I thought it may be interesting to hear people's recollection of getting their first Orange. I'll cheat a bit and include my 1st two Oranges, as the 2nd one has a neat story.

2001. I was playing in an indie rock band and wanted a nicer amp to replace my Peavey classic 100 head. I had seen OR-80s and OR-120's being played by a few bands I liked. Namely Jimmy Eat World, and a band called Engine Down from VA (great band!). That sound! I never heard an amp that sounded anything like it. It was so unique with that jagged, toothy, big huge, fuzzy overdrive. I saved up and went on eBay to buy one.

I still remember the day I got home an saw the package sitting on the front steps. I opened up the box and saw that head all wrapped up in plastic. Bright orange tolex, big chromed handles on the front. Huge knobs, and I didn't even know what they did. I plugged it in and hooked it up to my cab, turned it up, and my jaw dropped. It sounded *exactly* like it did when I heard those other guys play it. That distinctive tone was unmistakable. Score. I've owned an old OR-series amp ever since.


My 2nd Orange was the plexi panel GRO100 you see in my sig. It was 2002 and I was active on the plexi palace forums. One day I received an email from someone that had a brand new account, asking if I wanted a 1971 Orange head in near perfect condition for a nice price.

After exchanging some emails, he claimed he was the original owner of the amp and had not used it in years. He wanted it to go to someone who would appreciate it, and wanted to give a fair price. He did not have PayPal. He did not own a camera. He lived clear across the country from me, and could only take payment via personal check or USPS money order. This seemed quite risky to send money to a stranger across the country, for an amp I couldn't even see pictures of.

After a phone conversation, he seemed nice enough and sat there with the amp and described it in detail. It was near mint with one small 1/4 mark on the top, and a small crack in the upper right hand corner of the plexi panel. I told him i'd send the money out the next day.

I estimated it would take over 2 weeks by the time he got the money and shipped the amp out, then it travelled to me. I sent the money order out on a Thursday.

That Saturday morning, I walked outside to run some errands. There was a FedEx truck parked outside. The driver got out and said, "are you Nick". "Yes, I am". "Great, sign here".

Then he pulled out a 60 lb box a little larger than an Orange head. I brought it inside and opened it up. Inside was a 1971 Plexi front GRO100 head, exactly as he described it. He didn't even wait for my money order to get there. He shipped the amp out express service the day after I talked to him on the phone and said I wanted it. I still have it to this day. 2 years ago, I was contacted my the editor of vintage guitar magazine and asked if they could do a feature on it. They did, and as such I have a few cool stories about that amp.


Who has some stories about getting your first Orange?

-Nick

my first one doesn't go back very far, to the summer of 2010.

i was really starting to get tone conscious. i didn't know too much except that i liked delay and that on youtube, Orange amps always sounded, for a lack of a better term, REAL. the sound was so rich and perfect that I didn't know what else i could possibly get. I took a chance on a used Rocker 30 head for $1000 (after tax: $1100), which is way more than i might have paid had I been smart and waited for a while (saw one going for $700 the other day...oh well). I already had an Avatar 212 cab which i was using with my old amp...a POS Carvin amp from the 80s...it was alright. this was my first big, really big gear purchase since i got a Line 6 spider for Christmas a couple years before for $300, so i was extremely excited. and i was also sorta nervous, what if i didn't like it? i had never played it before.

well it came in and i loved it. immediately sold my dirt pedal (Jekyll and Hyde) that I was using with the Carvin. i liked it because i was playing in a Punk band and just needed a simple clean and dirty. the Rocker provided this. and man, honeymoon on that thing lasted a long time. it was only until maybe summer of 2011, when my punk band broke up and i had to expand my musical horizons a bit. i started playing as a hired gun for churches more, I started writing more music like that. I also joined a crazy experimental/progressive/rock/metal/salsa (not kidding) band that had a lot of different sounds other than a simple clean/dirty. so, i thought I might exchhange my rocker for an AD30 and some pedals.

I bought an AD30, and liked it, but i didn't immediately love it...whenever I played it out, something didn't feel right. not enough bottom, too much top, too much compression. I was really trying to convince myself I liked it better than the Rocker 30, just because I had paid a lot of money for it. the moment of truth came one day when a tube on the AD failed and I had to take my Rocker to the gig and use it as a pedal platform. using the natural channel, I was actually surprised how pedal friendly it was...I had never really given it a chance with pedals I suppose, but I was really happy. the AD30 went in the closet soon after, and was sold a few months before christmas.

i'm still going strong with the Rocker, though it's definitely got a different purpose than when i first bought it. i'm going on almost three years now!

