I wanted a small amp to play at home, but wanted great quality. I kind of had the Vibro Champ in mind and took it into the demo room for a while. I took my John Mayer Stratocaster with me to test it and was completely blown away. Basically you just crank up the amp to 10 or 12 and control the sound with your guitar's volume control. It goes from a nice clean to a very impressive swampy overdrive. It's more than loud enough in my house when set to half power. Tube bias tremolo sounds absolutely fantastic and will likely make me use it more than I normally would. Workmanship is very impressive being hand wired and hand built with great materials. When I first saw this amp (before playing it) I thought Fender was nuts to be asking a grand for it. After using it I'd actually say it's not overpriced one bit. When i play through this amp it makes me say "wow" all of the time. If you're looking for a small amp for home use, recording or to mic up on stage this could be the one. You certainly won't get metal tones out of this little monster, but blues sounds don't get much better. Classic rock players should also feel right at home without the use of a bunch of pedals. The value of this amp isn't apparent until you fire it up and hit the first note.

waltah owns this item

I'm very impressed with this amp... both the tone and the craftsmanship of it. I am an owner of a company that manufactures products in the USA, and it means a lot to me to discover a beautifully made product that is created (somewhat) affordably in our country. It is expensive, but it shows in the details and the sound. The wood, the speaker, the wiring, the leather handle, even that Fender went the extra step to use nice-looking copper-colored screws on the front panel is an example of the thought that was put into this amp. The build quality is superb, however the white lettering on the chrome knob plate has seemed to start wearing off rather quickly... especially around the Input jacks.

The tone is unreal. I also own a 1968 silver-face Virbro Champ that I thought was the holy grail for me. This is better, and certainly quieter with less hum which is very nice. If you really boost this amp (I use an Ego-Booster sometimes) it just melts in a good way. It's amazing to finally see a current production model match or exceed the sought-after vintage Champs I've hunted down over the years.

I play two guitars through this thing. An American Deluxe Tele (the S-1 boost turns this amp into a beast), and a Nighthawk with P90's that really brings the guts + growl of this amp to the surface. My favorite part about the amp is that I find no need to have a single pedal between my guitar and it (I record a lot and occasionally mic it). There are so many sounds available just through it's responsiveness, especially with good pickups.

The tremolo sounds wonderfully warm and really hits the sweet spot as far as it's strength. I think it's fine that there is only a speed control for it. I have one slight criticism here: I wish the speed could get slower actually. Just a slightly broadened range in the speed of the tremolo would make it more usable for me.

I'm trying to be subjective here, but really I'm just absolutely thrilled with the tone and build quality of this thing.

jtjunker owns this item

I eagerly awaited the arrival of my EC Vibro Champ and when it arrived I thought wow sounds great, nice tone with the stock tubes, breaks up well and the vibrato was nice and articulate

Then after an hour a horrible crackling static noise occurred in the amp. After hitting a note it would decay quick and the crackling would start. Took it back to be looked at in Australia. After waiting 3 and half weeks they returned the amp supposedly fixed. Well, after an hour it did it again.

This only occurred on input 1. input 2 was fine but hey i paid for a working amp & i want it to work.

Not happy so it went back, and they sent me a new one.

So after another week i have a new amp that has supposedly been tested and works fine ...... Well after an hour, the same issue but worse than the first one. My primary intention for this amp was for a recording amp and it wasn't good enough. I went and got my money back


hope Fender sorts the problem out - a great sounding little amp otherwise

leftrightout owns this item