NAD, My SonicTone Loyalist is home.

[MadAsAHatter]

EDIT: Go to post 8 & 9 for my thoughts after bringing the Loyalist home and spending some time with it.

Nick messaged me to say my amp was complete and he finished all the quality checks. I'm taking the day off work Thursday to start my Holiday weekend early and go pick it up.

As a refresher I went with the 100 watt Loyalist with a mod to channel 4. It's a 4 channel British voiced, high gain amp. Channel 1 is clean to crunch. Ch2 is his 81 Special preamp; think boosted JCM800 and Ch3 & 4 are the high gain channels. The mod is instead of Ch3 & 4 being duplicate channels, I had Nick do the high gain channel of the Patriot for Ch4. That amounts to Ch4 having a little more bass, more scooped, and being more American sounding.

Since this series of amps (Loyalist, Patriot, & Mercenary) have the revolutionary war theme I dubbed it the Culper mod after Washington's spy ring. Like an American spy infiltrated the British ranks. On the flip of that token, Nick said he was going to dabble with putting the Loyalist high gain channel into the Patriot, maybe name that the Benedict Arnold mod.

I'm excited for Thursday. Will report back when I have the amp in house.

Edit: wanted to add a link to SonicTone's website.

https://www.sonictoneamps.com/

 

[311splawndude]

Sounds very interesting MAAH.

Nick with Ceriatone? Sorry, not as familiar with all the branding names you threw out.

HNAD regardless as I won't be around much this weekend myself. Cabin time and a friends wedding.

 

[MadAsAHatter]

Sounds very interesting MAAH.

Nick with Ceriatone? Sorry, not as familiar with all the branding names you threw out.

HNAD regardless as I won't be around much this weekend myself. Cabin time and a friends wedding

No, This is Nick with Sonic Tone out of New Orleans. He's local to me. He started up his amp company during all the lockdowns because he couldn't gig and needed something to do.

I went to his shop about a month back to test some of his amp and walked out putting payment down on his Loyalist model. First impressions when testing things out were I'd put his amps on par with some of our more known forum amp builders.

 

[GuitarGuy08]

No, This is Nick with Sonic Tone out of New Orleans. He's local to me. He started up his amp company during all the lockdowns because he couldn't gig and needed something to do.

I went to his shop about a month back to test some of his amp and walked out putting payment down on his Loyalist model. First impressions when testing things out were I'd put his amps on par with some of our more known forum amp builders.

Hell, if that sounds killer and is a decent price, the forum would keep him buuuuusy.

 

[jchrisf]

Sounds awesome.. I like the 80s tones and the cleans

 

[MadAsAHatter]

Sounds awesome.. I like the 80s tones and the cleans

That's the Mk 1 version in the video
I got the Mk 2 which is a full fledged 4 channel amp, each channel having its own EQ. I probably got one of the first MK 2's since he was just finishing up some circuit tweaks when I went try them out.

 

[Jimty]

Congratulations man - exciting stuff! Goood call on the mod - I’d definitely do the same.

 

[MadAsAHatter]

Fair warning, this is going to be long, but I want to cover everything I can.

First off, I’ve had the Loyalist only a couple of days. So keep in mind I’m still in the honeymoon phase and these are initial impressions. I’ve spent several days with the amp plus the time I spent trying things out before I ordered.

My review will first be a general overview and thoughts on main features of the Loyalist, then I’ll go through what I thought about each channel.

To start, I have to say I really love the way the Loyalist sounds and feels. It definitely has the British character. I have several name brand & boutique amps that are also British character so I have many of those typical tones covered. I can hear certain influences in it without it being an exact clone of any particular amp. The Loyalist; while being in the same realm, still has its own unique character to set it apart.

As far as feel goes, I like where it sits. It doesn’t respond as much as say my Naylor Superdrive, but is definitely not as compressed as my ENGLs. I like where it sits. It’s compressed enough to keep and even keel with variances in picking, but not so much so to feel stiff. On the other end it has enough give that you can tell the difference between low and high or passive and active output pickups. And each channel has a slightly different feel. Channel 2 (crunch) is a bit more responsive than Channel 3/4 (high gain).

If I heard Nick right, mine was the first production Mk 2 out the door. I asked for mine to be modded. Instead of duplicate channels for 3 & 4 I wanted Ch3 to be the Loyalist high gain channel & Ch4 be the high gain from the Patriot model. So Ch4 would be more American sounding having more scooped mids and a bit more bass. This setup would be more useful to me than duplicate channels. We’ve dubbed this the Culper mod. (Google Culper spy ring and you’ll get the reference).

As mentioned already it’s 100 watts, EL34 & 12AX7 tubes. Heyboer Transformers with 4/8/16 ohm taps on the OT, switchable series/parallel FX loop that cab be bypassed, FX send & return levels, and bias test points for each tube. There is only one external bias adjustment knob so matched power tubes would be needed. One newer feature that wasn’t on the prototype & put on mine is dedicated preamp out and power amp in jacks so you can slave.

Each channel has its own gain, volume & EQ. There’s a master volume, presence & resonance knobs. Channel 1 has the lowest channel volume so you’d want to set that first, then match volume levels of the other channels to that, and use the master for overall volume. The master volume has a smooth taper across the sweep. No worries about being whisper quiet then a big jump to ungodly loud.