My first was just last year. I was looking for a British sounding amp and thought I would end up with a Marshall. Then I saw Jason Bonham's Led Zeppelin Experience and was blown away by Tony Catania. He had an Orange behind him. He had a Marshall too but who cares. I knew nothing about Oranges. I tried out a TT at my local GC because that's all they had. I found a used AD30HTC on line and bought it. I had actually ordered a used JCM800 but called back an hour later and cancelled it. While it did t end up being a keeper for me, it was my first Orange and I was hooked from there. I later found out that Tony's Orange was a Rockerverb.

Got to go right back to March 1980 for my story. I was still at school in Edinburgh, Scotland, owned my first bass - a decent enough Aria Jazz, but still needed an amp with some decent grunt for it. (I'd started with a 15W WEM Dominator Mk.III because it had valves and valves were the thing to have. But the quiet burble in the background didn't really disturb anyone. The 60W S.S. H+H Studio Bass combo that had followed really wasn't that much better - no guts, my bass still didn't sound like a bass.)

Wandering around Grant's Music in Tollcross, Edinburgh (now long gone) I spotted this big Orange lump. Strange looking thing, but interesting. Asked the shop guy if it was any good for bass. "Let's try it and see!" We did, it was. It was also 150 quid, a lot of loot for a young fella back then. But I had to have it so started scraping the money together, selling the H+H and odds and ends, working mercilessly at my Mum, all the time hoping hoping hoping it'd still be there for me. About two very long weeks later I had the cash, and at school lunchbreak on the 20th (yes I still know the date) I belted the mile or so down the road to Grants as fast as my long legs would take me.

Yes, it was MINE! And it even came with a black slip cover with Orange piping - most bonus! Didn't manage the trip back up the road quite so fast - this thing was heavy, Edinburgh is pretty hilly, and I didn't even have a bus fare left over - my school bus pass only worked before and after school hours to get me to school or back home. Eventually made it back to school with really sore arms but a really huge grin, and dumped it off for safe keeping in the music department. The head of music - an inspirational teacher called Martin Rutherford - would keep a vaguely disapproving eye on it for me. Thanks Martin!

After school it seemed to have doubled in weight - my arms were very sore - but at least I could get the bus this time, though as ever the last bit was an uphill walk. But at last I had my wonder amp in my own room where it got pride of place on the shelf until I could actually afford a cab to put it on. That took a bit longer, but at least I knew I had my amp!

OR120M S/N 015637 (DOB 10th Aug 1978) and I have had a fair few adventures since, but I promise you I've never even tried to carry it anything like as far as that again by hand. What a lump, but the sounds have always been worth the pain that day!


Andy.

Must have been around 1984/85 I was invited round to this guitarists house with the idea of doing this possible side project set up by our old soundman with him on vocal.

Not only did he have two Orange heads and matching Orange 4x12s this guitarist but he was just an amazing all round genius when it came to anything technical. He was a brilliant photographer and understood amplifiers and electronics inside out. He helped me understand the signal path in solid state amplifiers with my college work in a way my tutors could never have.

He did band and model portfolio photos having a white room upstairs for shoots and down in his cellar was split between a workshop on one side and a darkroom on the other where he developed his prints.

The first major act I ever saw live at 14yrs of age was Wishbone Ash in 1980 so owning an Orange or Matamp was just a dream really as all the other bands around that time I saw were running Marshalls and just didn't match Ash live for tone to my ears.

Anyway I finally bought my own '75 Orange OR120 within a few months. The side project thing never took off but he did become the bass player in my regular band eventually, replacing me on bass as I moved onto guitar and the OR120 . He also later sold me one of his own Orange half stacks when he'd decided he was moving down to London to setup his own recording/rehearsal studio.

I still have the original amp I bought and the cab from the half stack I bought off him. Since lost contact with this guy though unfortunately as we had become very good friends.
He wanted me to move down to London and work with him but I chose the steady 9 till 5 route...
More fool me!

Some great stories here, I don't think an amp brand captures peoples hearts as much as Orange do.

My story is pretty boring in comparison. I had been playing on and off for a few years, but spent more time producing and recording. I made the decision in 2010 to start learning 'properly' - effectively unlearning everything I had done so far to eradicate the bad habits and starting afresh. At the time, all I had was computer based stuff (Amplitube etc) which was fine for playing at home but not when I came to start my old band back up again.

