JJ vs Butterslax vs BE

MistaGuitah

Well-known member
I have all three of these amps now. The JJ has bubbled to the top, so now I need to determine whether to let go of my BE or Butterslax. The JJ's JB mode edges out the BE, but it does not have the midrange growl of the BE. It has a little bigger low end and upper mids with a flat EQ than the BE with a flat EQ. It is hard to tell which one cuts better through a mix. Metal is a little more natural to the JJ and Butterslax, but the BE is surprisingly aggressive enough to keep up with the back switches up and the front switches to the right.

The Butterslax is really unique. It's pretty much useless for cleans, but anything bluesy and maybe some classic rock it can do. What is most surprising to me about the Butterslax is that it seems very refined. It's a metal monster but I gotta say the lead tone is where its at, maybe better than the JJ's JB mode. The JJ is surprisingly as articulate with the gain maxed out as the Butterslax. The BE has the most midrange punch, and thicker than both other amps with the fat switch up.

It seemed like two weeks would be enough time to make a choice, but here I am three weeks later and cannot decide. It's going to hurt either way. The Butterslax is the most inflexible, but the one main sound it has is so damned good. The JJ is as versatile as the BE in my opinion, except no boost, because the toggle switches are not footswitchable. If there was a way to toggle the back panel Sat switch when engaging the boost on the footswitch, then that would make the BE like a 3-channel head.

It's hard to decide since the BE is like ultimate Marshall box and can pretty much do any kind of music. The JJ is not the proverbial Marshall style, but I think the clean channel is better than the BE, and the regular BE mode is very satisfying for low to mid gain tones. Then it has the JB mode which is sort of like the BE with the sat,S, C45 and voice switches all on at once. The Butterslax is the most mysteriously appealing of all three. It is more refined than I expected, not too versatile, but it makes me want to solo all day long.

I would like to hear some owners chime in on these three amps. The SS sounds like it is very versatile. The demos make it sound like it can do pretty well with heavy metal rhythms, but reviews describe it more like a classic Marshall tone. I do not hear that in the demos because it sounds syrupy and kind of a darker bass sound like the JJ. The Butterslax vs SS would be comparing very different amps, but it would be interesting to hear that contrast.
 
BE100 all day for me....I like JJ but it's a little too deviant from the Marshall tone I love....

SS100 is also very good and has a great clean...But for an overall, it's a no-brainer, BE! :)

IDK Butterslax well enough to comment...
 
I've got the BE50 and Butterslax. My Slax is in the Classifieds ONLY because I can't afford to keep both and the BE50 fits my needs better.

I love the Slax. I never play completely Clean as it is, so I LOVE Channel 1 for dirty clean to early hard rock. Then that channel boosted is super awesome. Very punchy. That makes the Slax pretty versatile to me, but not as much as the BE50 or a BE100.

I've been wanting a JJ for a long time, but opted for the BE50 instead. I love all the Friedman's I've played.

Curious to see where you end up and good luck with the decision!
 
The SS is not going to be as heavy as the JJ or Slax.

It also doesnt have the growl and aggression potential of the BE, so keep that in mind. Its like a slightly more aggressive classic plexi with a bit more gain and a lot more low end available if you dial it in that way. It does have my favorite clean channel out of them all - the most Fendery.
 
I love the Slax and had to decide between these two amps as well and ultimately went with the BE-100 because it overall was more "me". I think it gets plenty heavy for what I call metal but then again I did Cannibal Corpse tunes on a JSX. Hit it with a boost and it's thrash for days. No experience on the JJ so I am no help there.
 
I've got all three, none are going anywhere. If one were to move it's probably the be100 for either a be50 or a ss100.

JJ is pert near perfect for me, slax is just fun and I'm a fanboi of mastodon and alice...
 
Been gassing for Friedman lately, played a BE100 at a music store a month ago and its been in my head since. Im looking for that core Marshall tone, so probably just gonna go with a BE100. Would love to play a Butterslax. Gonna keep an eye on this thread like a hawk.
 
