I haven’t used the standard amp sim that comes with Garageband 09 very much. My AMT Electronics Fatal Tube and California Sound do the business for me pretty nicely:
However, they don’t really seem to do rhythm tones as well as they do lead tones … or I haven’t yet managed to set them correctly to get the sort of tones I’ve looked for: 80s hair metal, edgy, EVH-ish, sort of Marshall-y I suppose.
I decided to investigate the (free) Marshall-y amp sims/plugins I’d accumulated (but not so far tried out). I started with the amp sim that comes with Garageband. – And I found it hard to tear myself away, to be honest.
Previously I had found the clean tones to be quite nice, but the dirty ones to sound fizzy, and basically lacking in cool-ness. But this time …
… this time I’ve been very happy with it. And it inspired a little hair-metal-funky-swing riff that will become a song. 
That was the “American Gain” model, with preamp volume up, I dunno, maybe 8.5/9; master down around 2; bass up around maybe 7, mids down maybe 4; treble up maybe 6 or 7; presence around 5.
And even my 3 year old daughter liked it 
Popularity: 3% [?]
