Eddie Van Halen’s “brown sound” is, for a lot of gamers, the Holy Grail of guitar tone. Featured on his band’s 1978, debut album, it continues to captivate listeners and amp builders, lots of whom have taken on the problem of re-creating it. The most recent to attempt is SoCal’s personal David Bray, together with his Coco 50.

Bray’s 50-watt head is powered by a pair of EL34s in a circuit primarily based on a ’68 Marshall Mannequin 1959 Tremendous Lead “plexi.” On the entrance panel are controls for Quantity 1 (shiny) and Quantity 2 (darkish) that mix like a traditional plexi and work collectively to set general achieve, together with Hello and Lo inputs, Output (which acts as a grasp Quantity), knobs for Bass, Center, Treble, a Tight swap to tweak low-end, and a Presence management.

With a Les Paul plugged into Hello, Quantity 1 cranked, Quantity 2 at 10 o’clock, and all three EQ knobs at 2 o’clock, the Coco 50 nailed recognizable sounds from ’80s exhausting rock and steel data, with extra achieve on faucet than a inventory plexi. Tone was wealthy, thick, and articulate, even on the highest achieve settings. Dripping with harmonic overtones and a vocal high quality, it supplied fats, juicy mids and distinctive responsiveness that made each observe sing.

The Lo enter yielded decrease achieve however was nonetheless fats, heat, and really able to dialing-in classic-rock, blues, and clear tones that retained the bouncy really feel of the Hello enter.

Experimenting with the Quantity controls unlocked a good wider number of tones; plugged into Hello and cranking Quantity 2 previous midday whereas retaining Quantity 1 at 10 o’clock places you in early Santana territory with a fats low-end, spherical highs, and simply sufficient achieve and chunk to make notes soar. The elevated backside additionally enhances the bouncy really feel when taking part in leads.

The Bray’s footswitchable Gangster characteristic gives instantaneous quantity/achieve enhance to 10 irrespective of the place Quantity 1 is about, successfully mimicking a dual-channel amp. The Quieter knob controls quantity bounce.

The Coco 50 isn’t only a plexi duplicate, it’s a reimagined, finely tuned amp that captures the soul of the Mannequin 1959 Tremendous Lead and spirit of EVH’s legendary tone, however brings trendy performance in a hand-wired package deal with high-end elements. Whether or not it will get you into “brown sound” territory relies on you and your fingers, however it doesn’t matter what, the Coco 50 won’t disappoint.

This text initially appeared in VG’s February 2024 difficulty. All copyrights are by the writer and Classic Guitar journal. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.