SomedudeinTX":3cvl1ft2 said:
Been gassing for Friedman lately, played a BE100 at a music store a month ago and its been in my head since. Im looking for that core Marshall tone, so probably just gonna go with a BE100. Would love to play a Butterslax. Gonna keep an eye on this thread like a hawk.

That "tone" is available much cheaper. I guarantee my Ceriatone Yeti will give it a run for it's money, as will a Splawn.
 
napalmdeath":3scblir2 said:
SomedudeinTX":3scblir2 said:
Been gassing for Friedman lately, played a BE100 at a music store a month ago and its been in my head since. Im looking for that core Marshall tone, so probably just gonna go with a BE100. Would love to play a Butterslax. Gonna keep an eye on this thread like a hawk.

That "tone" is available much cheaper. I guarantee my Ceriatone Yeti will give it a run for it's money, as will a Splawn.

So what.
 
The reason I spent the coin on a Friedman is that is sounder fuller and more 3D than other amps I’ve owned (Marshall, Splawn, Helios, others). I have the BE50. It is not a smooth amp at all. It’s got an aggressive vibe to it.

Yup, you can get a badass sound from a Splawn at a lower price. But it’s not a SLO, Wizard, or Friedman. Sorry, it’s just not. But yes, Splawn’s sound great and cost a lot less. Just depends on what you want and are willing to spend.

I recommend a Splawn any day of the week, and you owe it to yourself to play a Wizard, SLO, Friedman, just to see what they are all about.
 
I had this setup for a day (ignore the DSL). I compared the two for a couple hours. In the end, the BE sounded bigger and more dynamic at gigging volumes. Only by a bit though. Both are amazing heads. Wish i could have kept both honestly.
IMG_0229.jpg


Also... never justify to someone why you have a Friedman. The Friedman speaks for itself. It needs no justification.
 
atrox":311gx963 said:
I had this setup for a day (ignore the DSL). I compared the two for a couple hours. In the end, the BE sounded bigger and more dynamic at gigging volumes. Only by a bit though. Both are amazing heads. Wish i could have kept both honestly.
IMG_0229.jpg


Also... never justify to someone why you have a Friedman. The Friedman speaks for itself. It needs no justification.

Agree.

So the BE sounded bigger at gig levels than the JJ to you?
 
The BE sounded bigger than the Butterslax to me. The Butterslax seemed to have the same tone at all volumes. never really got as much of a power amp push as the BE did. Subtle differences, but the BE came out on top for me.

I have yet to play a JJ :(
 
Here is an update on the situation. I traded my Butterslax for a guitar and some money but really kicking myself in the ass for it. I was having a hard time getting over not having a clean channel and decided to choose versatility of the BE. After boxing it up and shipping it off, I was obsessive about choosing between the JJ and BE. I made many mistakes in this whole process which I will detail for you here.

First, it is not really a fair comparison if you compare any of these amps by themselves. The only comparison that really matters is in a band mix. The BE has a certain midrange growl that the JJ and Butterslax do not have. People almost always try out amps isolated, so the mids standing out in the BE a little more probably draws the most preference. However, it sounds different in a band mix.

In the low end, the BE sounds to me like it is on par with the JJ and Butterslax. I would say the BE has like 85% of the bass the JJ has. The Butterslax is kind of deceptive because it is not a V curve amp like the Mesa Boogie Dual Rectifier. The Butterslax actually has a very up front midrange that stands out more than the low end, and might give the impression that it has less low end than the JJ. In reality, I think they are all about the same. The low end punch comes through in a band mix. I kind of agree with atrox about the Butterslax, but the way I perceive it is that it is the best of all three amps maintaining its character from one side of the volume dial to the other. The BE and JJ probably have a more classic way of filling out when played loud.

I think if there was a way to look at all three amps in a graph that shows the full frequency range from low to high, then the BE seems to have the most prominent mids across the full frequency range. Yet, the JJ is not mid-scooped. I would describe it as mid-combed, meaning most of the BE mids are there but some bands across the midrange frequencies are pulled back. The upper mids are least pulled back which makes it sound like an emphasis in that range. The Butterslax sounded to me like the BE with a spike somewhere in the lower midrange.

