ENGL Ironball Special Edition | The ultimate do-it-all tube amp for the modern player? Review & Demo

This is my take on the Engl Ironball Special Edition!

A made-in-Germany, two channel lunchbox-sized tube amp head that’ll set you back around €1,200 in Europe, the Ironball Special Edition is Engl’s take on the do-it-all analog/digital amp head. It’s an all-analog signal path with digital FX (delay and reverb), MIDI options and an IR loader, so it’s theoretically perfect for everything from practice, rehearsals and gigs to silent bedroom jamming and home recording.

Get the Ironball Special Edition here: https://bit.ly/IronballSErwm

Of course, everyone knows Engl as being the metal player’s amp brand of choice – and I am most definitely not a metal player! So my goal for this video is to answer three questions:

1. Can the Ironball Special Edition excel at genres other than metal?
2. Are all the amp’s extra features genuinely useful, or just gimmicks no one will really use? And:
3. Is the Ironball Special Edition the ultimate do-it-all tube amp for the modern guitar player?

And that’s what we’re going to find out! I’ll be playing my single coil-equipped Fender Telecaster and my humbucker-loaded Epiphone Les Paul across a wide variety of genres during the video, and we’ll see how the Engl handles some choice country, pop, folk and indie riffs, as well as a bit of rock and some heavier stuff too. I’ll also do some loops where I tweak the amp’s controls to really see the extremes it can go to, and to test the built-in IRs that ship with the amp, and its delay and reverb effects.

Here’s the links to the various playing samples and info bits:

00:00 Hello!
00:58 Introduction to the ENGL Ironball Special Edition
02:18 The amp’s front panel
04:41 The back panel features
07:14 What we’re doing today!

Clean Channel sounds
08:23 Clean reference chords on all pickup settings
09:10 Poppy barre chords
09:42 Ringing open indie pop chords
10:10 Strummed country pop chords
10:51 Country lead sound
11:07 Country ballad arpeggios
11:34 Airbourne inspired classic rock riff
12:07 AC/DC inspired classic rock riff
13:01 Hendrix inspired classic rock riff
13:35 Hendrix inspired fuzz tone

13:56 Indie rock barre chords
14:48 Greta Van Fleet inspired rock riff
15:13 Indie octave chords riff
16:03 Upbeat indie barre chords
16:32 Indie rock octave chords
17:28 Indie rock rhythm tone

Lead Channel sounds
18:00 Classic hard rock riff
18:36 Hard rock riff
19:10 Glam rock riff
19:39 Pop punk riff
20:06 Pop punk melodic lead sound
20:38 Punk rock powerchords
21:07 Foo Fighters inspired modern rock riff
21:42 Chunky alternative rock chords
22:34 Modern alt rock riff
23:02 Rage Against The Machine inspired groovy rock riff (Drop D tuning)
23:36 Progressive rock riff (Drop D)
24:06 Modern rock palm-muted power chords (Drop D)
24:55 Hardcore chugging riff (Drop D)
25:27 Mastodon inspired metal riff with country twang (Drop D)
25:51 Hardcore punk riff (Drop D)
26:21 Thrash metal riff (Drop D)
26:42 Classic heavy metal/sludge riff (Drop D)

27:48 Fender Telecaster indie rock loop – clean and crunch sounds
29:35 Epiphone Les Paul hard rock loop – crunch sounds
31:44 Epiphone Les Paul metal loop (Drop D) – heavy and chugging sounds
34:17 Epiphone Les Paul clean loop – delay/reverb FX test

37:51 My thoughts and getting used to the Ironball
38:41 Build quality
39:23 Sounds – Clean Channel
41:34 Sounds – Lead Channel
44:48 The built-in delay and reverb effects
46:52 Front panel switches and options
47:34 MIDI – get a foot controller!
48:10 Power soak, volume levels and IRs
49:17 What I don’t like so much: controls on the back
50:38 Shared EQ for both channels
51:50 Balancing output levels when using headphones/IRs
52:41 The headphone out
53:34 What is the competition for the Ironball Special Edition?
56:25 Does the Ironball do more than metal?
57:07 Are all the extra features useful or just gimmicks?
58:11 Is this the ultimate modern home recording amp?
58:54 Final conclusion and goodbye


My setup was as follows: I ran the Ironball Special Edition straight into my Focusrite Scarlett 2i4, which went into Logic Pro X. That's it. No post-processing on the sounds was done. Oh, and I used my TC Electronic Ditto Looper to play the loops.

Here’s some links to those bits of gear:

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TC Electronic Ditto Looper: https://bit.ly/TCDittoRWM
Focusrite 4i4 (this is the newer equivalent of my 2i4, which they don’t make any more!): http://bit.ly/rwmFR4i4
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Enjoy!


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Backing music from the YouTube Audio Library: Duck In The Alley – TrackTribe.

#ENGL #ENGLAmps #ENGLAmplification #ENGLIronball #ENGLFamily


*Note: certain links in the description are affiliate links. If you click said links and purchase anything as a result, I will receive a small commission. This doesn’t cost you anything extra, but it does help to support the channel. So, if you do that, thank you very much!*