I began shopping for my first valve amp last year, and whittled it down to 2 potentials. I must have read every single forum post and review of these 2 amps, and watched every YouTube video 100 times. It was all I could think about for probably 3 months. There was a Blackstar HT100 head and cab, and the Orange TH30 and cab. The Blackstar came in around £300 cheaper, and was far more versatile, powerful, loud, and was the 'sensible', pragmatic choice. I got to try out the Blackstar in a local shop.

The Orange, on the other hand, was ridiculously expensive, 'only' 30 watts, had no standard EQ and took a bit of a bashing on some forums for being limited in what it could do. I had never even seen one in the flesh. However, it just had something about it that couldn't be explained or rationalised.

I decided to go with what my heart said and ordered the Orange, and have never regretted it for a second. Running home from work to see these 2 enormous boxes in my front room was a hell of a feeling. When it's not at our band room I have it set up at home and, honestly, every time I look at it I can't help but smile.

I'll keep that amp forever. One day it will be a 'vintage' classic, but after I've finished with it my son (aged 3 at the moment) will get it and hopefully he'll get the same enjoyment out of it that I have.

Hard to explain (to people who don't understand) why we get so attached to a lump of wood, PCBs and tolex.

Back in 1987, I was around 18 years old, and a friend of mine was singer in a terrible hard rock band.
They were in the process of recording an album, and the lead guitar was not that good.
I was not much better, but my friend asked me to record some guitar stuff for the album.
I bumped in the studio with my trusty Aria Pro II Cardinal , and there was an Orange half stack with a big vintage orange head (means that was an amp from the 70s !). And I was allowed to plug in and play, my first physical experience with a 4X12 stack. This stuff shake the building !! And it has that big raw sound!
Since this date I have that Orange sound in the back of my mind, never had any vintage amp, nor Orange for musical and practical reason.
Now my musical project allows me to use a big raw sound, I finally (30 years later) bought an Orange (made in PRC, stupidly new, but the sound is there).
I don't know what kind of Orange amp was that head in 1987, but it had an impact on my recent buy.

In late 2008, I was looking for my 1st valve amp.

I'd been looking for stuffin my budget (£300/£400) trying out Fender blues pro/junior, deville, Vox AC30... good sounding amps, but not stuff that made me pull out my wallet.

Then I remark to my local music shop sales man that their deal on the RV50 + 2 * PPC412 for less than than a RV50 + 1 * PPC412 was a very good deal indeed. He said I could try it. I said I couldn't afford it. He said you can still try it.
I left the shop shaking - that tone - it was like falling in love. Seriously stupid and true.

Came back home. Explained my fiancee how big a mistake I made and how much it could cost me. She replied that I was saving money by not buying the others and upgrading later...... (Yes I've since married her)

Anyway, I wasn't expecting to spend that much, so I spent the next 6 or 8 month trying every amp I could get my hands own. Oranges (TT, Rocker 30, AD30, Thunderverb 50), Vox (AC15/30/50 night train), Marshall (JCM 2000 / JVM 205/410), Mesas (stiletto, F50, 5/50 express), Fender (blues junior/Pro, deville, deluxe, super sonic, duo sonic, bassman, deluxe reverb), some blackstars (never been impressed by any of those yet) and others.

After several months, my choice remained the RV50 - with a matching PPC212. In black.

I love the chest thumping excitement the day they called saying it had been delivered to the shop....... and plugging it in at home.....

Still love it almost 4 years on.

Since then I managed to get and AD5 (couldn't get hold of an AD15 at a reasonnable price) and later on an AD15...... at a reasonnable price!

I play the AD15 quite a bit these days - easier to shift than my RV50 & PPC212 - but the RV is still my dream amp.

2009 I think. I had been playing in my band, Fires, the first band I had been in in years. And this was first real band I've ever played guitar in (been a bassist before that). I had a Line 6 Spider 75 watt combo that I bought when I started getting back into playing guitar (because it had all the effects, tuner, etc, and I knew nothing really, having been out of the loop for a while, and it was great for basement-lone-jamming!). Anyways, the band had our first gig coming up, so I was shopping for a cab/head deal, something with more power and a better tone for playing live.

