What do you call it when you make a tasteless racial joke and it blows up in your face? I’m not sure, but in unrelated news, Blackstar has a new amp for Firewind/Ozzy Osbourne guitarist Gus G, called the BLACKFIRE. At a startling 200 watts, 4 channels, and 6 modes, it’s looking like it will be an extremely flexible and powerful metal machine. The kind of amp suitable for playing, say, slow, boring, and predictable power metal, or in a band with a singer old enough to be your grandpa, for instance. An amp built for a killer shredder playing to huge crowds in huge amphitheaters, which sadly we are not, so luckily there is a switch that dials it down from 200 to 20 watts, for when I’m shredding all of the four chords I know in my bedroom by myself.
Dialing up the metal are the four channel’s names: Clean, Crunch, Fire, and Fury. I was expecting the last one to be called Wind, but that sort of evokes a gaseous tone that I can make all by myself without a $2,499 amp.
If you’re a fan of Gus G’s powerful tone, I’d hurry up and get my paws on one of these fast, they’re only making 225 of them. More information can be found from Blackstar here.
