Amplifiers can be nasty, little attention hogs at times. Heavy and bulky to tote around, too loud when you need them to just relax at a normal volume and not make everyone’s ears bleed—especially for apartment-dwellers practicing at home.
That’s where the Spark MINI Vai practice amp comes in. Small enough and quiet enough to use at home or on the go, Positive Grid’s battery-powered amp crams four selectable tones into a 10 watt, solid-state package not much larger than an iPhone. And with Bluetooth connectivity, an FX-packed integrated smartphone app, and a slew of cable connections, it could be that studio-in-a-box you’ve been thirsting for during solo shred sessions.
More than Just a Pretty Face
First off, what’s a Vai? Well, that’s guitar god Steve Vai to you, and Steve’s been one of the most constant figureheads of the hard rock and metal scene since he first began playing in Frank Zappa’s band in 1980.
There are four selectable modes you can choose from, all based on Vai’s own carefully mixed sound profiles: fresh (for cleaner tones), mild (a slightly overdriven, bluesy tone), hot (reaching into hard rock levels of distortion), and fire (full-on, Beavis & Butthead, heavy metal lead guitar). These modes give you the flexibility to change up the character of your amp without having to resort to plugging in expensive pedals or swapping amps entirely.
Connecting the amp to the Spark App via your Android or iOS smartphone or tablet expands the possibilities severalfold. You get 33 more selectable amp profiles and 43 iconic effects to further flavor your MINI Vai‘s sound, plus roughly 50,000 downloadable tones. Delay, reverb, you name it. Mimic Jimi Hendrix’s Marshall Plexi, Queen’s Vox AC30, or Stevie Ray Vaughan’s Fender Twin Reverb with a flick of the finger.
There’s even a Smart Jam feature that follows along with your playing to create a backing track of bass and drums that responds to your playing. You’ll get up to eight hours of play before the MINI Vai needs a recharge.
Being a low-wattage practice amplifier, the MINI Vai isn’t designed for stage use. It wouldn’t be loud enough. That’s part of why it works for low volumes, though. Amplifiers like to be played hard at the upper end of their volumes to sound their crunchiest, most distorted best. For a typical stage amp, that means volumes too loud in the bedroom or practice studio. Being only 10 watts, the MINI Vai can be comfortably played into its upper volumes for an overdriven sound without blowing out your hearing.
Looks, too, aren’t everything, but they count for something. The MINI Vai comes with a unique burgundy Tolex-wrapped cabinet with matching braided burgundy cable make the gold-and-black speaker cloth design pop more than any other practice amp that comes to mind.
It comes with a headphone jack, auxiliary input, and USB port so that you can hook it up to recording software or loop in pedals and footswitches, if you’ve got ’em. All of it adds up to one of the most versatile amps we’ve seen in a compact package, perfect for the practicing serious amateur or the bedroom hobbyist alike.
The post Shred Like a Bona Fide Guitar God With the Positive Grid Spark MINI Vai Amp appeared first on VICE.
The post Shred Like a Bona Fide Guitar God With the Positive Grid Spark MINI Vai Amp appeared first on VICE.
