Modeled Amps & Cabs • Class A-30 TB
5 • 26
Class A-30 TB
Music was changing in the early ’60s and guitarists were asking for more brilliance &
twang. So the Jennings Company, makers of Vox amps, decided to add Treble and Bass
controls (and an extra 12AX7 gain stage, incidentally) in addition to the Treble Cut
knob it already had (which in actuality was a sliding bandpass filter that always seemed
like it was working backwards); this additional circuit became known as Top Boost.
The AC 30 with Top Boost was the amp made famous by many British invasion bands.
Much of the unique character of the Vox sound can be attributed to the fact that Class
A amps overdrive in a very different way than Class AB. Brian May of Queen, Mike
Campbell of Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers, and The Edge of U2 have all used classic AC
30s to make their music. Although usually played fairly clean, a cranked AC 30 has a
great saturated lead tone, a la Brian May on the early Queen albums.
On this Amp Model, POD
XT’s MIDDLE control acts like the original Cut knob on the
AC 30.
For this model, we used the Hi gain input of the Brilliant channel. We also turned the
tone controls around, since original Top Boost amps had the bass and treble turned all
the way down when the knob was all the way up. Go figure.
All product names are trademarks of their respective owners, which are in no way
associated or affiliated with Line 6. These product names, descriptions and images
are provided for the sole purpose of identifying the specific products that were
studied during Line 6’s sound model development.
PODxt Manual Book RevC.book Page 26 Friday, August 29, 2003 5:43 PM