Mesa/Boogie MultiWatt Dual Rectifier 100W head
April 2010 Guitarist 103
£2,329
Guitar amps
L
ong before many of the
guitarists in today’s metal
bands had even been
born, Mesa Engineering
founder Randall Smith had
already written his own
chapter in rock history with the
creation of the original Boogie
amplifier. Possibly for the very
first time, here was a
manufacturer who was totally
hip to the concept of the guitar
amplifier as a musical
instrument in its own right.
Players such as Santana and
Larry Carlton developed a
significant part of their styles
based on what the Boogie could
do and soon guitarists weren’t
only noted for being Les Paul or
Stratocaster aficionados, but
also ‘Boogie’ players.
That would have been enough
for most amp designers, but in
1989 Randall and his team
scored another direct hit with
the amp that would provide the
sound for an entire new wave
of heavy rock music: the mighty
Dual Rectifier. Just like the
Mk 1 Boogie, the Dual Rec
raised the bar at a crucial point
in time and gave many players
the tone they’d been craving,
along with new styling that’s
become an icon in its own right.
The first 500 or so Rectifiers
had two channels, after this the
circuit was redesigned with
three channels and a number of
other component changes.
Predictably, a mythology has
since grown up around the ‘pre-
500’ units suggesting that
they’re the ‘holy grail’ of tone,
although post-500 users will
usually disagree. Now, after
nearly 20 years of
uninterrupted production, the
Dual Rectifier has had another
update. Is the new version going
to be the ultimate holy grail of
rock guitar tone?
In common with most other
Mesa products, the Rectifier’s
styling, fit and finish are
practically flawless. The closer
you look, the more obvious it
becomes that someone has
thought long and hard about
every aspect of this head’s
appearance, including things
that aren’t immediately
obvious, such as the way it
balances perfectly when picked
up by its single carry handle.
Inside the immaculately
presented steel chassis, the
electronics are almost all PCB-
mounted, with one large high-
quality main board and three
smaller ones for the rear panel
jacks and switches, output
valves and rectifier
components. The wiring is neat
and cleanly routed, with
separate leads to all the front
panel controls, making service
replacement easy.
There’s a lot packed onto that
front panel, making it difficult
to see the screen-printed
writing that tells you what the
function of each knob or switch
is. However, most are identical
for each of the Dual Rec’s three
channels and everything is
arranged in a logical,
structured way that makes the
amp quite easy to understand.
Each channel has a set of six
knobs for EQ, preamp gain,
volume and presence, with a
pair of toggle switches: one is a
new feature called ‘multi-watt’,
which lets you preset each
channel for 50 or 100 watts
output, the other is a voicing
switch that dramatically alters
the channel’s gain, tone and
response. Channel one, the
clean channel, has a two-
position switch labelled Clean
The Rivals
Rivera’s Knucklehead
Reverb KR100 (£1,998) is
one of just a handful of amps
that can match the Dual Rec
for tone and response. It’s
built to exceptionally high
standards and the sounds
are right up to date, used by
some of the world’s biggest
names in rock and metal.
Bogner’s Ecstasy Classic
(£3,100) is one of the world’s
best multi-function heads
and though, it’s frighteningly
expensive, it can give the
Dual Rec a run for its money
in the tone department.
Hughes & Kettner’s Triamp
Mk II (£2,499) is the biggest
gun in its fearsome arsenal
and combines superlative
tone with huge flexibility and
typically high build quality. Its
looks may be contentious,
but there’s no denying that
it’s a monster of tone.
Mesa/Boogie Multi-
Watt Dual Rectifi er
100W head
£2,329
One of the best rock amps in the world gets an update. But
can Mesa really improve on a legend? by Nick Guppy
Channel one’s clean sounds are perfectly formed,
with a sweet high-end, rich open mids and tight bass
that’s reminiscent of the best ‘blackface’ Fenders
GIT327.rev_mesa 103 25/2/10 8:21:7 am