In that price range and new, very little, if anything. Most valve amps will have sufficient balls to run un-mic'd, but 1k for a head that's new is going to be hard to find. I can't actually think of anything in that range to be honest.rocklander wrote:so back to the original question (ish) - what's a <$1k valve head that has enough guts to run a live pub venue?
The music store I saw the Ashdown head in was Lewis Eady in Greenlane/Newmarket, quite a while ago now. They tend to specialise in acoustics so the sales guy couldn't tell me much about the amp, but it played okay with a Maton. I didn't find it particularly tube-sounding but it was loud.
My advice would simply be go second hand, because anything new is likely to just be waaaay to expensive for what it is. There's obvious exceptions to this, and without being biased, if I had 3k to spend on a new amp, I'd be seeing Custom Audio Boutique about a Splawn myself.