I saw Falling Red Last year supporting Steel Panther (I think...unless it was supporting Judas Priest)
Haven't really heard much of them before that, but they put on a fairly spirited performance.
But the amps may well be excellent and they may have gone out of their way to find some up and coming bands to show their product to.
When starting out it is indeed very hard to get any profile until a few artists are genuinely inspired to try out and take up using your stuff.
It may well be that an "artist deal" has been done that sweetened the price to whatever extent, much like BKP do with certain bands.
It is actually nice that an artist endorsing the product has put his hat (even a Von Hat-ski) in the ring to tell us that the product is worth trying out.
It is actually something you'd expect of an endorsee.
It's no different than if we were discussing the shortcomings of a Rebel Yell pickup and Steve Stevens came and explained how he uses the pickup and what it was designed to do.
My own product is considered expensive and out of the reach of many players budgets, but thankfully many of you may have seen it and know what it's like.
If Guitarist reviewed my guitars and said it was money well spent based on the playing experience and overall impression I wonder if I would face a similar type of discussion.
I do get to see a lot of low to mid thru high end guitars here in my repair shop and know that many budget instruments can be great guitars and punch way above their price tag.
However it doesn't mean that the PRS, Suhr, and high end Fender/Gibsons are taking the piss with what they cost.