• Fender Deluxe VM

  
  As reviewed by Sean Boyle on 3/22/2010

  Nice amp, nice tone!! I've played a couple Fender amps before, but this one is AWESOME! Nice, bright, crispy clean tone and searing, crisp distortion. The gain actually gets up WAY higher than any of the other Fenders I've played, and while it gets a lot higher and thicker, it still maintains the crispness and sharpness to it that could be used for blues. Same distortion sound, just goes a lot heavier, and I like it!! The reverb is amazing, too! Definitely one of my favorite things about the amp. The delay sounds great, too. I've never used chorus before I got this beast of an amp, so I'm not too sure about how to set it up or use it well, but it sounds pretty good, too I guess. The footswitch option is pretty nice, as well as the effects loop on the back (I've got a couple pedals). All in all, a really great amplifier, if I ever get a chance to perform onstage, I definitely plan to take this baby, trust me, it's the works!

  8 of 8 people found this review helpful.
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• Warm and punchy

  
  As reviewed by Kipp on 5/16/2010

  Love this amp! I needed a new one to replace my old modified Bassman that was lost, and this looked like the perfect mid-power amp - right between my 15-watt Line6 and 100-watt Marshall. Portable all-tube Fender with my favorite digital effects onboard - on paper, just what I needed. I didn't need a tone monster, since my JCM2000 has that; I was just hoping for a reasonable Fender sound that was easy to carry around. I went to Guitar Center to compare it to alternatives. I wanted to A-B it with a Super-Sonic (which in an earlier trip I found to have *incredible* sound), but they're not currently in stock. So, I compared it to Fender HotRod models, along with comparable Egnators and Voxes. The sales guy (Brad - really helpful) preferred the HotRod, but I just kept going back to the Deluxe VM because of the warm, friendly sound. Over the years I've learned that the amp/speaker/whatever that sounds the most punchy in the store is what usually works best on the gig. I ordered a blonde model and it arrived at my door in a few days. Looks great, and sounds great at home with both my 1960-reissue Les Paul and Strat Plus Deluxe. Definitely has the "vintage" sound - tonal character of the clean channel is very close to my '64 Fender Tremolux (pretty much 1/2 way between the Bright Switch on and off positions). Clear tone yet full and not brittle like Fenders can be. The Drive channel breaks up smoothly and naturally, compressing just right and letting all those great accidental harmonics sing out. You don't feel like you're forcing the notes out, just letting them fly on their own. My one quibble is with the chorus waveshape, which is not as smooth as I would like, but that isn't noticable when playing with a group. I saw web reviews saying these amps are prone to breaking down, but in my month of light playing through it I've had no reliability problems at all. Bottom line, the tone is just so friendly I haven't even thought about the Super-Sonic.

  6 of 6 people found this review helpful.
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• Fender Deluxe VM

  
  As reviewed by Mike on 4/29/2011

  I've been using this amp for 3 months now, two practices a week and 8 gigs. It's basically a two channel (clean/overdrive) amp with built in digital effects (reverb, delay, chorus) the four channel footswitch allows easy access to the two channels and on/off functions for all three effects. The clean channel has not master volume, the over drive channel has a gain setting. It looks pretty much like an old blackface deluxe. Is relativerly light and easy to transport. Now for the "goods", I've owned many amps, many fender amps a number of clones (5E3 circuits), a few marshals (800, 900, 18 watt), mesa boogies, VHT, H&K, blah blah. I've also got a slew of pedals to make good overdrive/distortion sounds. Now, what I wanted was a two channel amp that had a good fender clean tone and a decent overdrive tone similar to a marshal plexi or 800 if possible. I don't play metal so I won't make any comments on the amps ability to play that type of music. What does it do, well it pretty much nails the fender clean tone I want and it does it with ample volume to play in small to medium sized clubs (I use a variety of guitars with single coil, P90 and HB pups), the digital reverb is digital but it's more than adequate and adds the appropriate amount of tail for classic rock and blues. The delay and chorus are adequate, delay being the better of the two effects (but then I seldom use chorus, although it does a decent trem effect if tweaked a little). Now, here's where I'm very happy with the amp. The overdrive channel - VERY useable, I've only owned a couple of multi channel amps that I felt were good and they were expensive amps. I dialed in a great sustaining rock sound, a great blues overdriven sound and a great crunch for chords all by changing the gain from 5/6 for rock and 3 for blues, it's that easy. Is it spectacular, no, but it's much better than I thought it would be and I'll go out and say it's as good or better than any amp in it's price range (I test drove many). So, for a gigging musician who needs a good solid performing amp, with ample clean power and a good overdrive channel (eliminating the need to haul around pedals) then I definitely encourage whomever is reading this to give this amp a ride, having a decent delay in the mix is a cool benefit too. Tweak it some when you try it out, unlike many fender models the bass stays tight when turned up. It's an amp I'll keep, right along with my more expensive amps, and it's an amp I'll use regularly.

  2 of 2 people found this review helpful.
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