rehearsals. He always said ” This big thing sure sounds great but, HIWATTS SHOULD HAVE WHEELS!!!” The cabinet and the head where the same weight I think.
I sadly do not have this beautiful piece of my history with me but ahhh, the memories! My parents bought this for me from the now defunked Brantford icon, “Music and Sound” run by Bruce P. He fled the country to the US because of some tax stuff, or so the story goes.
I had went and checked out amps and decided on this one. The sound was just HUGE! It also had a warm and soothing sound as well. Great from RUSH to Renaissance. With just a acoustic, it was wonderful. I used “Groove Tubes” in this with great results and changed them yearly, they were a bit pricey but you get what you pay for.
Check out this demo that I found on YOU TUBE
The morning after my 16th birthday was fuzzy and quite warm to say the least, the days before air conditioning in my house. I woke up and saw the sun coming into my basement bedroom. This was nothing new but this time I could barely make out a big fuzzie rectangular object sitting in the door way. When my eyes started to focus on this off thing, I realized that it was a FREAK’N 50 WATT, HIWATT, 1/2 STACK!!!!!! I ran over to this thing and plugged it all in, in a nano-second! I then plugged in my RD and let it rip REALLY LOUD! I think it was set to 11 on the volume control.
At this point my parents must have known that I was up and went on downstairs. They told me that God called over from next door (we lived around 100 ft. away from St. Pius X Church) and said he can’t think or something like that. Then came a knock on the door and the sound of a heard of guys flying down the stairs. Yes, it’s the boys from Gemini! They just stood their with their jaws on the ground, right along with me. I think that my parents did the same thing, not realizing how loud this new toy was.
February 2nd, 2007 at 11:54 am
Wow that got me dancing round the living room…took me back to my old head-banging days!! More please…
February 3rd, 2007 at 12:40 am
Sweet amp. the demo video is great to watch. Your other posts… pictures say a thousand words. Pictures please. The guitars sound sweet but words don’t do it justice. Nice stuff!
February 3rd, 2007 at 7:45 pm
nice amp, I heard about you through my mom’s blog, http://incoherent-ish.blogspot.com and thought i would stop by and check it out.
you think your amp was heavy, i recently got a marshal 120 watt full stack with a B.C. rich warlock in black. now THAT’s heavy. the really great thing is that our neighbours hate metal but feel it’s ok to blast thier rap music, so I turn the volume knob up just a litte bit more, just so they can see thier windows rattle.
keep on blogging man,
June 13th, 2008 at 11:39 pm
I have a hiwatt custom 50 and use it with a hiwatt 4×12 cab and many many pedals, its an awesome amp I am a “Pink Floyd” head, and i really do get the sound im looking for with this monster, I also get “The Who” sound easily too!!
It’s an awesome amp but its too loud for a bedroom, I have had to tame mine with a pair of yellow yackets by THD, which are tube converters, and I use a attenuator to be ablde to control the master volume better when using pedals with this thing, and its still ffffffing loud lol!
Great amp though!
June 14th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
Now that’s what I want to hear! I, like everyone else at some point in their lives, feel on hards times and grudgingly had to let go of this amp! I love to hear that some guitarist are still using the ye olde HiWatt with great results!
I’ve never heard of the yellow yackets that you talk about? What are they? Please come back to this post and explain because I’m sure I’m not the only one in the dark about it.
Keep on Jammin’ REALLY LOUD!!!!!
June 14th, 2008 at 1:32 pm
Stay tuned for more LOUD reviews in the future. That’s Ruth for coming by! I know, too bad I didn’t reply earlier.
Keep on Jammin’
June 14th, 2008 at 1:36 pm
Spawn of Satan, I bow down to you!
(1) you’ve got an awesome amp
and
(2) I bet that I can bow down more physically, then you can because you’ve got to lug around this one son of a —– of a heavy amp! My back just hurts thinking about bringing the whole thing up and down flights of stairs!
Keep on Jammin’
August 23rd, 2008 at 10:20 am
Great sound from that amp. I’ve always played Mesa Boogie Amps but after hearing this I may want to check out Hiwatt.
August 23rd, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Boy, what a unique name that you have there John Smith. Just ribbin’ ya!
Mesa Boogie amps are in a league of their own. I’ve heard absolutely nothing but positive reviews on these amps from friends and acquaintances. They are small, but heavy, with rich sound. I wish that I have tried one so the next time I’m in my neighbourhood music store, the 12th Fret in Toronto, I’ll check a couple out!
John, what series have you had over the years?
Keep on Jammin’