Less well-known than some of Tone King’s amps (such as the Imperial) the Metropolitan offers the same fantastic made-in-USA build-quality but in a more compact, single speaker combo with distinctive tone shaping and a unique and useful power scaling that retains the amps tone anywhere from bedroom-level practice to large venue volumes.

This is a cathode-biased two channel amp designed by Mark Barte with a Rhythm channel targeting Fender-style cleans from glassy, sparkling mid-60s through to clean tweed sounds and a Lead channel that ranges from fatter vintage tweed sounds through to more driven mid-forward overdrive.

Tone shaping on the Rhythm channel has a ‘bright’ switch and a tone stack that is more flexible than traditional fender-style controls: the treble and bass here offer a wider range of sounds, changing the voicing as well as the tone. The Lead channel offers a traditional tone control plus a ‘mid bite’ control that simultaneously rolls off some highs, develops an upper-mid range peak and tightens up the bass. This is incredibly intuitive and lets you dial in anything between traditional tweed tones through bluesy drive to rockier heavy overdrive.

The Power Scaling looks like a per-channel master volume but works completely differently - the circuit lets you crank the output tubes for natural compression and sustain at whisper-quiet bedroom levels up to club volumes without shifting the core tone as it scales the power anywhere from 40w down to 0.1 watts.

The tube-driven reverb is available on both channels and the original dedicated footswitch enables channel switching and reverb on/off.

Condition

This 2013 example is in superb condition internally and externally. On the outside, the all-wood case is showing no real signs of damage: the tolex and grill cloth are both in excellent shape and the panel, handle and other hardware are all very clean.

Internally, the amp has been thoroughly checked and shows no issues. All caps and resistors are still in ‘as new’ condition, and the tubes (TAD preamp tubes, 4 × TAD 6v6 and a Fender 5AR4 rectifier) test as new. There is no bias adjustment necessary on these amps as they are a cathode-biased design.

Specifications

• Power Output: 40 Watts down to 0.1 Watts (via built-in Power Scaling)
• Speaker: 1x12” custom-designed Eminence speaker
• Tubes: 6V6GT (x2), 12AX7 (x4), 12AT7, 5AR4
• Channels: Two independent channels (Rhythm/Clean and Lead)
• Effects: Tube-driven spring reverb.

Inspection, delivery and collection

Collection in person from Southampton would be ideal as you can then play and check out this amp before completing the sale. If you are serious, I will reserve the amp with no obligation so that you don’t travel for nothing.

I am also happy to do a video call (Teams, Zoom, Facetime etc.) if you want to go over the amp without making the trip - again, just message me to organise.

UK and Ireland shipping on this amp will be as shown.