Well, I'm at the hard rock/melodic metal end of the scale and I do so love my Ashdown. I've just successfully worked out how to get a Hendrix sound out of the dirty channel (I could already do it on the clean channel, which is part of the beauty of it) and pissed off my wife by slamming out a very loud and slightly off time Purple Haze :twisted:
It's A) inexpensive
B) has GREAT cleans
C) is massively versatile. Although it was largely touted as a Nu Metal amp (which it does do WONDERFULLY) It pretty much covers all the bases. The fully independant channel controls allow infinite tweaking. By adjusting the EQ and gain on the clean channel you can get almost acoustic clean, springy clean, lightly spanked fender and pushed marshall. Indeed, with the gain all the way up and the bass rolled down a little it sounds quite like the new Marshall "Vintage Modern" amps. The fully tweakable dirty channel also allows pretty much anything you could imagine. I've just done a good Hendrix, you get a pretty convincing Zep, a good 80s type tone, a fantastic Slash tone, GREAT thrash tones and of course a spectacularly good modern scooped sound. The virtually infinite bass also makes it great for Grunge type sludgy riffing (Them Bones by AIC sounds awesome through it).
HOWEVER mine is one of the original UK made ones, and I haven't tried the Chines built ones, but you could probably get a good deal on one second hand (even better).
