HOW ELSE do you explain the continuing prowess of British stage amps, when we can't make much else musically other than those hexagonal electrobashers, with anything other than our natural tendency towards eccentricity? Who else but the Brits would laugh at Rik Mayall, buy "newspapers" whose chief concern is the welfare and offspring of an archaic herd of in-bred parasites, or sit up late and experiment with perverse combinations of pre-amps, power amps and loudspeakers?

Thus V-Amps, and a revamped line. Smart little transistor combos have come teeming out of the Peterborough HQ since 1981, and here is the latest in the line. The two combos we tested have something in common, at least, even if they are designed for middle-league guitar noises on one hand and heavier duty bass on the other: they opt for clear simplicity and an ordinary sound that is valuable in its very predictability.

Let's listen to the 30-watt guitar job first. It's keen to take your guitar sounds and make them wide and (relatively) loud — while acknowledging a workmanlike control panel, one's first nod must be to the efficient 10in Fane speaker nestling just off-centre in the small-ish sealed enclosure.

The chaps (presumably) at V-Amp seem to have got the tone controls at the right points in the sound. The obstacles for the amp designer are clear: go for a simple treble'n'bass setup and get clobbered for too little range; go for sweep-eq, graphics and knobs-a-plenty and bewilder the poor guitar-person who just wants a loud noise.

So (on both combos here) V-Amp have combined the best of both worlds — nothing of a startling, revolutionary nature, to be sure, but a sensible path nonetheless. And if that all sounds rather worryingly like the SDP, fear not — it's quite simple to get extremist noises out of this box, and the control arrangement seems to suit the guitar combo best.

Pull Fat? Not the newest scheme on Arnold Schwarzenfonda's workout disc, but a boosting bass knob which you (yes) pull out to bring into effect. The treble knob is quite normal, and in the middle sits what V-Amp, like a lot of seemingly misinformed people, call a "parametric". OK, so we shouldn't get too picky, I know, but it would be better to call it a sweepable-frequency tone control.

This "parametric" has one knob to select the frequency level to be worked on, from a lowish, honking 150Hz up to a decently spikey and singing 1.5kHz. The gain control next door gives gives you plus-or-minus 10 undefined units of volume — what this means in practice is that you can get some fine "hollowed-out" sounds, and generally give more definition and poise to your tone settings. The knobs are marked with big white lines which makes recall of settings quite easy — but there are no numbers to line up against, so it's clock-face-imagining time again.

That's the heart of the electrics of the VA30's sound. You can plug into a bright or normal jack socket and yes, one is brighter. Wouldn't one socket and a variable control be a good gadget for someone to slap on to a combo?

You can soup up your sound further by dishing out some reverb — a spring nailed to the floor does this, and doesn't want to clang too much when you bang the box (which is comforting). The range is suitable, and a footswitch (not supplied) will turn it on and off. You'll also need a footswitch to get the most practical use from the "sustain" overload switch, which V-Amp suggest is an improvement on that of the previous range.

This is switchable either by a pull-knob on the channel volume knob (mixable with a master volume), or by the said footswitch. It's rather a messy, overdriven-tranny-amp type of sustain, and I didn't like its attempts to make even the most insistent three-roots block-chord information into a sloppy porridge. But then I'm y'know, sensitive.

I tried to make an effects loop by taking a line out of (guess...) the Line Out socket and back into the input socket I wasn't using for the guitar, but it didn't work. At least my guitar sound continued when I did this, which is obviously what you'd want if you were using this Out for a mixer feed or direct to a tape — but the Phone Out socket, naturally enough, killed the speaker.

On to the bass boy, the VA60. More watts here than its brother from another soundfield — not a bad rule of thumb, that, to double the necessary watts from guitar amp to bass amp. So the VA30 and VA60 together in a group would happily chuck out balanced noises.

I imagine the word for the bass VA60 is poke. It has another hard-working Fane 10in speaker to do its air-shifting business, and a remarkably unflapping, uncomplaining, forceful bastard it is.

Another "parametric" in the middle, this one tailored more to an area useful to bassists, from roughly 80Hz, firm and uncomplicated, to about a kilohertz, helping click and flick. An open low E will cost you about 40Hz these days, so this extreme is better dealt with by the underlying bass knob. Further beyond the parametric's range lies the treble knob for pulling out harmonics and listening to your string windings wearing out.

It's an extended bass sound for an unported cab, and what the 10in loses in distant projection is rewarded by deep sounds and a responsive attack. Hardly any cabinet rattle, either, even with all the bass up and a headache-inducing thud numbing the interior.

There's a volume control and a line-or phones-out socket. While we praised the balance of control set-up on the Guitar 30, this Bass 60 could actually do with more versatility in the tone department. More fussiness on the part of bassists would welcome perhaps a second "parametric", but even with the four tone knobs on offer you can at least inject some colour into tired old bass sounds. I was confused by the two input sockets, too, marked low and high: low is for high-input pickups (ie actives) and high for low-output pickups (ie my Telecaster bass). Is there a clearer way of putting it?

Both amps are all-black with controls picked out in red. There's a strong plastic grille over the front which we gave the One Two boot test, and there's a small cut-out at the back for the very short mains lead. Corner protectors will protect, four rubber feet rest the thing on earth, and there's a carrying handle up top for you to shift their not-back-breaking weight around.

So for guitar, the VA30 suits clean, colourful sounds particularly, while getting messy on overload. Crispness is its forte, and it'll cut through, too. The reverb works and is handy, but you'll need to add the price of two footswitches to get full versatility from the combo. The VA60 is a tough and solid bass combo and could have gained even further from more in the tone area. You might find yourself wanting an extension cab later. A good impression, then — and a two-year guarantee means that V-amp believe in them, too.

V-AMP VA30 Lead/VA60 Bass combos: £172/£168

Contact: Deanvard Ltd, (Contact Details).