Fresh from their triumphant launch at Frankfurt, KMD are tipped to become one of the amp names in '86. Gary Cooper dons asbestos ear muffs and reviews their RRP £389.95 100 watt valve guitar combo.

KMD might be a new name on the British and European amp market, but this brand is already scooping up massive sales across the water, where its success in the cut-throat American market has been little short of amazing. Now KMD has come home to Britain — home? Yes, because KMD (although marketed internationally by a US giant) are British-made, and, reputation has it, another example of how British amp makers consistently get it right.

Unveiled at the recent Frankfurt Fair, KMD's range is big, including three C-Mos transistor pre-amped, valve power amped models (the 100 watt reviewed here, a 60 watt version and a 100 watt head/stack system), plus seven all-transistor models ranging from a tiny but powerful sounding 18 watt combo, through 45 watt guitar and bass and 75 watt guitar combos, a 100 watt MOS-FET head, 100 watt dual channel MOS-FET head and a 100 watt twin channel bass head. These, plus a range of Celestion equipped cabs, make for an impressive line-up.

From this range, I selected the GV100 valve combo to review — also the model that we're giving away free in this month's main competition. Is KMD worthy of the expectations it created at Frankfurt? How will it appeal to British players? Only an exhaustive test would tell.

THE DETAILS

KMD's 100 watt 1x12" GV100 combo is certainly a handsome and substantially built unit. Handily, it's probably a little smaller than the typical 100 watt combo, and isn't obscenely heavy, either. Structurally it's a good example of a modern combo, an open backed wooden frame fitted with plastic corner protectors, a top mounted carrying strap and a metal speaker grille (which carries the silver KMD logo) protecting the single 12" Celestion Sidewinder speaker. Nicely stowed away inside the GV100 are a fixed mains lead and a rewardingly tough all-metal reverb/channel switching footswitch, the latter being connected by a jack plug to an internally fixed lead.

The back panel is simple in the extreme, just featuring a standard line-out jack plus the required fuses — all the action takes place on the front panel, where it belongs, of course. Two inputs (high and low) are followed by the pre-amp and power amp (master volume) controls for each of the two channels the KMD offers, after which comes a Bright switch then three tone controls (treble, mid and bass) plus a single control for the on-board reverb (a Hammond/Accutronics spring unit). A pair of jacks appear next, offering effects loop facilities, following which come mains power on/off switches and then a hi/lo/standby switch.

If, incidentally, there's something familiar about this amp, and it perhaps reminds you of one of those Pro-Amp units much favoured in days past by your IN TUNE team, don't be surprised. Pro-Amp is now officially dead as a range, but it's the same superb design and manufacture team behind KMD; hence the similarities of design concept!

THE KMD IN USE

Loud would be a ludicrous understatement of the GV100's ear-splitting potential. Twin Groove Tubes 6L6GC output valves deliver a massive punch into the on-board Celestion 12" Sidewinder speaker — and the efficiency of this unit must be pretty good because it takes the whack delivered by the valves and turns it into one of the loudest 100 watt single 12" packages I've ever heard. Although trumpeted by its distributors as a 'valve combo', this term is in some respects misleading with regard to the KMD, because the pre-amp section is actually transistorised, a C-Mos circuit being used to run the pre-amp. This, like it or not, looks like it's destined to become the standard for many valve amps in the future. A major problem facing valve amp makers currently is that, while good quality output valves are still available, pre-amp tubes are getting hard to find in reliable quantities, and even such doyens as Marshall are currently looking at half transistor/half valve units, not unlike the KMD in design, mainly as a way to avoid having to rely on Eastern European or Asian pre-amp tubes which aren't up to the job.

Taking my Gibson SG in hand, winding the KMD up to full power and having warned the police beforehand to evacuate the neighbourhood, the sound I obtained from my earliest use of this combo was astonishingly good! Plugged into the high input, and with the silent switching footswitch clicked over to 'Clean', the KMD produced a sparkling response, especially with the Bright switch in. This was the sort of clean sound I love to hear, the Celestion reproducing every frequency from my guitar, the tone controls working well to blend and balance the sound, all resulting in a tingling, attacking sound which will serve any player intent on getting a natural undistorted sound which can be swung from a warm, smooth Jazz tone, through to a toppy blitz (especially with the Bright switch in and a Fender plugged through the amp. In fact, the top available is so good that my Tele was almost unbearable when used with the Bright in. Lovers of top, take note!).

Equally good news comes from winding the clean channel's pre-gain up against the post. Too often it's only a high output guitar that will give a rasping rhythm sound, full of distortion but not over the top, with modem amps; but the KMD GV100 delivers just that. Even a 'bog standard' Strat is capable of a fine raunchy half-broken rhythm sound on this first channel, if set correctly.

Hit the footswitch and you're instantaneously on the Overdrive channel. Although you are sharing exactly the same tone and reverb controls as you have on Channel 1 (and I'd love to see a fully separate channel on a later version of this amp!), the sound leaps and bounds forward here, even the lowest output guitar being capable of a distortion which can singe the cat's whiskers! (I know, I damaged the brute so doing!).

There's hardly any aspect of the KMD that I can criticise without drawing parallels with amps costing considerable more money. Both the Accutronics spring reverb and the tone controls work perfectly (the reverb being especially well applied), and the ability you have to set this combo for such sparklingly faithful clean sounds and such really wild and fierce distortions is bound to make this amp appeal to a very wide range of players. Most importantly, this is a really well built combo. Add together premium quality components like the super-efficient Celestion Sidewinder 12" speaker, the Accutronics reverb and the KMD's use of Groove Tubes valves and (especially if you've seen inside this amp) what you have is a thoroughly professionally produced amp for far less than most top pro combos.

Having said all this in favour of KMD's newcomer, I do have to admit that, in absolute terms, players who can tell the difference between a good tranny amp and a true all-valve unit might well find some significant differences between the GV100's overdriven sound and that from (admittedly far more expensive) 100% valve products like Taney's AORs, Mesa Boogies, HiWatts or Marshalls. An experienced all-valve amp user might find, as I have to confess that I did, a lack of ultimate warmth, responsiveness and 'sweetness' from the KMD which is no doubt due to the transistorised pre-amp. Perhaps this has a lot to do with the difference in translating picking attack through an ultra-fast responding transistorised circuit and a slowly responding (but perhaps more expressive) valve pre-amp. Who knows? My feeling is that the majority of players will find the KMD's sound more than acceptable, but that the truly fussy might quibble at a certain lack of responsiveness in the overload.

CONCLUSIONS

Bristling with every indication of quality design and manufacture, horrendously loud and equipped with a superb reverb and widely variable tone controls, the KMD GV100 combo seems to me to represent a very significant bargain at its RRP of just £389.95 inc. VAT. For this sort of money one would normally expect to get a pure tranny combo; but here, instead, one is being offered a very highly specified hybrid amp with a far superior guitar sound than one will get from 99% of tranny amps. In absolute terms, KMD's GV100 may lack the ultimate smoothness and response of an all-valve guitar combo — but how many players can honestly justify an extra £200 or more for an all-bottle amp? As it stands, the KMD is perhaps the perfect compromise.

Guitar players looking for a superb channel switching combo for both blindingly clean and bone-shaking distorted sounds at near-devastating volume levels must check out this newcomer (likewise other parts of the large KMD range). Only the hopelessly demented will fail to see why this brand has made such inroads into the US market of late and — unless money is no object to you — why this KMD combo is such excellent value for money.

RRP £389.95

More info from Rosetti Ltd., 138 Old St., London EC1. 'Phone 01-253-7294.