SCaRlETT amPlifiERS
Screamer 70
BY JORDAN WAGNER
I’ve owned a lot of gear over the years, and I
have more than a few regrets of selling some
of that equipment. One amp I kick myself
for getting rid of was an early-’80s Marshall
JCM800 50-watt head with forest-green vinyl
covering and wheat grille cloth. With its no-frills, single-channel setup and biting, brilliant
tone, it required you to hit the strings really
hard to get that famous Marshall grit. I ended
up trading it for a channel-switching amp
because I wanted to play heavier music at
the time. Ever since then, I’ve dreamt about
that amp’s sound, which started my love for
British-voiced amplifiers.
Scarlett Amplifiers’ Paul Marchman has
very similar tastes, and this is evident in his
Wildcatter 35, Lead Special, and Darkheart
amplifiers. Most of Marchman’s creations
are tonally influenced by Marshall amps of
the late ’60s and early ’70s. But with a nod
towards early-’80s Marshall JCM800s, the
red vinyl-clad Screamer 70 represents a new
direction for his company.
Digging in
Consisting of a simple 3-band EQ and Gain,
Presence, and Master volume controls, the
Screamer 70’s front-panel layout made me
feel right at home. Marchman designed
the Screamer 70 to be a bare-bones rock
machine, so there’s no effects loop and only
one input jack. The amp’s internal construction is immaculate, with a 1/8" fiberglass turret board with riveted, nickel-plated turrets.
The amplifier delivers its pummeling gain
via three 12AX7 preamp tubes, which feed
a muscular power section that features dual
Tung-Sol 6550s. Marchman’s design also
makes use of a unique presence circuit that
can drastically change the amp’s tone. In
most amps, the presence control affects how
much negative feedback or dampening is
applied to the highs and high-mid frequen-
cies. Marchman’s design uses only the bare
minimum of negative feedback. At the high-
est settings, there’s almost no negative feed-
back, which results in a major volume and
gain boost. The trick is to find the right pres-
ence setting to keep the low end tight and
under control. Of course, this depends on
your guitar and how hard you pick, too.
Pushing it to the limit
Like JCM800s of yesteryear, the Screamer 70
is designed to be cranked up. Back before
preamps with hugely saturated gain stages
were all the rage, the only way to achieve guts
and definition in guitar tone was to push the
amp’s power section. This approach creates a
very different feel than preamp distortion and
causes you to play a little differently, too.
Armed with Gibson Les Paul Custom loaded
with Tom Anderson pickups—an H1 in the
