I installed the free trial from the website for this review – All thoughts and opinion’s within this review are my own and do not reflect those of the developer or others.

INTRO

The little F-59 – a small guitar amp sim from Fuse Audio Labs with a big sound. It emulates a timeless classic – a late 50’s tweed-style American combo. I downloaded the free two week Trial, and took it for a spin to get to grips with it. Here’s my review:

Experience

First thing I noticed is that the install process was nice. Very quick and easy and in no time it was up and running. On loading up the plugin, the first thing you see is the classy looking GUI – it really nails the vibe of a classic tweed combo and certainly made me feel that warmth before I got stuck into actually playing.

The very straightforward features of the control panel are – Controls: Presence, Middle, Bass, and Treble. Normal / Bright channel levels. Master volume. Switches: Cab on/off, Main Power on/off, High/Low Input switch to match pickup choice. A Bright / Normal channel switch. That’s it. Super simple, super easy, and everything seems to work just the way it should. There are no noisy or scratchy pots or uncomfortable jumps in levels in the F-59, which is just as well because although real amps have their place, they can quickly get dusty or suffer from wear and tear with continuous use, and can cost an arm and a leg to maintain and keep healthy. Thankfully, plugins like this are not going to let you down or suffer from your neglect or abuse.

Moving onto the presets that come with the plugin – I was impressed with how they all sounded. They seem genuinely thought out and pleasing to my ears without exception. Some of my favourites were the Blues preset, where you get that real soulful tone that just hits the spot when you break out into tasty pentatonic licks and minor seventh chords, the twang preset where everything is just as you’d think – twangy – great for funky chords and rhythm work where you need to cut through, or the warm preset – which is great for playing nice full bodied open chords and would probably work really well in a verse setting along with country style vocals, or perhaps for some creamy bottleneck leads.

Although the F-59 has some lovely clean tones, much like the real amp, it isn’t known for high gain applications. This can work in your favour of course, as you can use it as a foundation for all your virtual pedal plugins. It takes overdrives, compressors, or eq boosts really well, and I’ve particularly enjoyed it in combination with my favourite distortion and fuzz pedal sims. Fuse Audio Labs have some great options in this department if you haven’t already checked them out – try placing the Big Sur or the Dozer Drive before the amp and get dirty and messy, especially good fun when you select the crunch preset.

I think the F-59 really is one of those must-haves if you are a player that is into experimenting with virtual pedals, just like it’s real hardware counterpart. If you’ve had experience with any Fender combo amps you’ll know what I mean, they can be some of the best amps for building a complex rig around because they are so simple to get a good base sound, and adapt to what you place before or after. The bright switch and the high and low inputs really add to their flexibility, whilst you can cut or boost with the presence to fine tune even further.

To open up the options further, you can bypass the cab section entirely and use an impulse loader or other cab sim software after the amp in your plugin chain. I found that it was really interesting to use the amp with IRs that one wouldn’t normally consider typical with an amp like this, but also you may have an IR in mind that would just be the perfect match. It may be sacrilegious but you could even try it with your favourite V30 impulses, put a distortion in front and you could probably get a decent metal chug tone, or at least a more modern tonal flavour. Some cab sims and impulse loaders can get complex and you can adjust mic positions and distances, add stereo or multiple cab combinations – you can get very creative here if you enjoy tweaking. With just two, maybe 3 plugins, you’ll get a massive range of tones and it really could be all you need for most of your creative applications, and then add modulation and ambience for all the rest.

UPS/DOWNS

The F-59 for my interests is simple and effective which makes for a super reliable and easy to use amp sim, however I feel some users might say it’s a little low on options for the price. I would think that a couple of additional options for different cab / speaker selections might help raise the game for the F-59 plugin, and would allow users a nice range of extra tones and potentially a quicker workflow. Other feature suggestions that might be nice and improve the versatility is perhaps an in-built Tremolo and a Spring Reverb, these features would really help finish it off nicely and truly elevate the F-59 in a crowded amp sim market. That being said, I enjoy this plugin for what it is and I certainly won’t be marking it down too harshly for its lack in features as the sound quality and feel from playing through the F-59 is up there with the best of any clean amp sims I’ve tried, and again, it makes for a great virtual pedal board platform.

Recomendations

Try out more plugins and effects from Fuse Audio Lab to enhance your signal chain – they are currently offering the VREV-666 Spring reverb plugin as a freebie, also the Big Sur Fuzz is included for free in the VPB Bundle. They have other plugins that are at great prices too, so check out their website for more.

Conclusion

For what the F-59 is going for, it does everything it should and I have no qualms or negatives to report. The super simple layout and features are firm, functional, and behave just like a real amp. I felt that it was a perfect starting point to build a pedal chain before or after, and I’m happy to say that I really enjoyed the entire experience.

The F-59 definitely gets my stamp of approval and I definitely recommend you try it out.

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Hear more – some sound examples from Fuse Audio Labs