Marshall Amplification is one the biggest and most well known
guitar amplifier companies around. They and
Fender are probably the biggest names around. Marshall was started in 1962 in London. In the
1960's and 70's they were used by artists such as (previously mentioned)
Jimi Hendrix,
Black Sabbath,
Jeff Beck,
Motörhead,
Peter Frampton, and many others. Recently, their amps have been used largely by
Nu Metal bands and general metal bands such as
Papa Roach,
Def Leppard, and
Slayer.
They are known best for their great
crunch/
distortion, but they are also used in many
blues applications (though not nearly as extensively as
Fenders). The classic setup is a 100
watt Marshall
tube (of some sort)
head with two 4x12"
speaker cabinets, all together refered to as a
full stack. Where as Fenders generally use
6L6 power tubes, Marshalls are mostly run off of
EL34 power tubes instead, which are grittier and more prone to
harmonic distortion.
Their 1960's amps are probably some of the most sought-after
vintage amps on the planet, even though now they seem to be moving away from tube amps and towards
hybrids and
solidstate tube
emulation.