The BE has the most transparent tone, JJ a little more color, and the Butterslax most colored of the three. With the BE, the wood and pickup characteristics really come through. Sometimes the BE can sound brassy. The BE's voice switch is kind of a double-edged sword because it opens the amp up, adds some low end, but also adds some brassy high end. The JJ is also very sensitive to the guitars wood and pickups, but not as transparent which lets it sound heavier with lower output pickups. I would have to say the JJ is actually a little more appealing for low and mid gain tones. It is my impression that the JJ is less compressed than the BE. The Butterslax is very unique in that I did not pick up on a lot of compression coming from that amp, like you can dime the gain and there are few amps that can do it without being too compressed. That is a work of genius. The BE has more midrange growl than the JJ and Butterslax, but also a little compression that makes it sound smoother. Maybe that is why people say the JJ is more aggressive.

The JJ has a little more flexibility in the clean channel because it has a master volume. My BE just has two volumes and the clean stays very clean. This is one thing I very much regret about the Butterslax because even though it did not do cleans, channel 1 has a pretty wide array of gain tones to cover many styles. Looking back, I failed to realize the merits of channel 1. Also, channels 2 & 3 of the Butterslax seemed the same to me, but channel 1 was a little more than just a low gain version of channel 2. There is something awesome about it that I overlooked. That is probably what I miss the most.

If I could go back and do it over, I would have kept the Butterslax and JJ and let my BE go. The BE has the widest array of sounds, but what I can do with JJ channel 2 and an overdrive pedal goes a very long way. Someone shed some light on this because I do not know about diodes and all that, but it sounds to me like the JJ's BE and JBE channel use different kinds of clipping. For anything other than metal, I prefer the BE channel of the JJ more than the BE. Then, I also want to say that the Butterslax sounds like it has more in common with the JJ's JBE channel but sharing a more similar EQ of the BE. I could be wrong about that, but there is something totally unique in the way the Butterslax clips. Maybe I'm not using that term right, but I am referring to how they get their distortion.

The truth is that it's really hard to choose. Any decision is made by a razor thin margin. I feel like I made the wrong decision getting rid of my Butterslax, but then I might also feel the same way once my BE is gone. I think I will try to trade my BE for a Butterslax or sell it to buy one. My JJ stays!
 
Don't kick yourself too hard man. I keep saying that Friedman is the master of useful subtlety. All his amps are different, but those differences are subtle, but enough to prefer one over the other. I hope that makes sense. Even the various switches on the BE are so subtle in the way they change things.

Getting rid of one, for another isn't making a huge change IMO. Especially in that family of three amps being discussed here. The DS and BB have other things going on for sure. The Phil X is very much in the BE family. Others may feel differently about that, but i felt the Slax was very much the same Friedman that my BE was, but those subtle things made me choose one over the other. Had i kept the Slax instead, i'd probably have wondered if i did the right thing, but would have also been more than happy with the Slax. It's all that BE tone.

Hope that makes a little sense. You can always go back to the Butterslax.
 
atrox":1jt2q57w said:
Don't kick yourself too hard man. I keep saying that Friedman is the master of useful subtlety. All his amps are different, but those differences are subtle, but enough to prefer one over the other. I hope that makes sense. Even the various switches on the BE are so subtle in the way they change things.

Getting rid of one, for another isn't making a huge change IMO. Especially in that family of three amps being discussed here. The DS and BB have other things going on for sure. The Phil X is very much in the BE family. Others may feel differently about that, but i felt the Slax was very much the same Friedman that my BE was, but those subtle things made me choose one over the other. Had i kept the Slax instead, i'd probably have wondered if i did the right thing, but would have also been more than happy with the Slax. It's all that BE tone.

Hope that makes a little sense. You can always go back to the Butterslax.

I get what you're saying and it makes sense. I'm pretty happy with the JJ, but having the JJ and BE is overlap, so I think the Butterslax would be the best compliment. However, I am becoming more open to other metal amps like the Dual Rectifier or JP2C. I might put my BE up for trade to see what trades come my way. Yet if it doesn't pan out, I'm still very lucky to own both amps. Thanks for the reply, it was helpful.
 
Back
Top