Understanding your Origin

Posted: 2nd June 2023

We've gone back to our roots and listened to what contemporary players wanted, just like Jim did at the beginning. Origin is designed to be the most expressive valve amp in the Marshall collection, delivering organic and transparent clean and crunch sounds, this single-channel amp is unmistakably Marshall.

Read time: 5 mins

The Marshall Origin is our affordable all-valve range of amps, which are great for intermediate players looking for a live-performing valve platform, and also great for beginners looking for a great combo amp for stage and home use. Origin cabs and combos feature a Celestion Midnight 60, 12” type speaker to provide a classic - rich harmonic tone, so all players of all backgrounds and experiences can get their hands on that classic 'Plexi'-style tone.

Origin features two preamp voices ‘normal’ and ‘high treble’ which are blended using the tilt control. Turning the knob all the way to the left will hear warm and full tones, whereas turning it the opposite way you’ll hear a brighter, more cutting tone –similar to the two channels of the classic Marshall JTM ‘Plexi’ sound. 

Understanding Powerstem

Powerstem works by reducing the voltage rails around the power amplifier rather than using our traditional pent over triode method, allowing you to use this amp in various kinds of playing situations. There's a high, mid, and low power setting. On high you'll get the full 20 or 50 watts out of the amp. Switching it to mid will drop it down to roughly 3 watts, and then the low position will produce roughly half a watt.

Whether you're playing at home, rehearsals, or even in a live situation, the Powerstem technology means you are able to push the master volume on the Origin to get the preamp valves working hard without having to effect your tone and having to turn the master volume down.

Understanding Tilt

The tilt control on the Origin series mimics the channel jumping (or patching as some call it) on the old Marshall ‘Plexi’-style amps. Channel jumping is when you place a patch cable between two of the inputs on a ‘plexi’ amp, this makes both channels run in parallel together.

On ‘Plexi’ style amps one had a high treble or standard input, one sounds kind of bright and in-your-face, and another which sounded a lot more mellow and relaxed. In the past, people have patched the two channels together giving them a blend of the two. The tilt control gives you this ability with a simple turn, giving you more versatility and control in the brightness of your sound instead of having to choose between two extremes.

This makes the Origin sound much more mouldable for any player meaning it can be used in many different ways to achieve the desired tone. All the way from Rock and metal to even country, blues and clean playing.

Watch more about Origin

Origin Tutorials | Country Tones
Origin Tutorials | Clean Tones
Origin Tutorials | Dirty Tones
Origin Tutorials | Boosted Lead
Origin Tutorials | Gain Boost