I had seen some bands (Torche comes to mind) using Orange and I loved the sound, it was so big and loud and ballsy. So I started looking into them. I found a PPC212 on CL, turned out to be a neighbor across the street selling it! So I convinced my then wife to let me have it. Then I found a Sovtek Mig50 in a local shop, played it, loved it, so loud. And the price was right, a couple hundred bucks. When I went back to the shop to actually buy it, three days before the gig, the amp wouldn't work. Something wrong that was fixable, but wouldn't be ready by the gig date. Then, in the mix of black heads in the store was this bright orange tolex - a used Rockerverb 100! Way more than the Sovtek, but I plugged in and tried it out. That was the tone, that was what I wanted. Convinced the wife to allow me to spend waaaay more on that, with the logic that "I can get what I want now, pay a little more for it up front, or, have this Sovtek that--while cooooool--will likely need more and more repairs down the line, costing more money." The logic worked and I left the shop with my first Orange!!

fiveightandten wrote:2001. I was playing in an indie rock band and wanted a nicer amp to replace my Peavey classic 100 head. I had seen OR-80s and OR-120's being played by a few bands I liked. Namely Jimmy Eat World, and a band called Engine Down from VA (great band!). That sound! I never heard an amp that sounded anything like it. It was so unique with that jagged, toothy, big huge, fuzzy overdrive. I saved up and went on eBay to buy one.

I still remember the day I got home an saw the package sitting on the front steps. I opened up the box and saw that head all wrapped up in plastic. Bright orange tolex, big chromed handles on the front. Huge knobs, and I didn't even know what they did. I plugged it in and hooked it up to my cab, turned it up, and my jaw dropped. It sounded *exactly* like it did when I heard those other guys play it. That distinctive tone was unmistakable. Score. I've owned an old OR-series amp ever since.

So what was your first Orange, you never said. OR80 or OR120??

Great topic!

Mid 70's I was playing through an Ampeg VT-22 and then bought a Marshall Superlead stack. It sounded great - huge improvement over the Ampeg - but it had to be very loud to get any tone. I was okay with the sound but not totally satisfied.

Then, on a first date, I took this girl out to dinner in Boston and looked up what was going on that night in the Boston Phoenix weekly newspaper. We went to The Club in Cambridge to see this band called The Streets... knew nothing about them. Had no idea my life was going to change forever... They were a hard rock band from Boston with a distinctly Boston rock sound - featuring John A. on guitar, Greg Tawa on guitar, Bobby Lytle on drums, Steve Hanna on vocals, and I forget the bass player's name right now. But John A. was playing through TWO full OR120 stacks! Oh my God, what a sound! Simplified, The Streets basically out-Aerosmithed Aerosmith. Tight riffs, great lyrics and songwriting, and you left the club with many hooks and melodies running through your head. Plus the guitar riffs were so different and inttricate that you went home and wanted to play them but had to see the band next time to really get it.

Of course, no one around had Orange but I filed that away in my head to get one someday.

Segue forward to 1988 - John A. and I are close friends - he's using Mesa Boogies or Marshalls - his Oranges are long gone and we're in a band together (and I'm dating his sister). I read an article in Guitar Player about 10 affordable used amps and the writer mentioned Orange as one of them. At the end of the column he said that he heard of a warehouse with about a dozen unsold Oranges from the 70's. He got into trouble with GP for saying that but I contacted him directly and he gave me the info. I told John and through LasSalle Music in Boston (where John's cousin Sue was the business manager) they arranged to buy the whole lot with John and I getting a little something for our troubles. The long and the short of it is, I got a brand-new 1978 OR80M head in the box in 1988 for $350. AND with Mullards to boot! Man, that amp sounded awesome! John got one as well plus a few oddball cabinets (the keyboard ones with 2 12's and a couple of horns). He still has the head I think - he used it to do some demos when I was in the band. I was using a Marshall 1936 cabinet that I loaded with a pair of Vintage 30's.

Then in the local WantAdvertiser I spotted an Orange 4X12 used for $400 - and a couple of years later another for around the same price.

All along, I scoured everything I could for any information about Orange - it was pretty difficult, just mentions here and there in amp books, etc. By the time the forum started, I had an AD140TC, a second 90's reissue OR80M, and was in the process of trading a 50 watt plexi tremelo Marshall head even for an AD30TC combo. I was psyched for the forum because I thought I could get a lot of good information here (which I did) but found myself answering a lot of Orange inquiry threads since I had learned so much over time. So for that reason, they asked me to moderate it!

Then I found the OMEC head, which Orange has now, and my Orange collection is getting bigger by the moment.... even part of an Orange high-hat drum pedal!

Back in late ‘98 I went to Rhodes Music on Denmark Street in London looking for a souvenir amp to take back to the States. I was specifically looking for a Vox AC15 but they didn’t have any in stock at the time. They suggested I consider one of the new Orange amps instead. They were expecting their first shipment in a few days and pointed out there would be some very low serial numbers available. I called a few times over the next week but the shipment hadn’t arrived and I forgot about it for a month or so before I called again. When I finally did call back the shipment had arrived the day before and they had an AD15-12 in stock, serial number 001. I left work immediately and within an hour or so I was headed home with my first Orange.

