2019 Todd Sharp Amplifiers JOAT 20RT Purple

No Sales Tax For Customers Outside Of California.

When you see an amp with an ATTITUDE switch, prepare yourself!

This ultra-high quality, hand built tube amp bowled us over when it arrived in the shop this week.

JOAT stands for Jack of All Tones. The unconventional set of controls definitely provides all the tones from one of the best sounding bases for guitar amps - two EL-84 output tubes.

After plugging into this amp and immediately saying, "Whoa!", you then notice that there are no traditional tone controls. Instead, the amp offers the above-mentioned "Attitude" control, Low Cut and High Cut controls. These controls are switches. Attitude offers 5 positions. The low and high cut switches each offer 6 positions.
As described below, these switches replace tone controls and work in a way that is constructive to your tone, working in a completely different way as compared to traditional amp tone controls. What is apparent when you sit in front of the amp is that the nerdy approach provides you with clarity and detail that will knock your socks off. I noticed that the amp is really hi-fi sounding, but that it remains incredibly approachable like any of the vintage tweeds in the shop. I also remarked that I can see the amps interface being incredibly friendly for stage use, imagining that a player could likely more easily document or remember where tone settings should be for certain songs or sounds with the tone switches replacing traditional pots.

The amp does clean and dirty and excels at each. It can cut and it can be big and warm. It is the JOAT.

Oh, and check out the reverb section - you get some serious flexibility here and the reverb is gorgeous.

Lastly, the build quality is amazing - no corners were cut from the cab to the iron (Mercury Magnetics transformers are used throughout).

From Premier Guitar:

What would you expect from an amp named JOAT—an acronym for “Jack of All Tone?” I’d imagine some bloated monstrosity overloaded with cascading channels, switchable tube configurations, and an appalling number of knobs and switches. You know, something that promises the sounds of everything from a Fender Champ to a Bogner Uberschall, while never sounding as cool as either.

Thank heavens, this 1x12 combo version of Sharp’s JOAT 20RT head-and-cab model is nothing of the sort. The “T” stands for tone, singular—as in, “this amp is all tone.” Sounds like total marketing B.S., right? But amazingly, this 20-watt, dual EL84 amp delivers on the promise of its name.

The JOAT 20 Combo is masterfully made from great materials. But what sets it apart from other ultra-premium amps is its radical approach to tone control. Almost all guitar amps (and, for that matter, most distortion pedals) rely on passive tone stacks. That is, they trim frequencies by shunting parts of your signal to ground. Being passive, conventional tone controls can only shape sound by subtraction, never by addition. You build up massive energy with the tubes, and then sculpt it down with the tone controls, sort of like carving a statue from a block of marble.

Sharp omits conventional tone controls, employing instead an ingenious array of biasing, phasing, and feedback tricks to conjure a broad palette of tones without energy-sucking shunting. Yes, you can cut bass, but you don’t use a conventional high-pass filter. Instead, the bass cut knob alters how components are coupled downstream. The treble cut knob doesn’t dump treble frequencies to ground. Instead, it activates a feedback circuit across the output tube plates, trimming top end via varying amounts of phase cancellation.

In lieu of midrange controls, there’s a 5-position attitude switch. It alters the biasing of the initial tube (a 6AU6 pentode, instead of the more common 12AX7 dual triode). The settings vary in midrange contour, compression, and attack.

But what does Sharp’s circuit sorcery actually sound like?

The differences in tone and feel relative to conventional amps aren’t subtle. I’ve never encountered a more present and touch-responsive amp. It produces a remarkably loud 20 watts. Notes have rock-solid fundamentals. The touch sensitivity is off the charts—notes seem to blast from the custom-spec Vin-Tone speaker (a fab-sounding model in the Celestion Alnico Blue vein).

Every design choice contributes to the amp’s harmonic richness, clarity, and impact. Pentode tubes overdrive less readily than 12AX7s. The EL84s deliver their famed, electrifying treble presence. The alnico speaker performs its expected magic, rounding off nasty highs without sacrificing lively sparkle. And yes—the absence of a conventional tone stack makes everything bolder and brighter.

Actually, such extreme dynamic response won’t be an ideal fit for all players. I had to play for an hour or so before feeling comfy with the combo’s hair-trigger response, and getting it to bark in the right ways. Likewise, you may need experimentation time before you can deploy the alternate tone controls in repeatable/predictable ways. (I wound up simply flicking through the attitude settings till something sounded appropriate for a particular guitar and/or part, and then applying treble and bass cuts as needed.) Don’t be surprised if you dial in and use relatively deep treble cuts. This thing emits intense top-end energy.

The amp highlighted the best qualities of every guitar I connected. Lipstick tubes pickups maintained their airy high end. Baritone guitars retained as much bass mass as if they’d been recorded direct. Strats shone exquisitely. Pauls were perfectly Pauline. JOAT 20 doesn’t impose its own sonic agenda. It just delivers more of whatever you plug in.

JOAT 20 is slower to distort than most 20-watt combos. But with so much harmonic intensity, you might find yourself playing a bit cleaner than usual. When you push things, the overdriven tones are gorgeous—focused and rich, with extraordinary harmonic coherence, string separation, and note attack. And while I recorded the demo clips without stompboxes to highlight the amp’s innate character, JOAT sounds smashing with any good overdrive or fuzz.

The amp offers more tone-shaping tricks: Its dual inputs are optimized for single-coils and humbuckers, but both pickup types sounded superb through both inputs—one is just a bit hotter. A switch lowers the power from 20 watts to 10, and you’ll probably use it—this thing is loud. The 3-way “bite” switch is Sharp’s take on a traditional bright switch. It’s not a conventional filter, either. It manipulates the 6AU6’s grid, exploiting varying degrees of the tube’s natural brightness. There’s also a fine-sounding bias-based tremolo circuit with a click-off position (again, for minimal circuit loading). A rugged metal footswitch is included.

Shipping policy:

This amp is big and heavy - shipping will be expensive!

Shipments will require signature on delivery, no exceptions. If there is damage, the buyer must retain all packing materials intact and picture them immediately and send them to sales@maharsvintageguitars.com. Less than 1% of our shipments are damaged in transit, and we are committed to making sure your item arrives safely, but we are taking these additional measures to make sure you are happy with your purchase.