Presence & resonance knobs are the same way. They’re not like some amps where all the adjustment is in the last couple of millimeters of the sweep. You get a nice sweep across the full range of the knobs. Resonance doesn’t get too boomy even at max. I find 3-5 is a good spot for my taste. Presence can sound a little muffled on the lowest end, but doesn’t get ice-picky when maxed. 4-5 on the knob takes the blanket off, but I like a little extra shimmer so 6-8 seems to be good for me.

Unlike some production amps, I got a footswitch. Switching is done with relays so the footswitch function is a little unique and not everything is accessible via footswitch. It’s not complicated or anything, but will take a bit to get used to. It’s 4 button, Button 1 switches between Ch 1/2 & 3/4, button 2 switches between Ch1 & Ch2, button 3 switches between Ch3 & Ch4, and button 4 is FX loop on/off. Depending on where you are & where you want to go switching between channels can take a couple of stomps. The other features are switchable only on the amp.

It would be nice to have everything accessible via MIDI and be able to have programed patches, but at least the way I use my amps I don’t think it’s necessary. I’m not going to switch between a heavy mid scoop sound and mid push in the middle of a song. The most I’m going to do is switch clean/crunch/gain. Plus, in the standard (non-modded) amp Ch3 & 4 are duplicate channels. So, you could set them mid scoop & mid push. Nick mentioned he may try to work MIDI function into the amp later down the road. Right now, I don’t think it’s a priority.

That mostly covers the amp in general. I’ll go into each channel in a separate post.

 

[MadAsAHatter]

Channel 1:

This is the clean channel. Unlike many high gain amps, the clean channel does not sound like it was slapped on as an afterthought. It can actually be used 2 ways. For a pristine clean max out the volume knob and use the gain knob to set the volume. If you want to crunch it up, set the gain between 7-max and use the volume knob for volume level.

There is a bright switch. If you use single coils it’s more of a set to taste. If you use humbuckers like me, it’ll likely be always on. With humbuckers it sounds a little dull with bright off. Bright on with humbuckers gives it the right amount of top end and livens it up.

I personally like Ch1 with a bit of hair so I set the gain at 7.5, turn bright on, and max the volume. As mentioned, Ch1 is the lowest channel in volume so set this one up first then match the rest of the channels to it.

Channel 2:

This would be the “crunch” channel. It uses the same preamp as in the 81 special model. There’s a switch for classic & hotrod mode. Given the description on the 81 special you may think JCM800. I hear that influence in it, but it doesn’t have the same upper end bite as a JCM800. To me it sounds a bit thicker in the mids and not quite as grindy in the high end. I hear Ch2 more as sitting somewhere between a Plexi, a 6550 JCM800 and a SLO. Classic mode puts it in the Plexi gain realm and hotrod is like putting a transparent boost in front. This channel will work great for rock/hard rock. It has just enough gain for thrash metal, but it’s not tight enough on its own. If you want to use this channel for higher gain you’ll want to have it in hotrod mode and put a Tube Screamer type boost to hit the front end and tighten it up. Sticking with it for the hard rock crunch sound it’s just right.

Channel 3:

If you don’t do the mod like I did this will apply to both Ch3 & 4. This is the high gain channel. It’s tighter than Ch2 and has much more saturation. It’s not just a higher gain version of Ch2. It has its own sound. You still heart the British tone in it, but I’m detecting what sounds like some 5150/6505 influence. There’s a mid scoop switch. With scoop off it has a really pleasing mid forward sound that’s not honkey or wooly. It’s a good thick sound for rhythm playing. I like my mids so you’d think a mid scoop wouldn’t be that useful to me. In actuality I really like the way it functions. With scoop on it obviously scoops the mids, but also seems to shift the center frequency slightly. To my ears this gives it a more modern sound that still has midrange bite. Something that would work well for down tuning, but still cut through a mix.

In my playing style I prefer to use my technique to tighten up the sound than put a boost on a high gain channel. So personally, I think this channel is tight enough on its own. That said some people my not think it’s tight enough without a boost. If that is the case, just drop a Tube Screamer or Super Drive in front, back off the a little on the amp gain, and you should be good to go.

Channel 4 (Culper mod

As said my amp transplanted the high gain channel from the Patriot into the Loyalist. If not evident my realm is British voiced amps. I wanted something that would push me into an aera I wasn’t used to, but still have a little familiarity. The Culper mod does just that.

Pretty much everything I said about Ch3 applies to Ch4, but the tone is shifted. Modded Ch4 scoops the mids more in both scooped/pushed setting and adds more bass and a hint of extra treble. It’s a different enough voicing where I wouldn’t be able to achieve it by adjusting the EQ on Ch3. What this amounts to the way I hear it is a more American voiced channel that still has a bit of British bite. This is perfect for me. Scoop off is slightly more scooped than Ch3 with scoop off and the same with scoop on. It gives me more variety without being something that would be unusable/unfamiliar to me.

To sum everything up:

I own some amps that many hold in rather high regards. I would put the SonicTone Loyalist right up there with them. I’m not going to blow smoke and say this will be the perfect amp for everyone. What I will say is the quality and tone is at the top of the hill and the Loyalist can stand with any well-regarded boutique amp. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it to anyone if you think it would fit your style. And if the Loyalist isn’t your speed, I’d still recommend SonicTone in general. Nick has several other high quality models where you should easily find something you like.