The next week I went back in with a few questions. I mentioned that I had purchased 001 and the sales guy explained that Orange management wanted to keep serial #001 and that they had sold it to me by accident. I asked about the Trace Elliott sticker on the inside and they said the amps were designed by Orange and manufactured by Trace. I asked about buying some replacement tubes and the sales guy disappeared for a while and came back with the Orange technician. The technician explained that they didn’t have any power tubes in stock but did have a couple of pre-amp tubes which he had tested and labeled one “1st stage” and the other “2nd stage”. I also mentioned that I would eventually be returning to the States and the technician explained that converting from 220v to 110v was as simple as re-wiring the two halves of the power transformer input from a parallel to series. He described the color coding and what needed to be done. He also described a mod that could be made to increase the overdrive by adding a cap and changing the value of another. I didn’t realize it at the time but the technician was also the guy who designed the amps, Adrian Emsley.

I was browsing at my local guitar center when I spotted a used Orange AD30TC combo. It was in great condition. I was excited to try it out because I had never tried an Orange before and I knew some of my favorite bands used them. The store had just opened and I was basically the only customer inside so I plugged in a guitar and cranked it up. I was immediately blown away by the tone. It was the guitar tone I had always imagined in my head. I played around on it for a good half hour that seemed like only 5 minutes. Unfortunately they wanted a lot of money for it and my wife and I had just bought a house so finances were very tight. I talked about how great the amp sounded it for weeks on end.

About a month later my wife and I happened to be close to Guitar Center so we went in to browse. I was surprised to see the AD30 still there. So I plugged in a guitar and told my wife to be prepared for some loud and beautiful guitar tone. Then I strummed a few chords and nothing happened. The lights were on but no sound was coming out of the amp. I grabbed a salesman but he couldn't get it to work either. So I walked away and was trying out some other lesser amps when the store manager asked if I'd be interested in buying the Orange if he knocked down the price some. After some haggling he agreed to sell it to me for half price. My wife finally said "Go ahead and buy the thing. I'm tried of hearing you talk about it all the time." So I bought it and took it home thinking that I'd have to take it some where to get it fixed. The next morning I went to radio shack and bought some fuses. I didn't think it could possibly be something as simple as a fuse but I believe in trying the cheapest simplest solution first. So I replaced the fuse, turned on the amp, and was pleasantly surprised to hear buzzing from the speakers. Excitedly I plugged in my guitar and was rewarded with beautiful tone.

In 2003 I walked into a local music shop wanting to try out a Gibson Angus Young signature SG I'd heard they had in. I pulled it off the wall and the shop assistant asked me what I wanted to plug it into. Nothing they had really grabbed me until I saw an odd looking orange cube in the corner. I'd read about Orange amps (I think it was review of an OR or OTR combo from the late 90s in an English guitar mag) and was a little intrigued. I plugged the SG in and played. I was impressed with the guitar, but blown away by the amp.

The amp was an AD15 that they'd originally sold to a guy months earlier who'd brought it back and traded it in on something else. The shop owner reckoned the guy had bought it off them on a whim not really knowing what it was and had traded it back after finding its single channel 15w configuration too limiting for his needs. So it was s/h but still relatively new. I uhmed and ahhed for probably six months over that amp. I did the research and discovered the AD series, even read a lot on this forum. On a trip to the big smoke I played an AD30 and was equally impressed. I'd been playing a 100w Fender Tonemaster to this point and was looking for a lower wattage combo as I wasn't getting the most out of the best that was the Tonemaster. Orange seemed like the way to go and I was settling on the AD30.

Then I had to move away for work and I left the band I was playing in. The AD30 now seemed unnecessary and I eventually made an offer on the s/h AD15 still sitting back in the local shop. My new job had not only taken me away from my band but from my then girlfriend, now wife, and on her first trip to visit (in my new town some 1500km away) she brought down the AD15, the transaction for which she had completed for me.

I'm onto my third Orange now, but I think I'll always keep that first AD15.

And I never did get the Angus Young SG. I reluctantly ended up with another Gibson signature SG, but that's another story.

Ade

In 1975 I bought an early 70’s Orange Matamp from a long since defunct dealer in Mitcham, South London. It had a stencil of a famous band of that era on the back ‘Cockney Rebel’. I don’t remember the exact model but remember it as being very loud, slightly temperamental and weighed half a tonne. There was then a gap of 35 years before I bought my next one, nothing to do with the product, just life getting in the way!