I have had lots of Gibson amps, and they have the best distortion/overdrive ever! I find them much smoother and crunchier than Fender. Also, much lower breakup volume. I had a GA-40 that was too loud, I then had a GA-20 I sold like an idiot....it was perfect. The best thing about the Gisbon amps for me, is how well they respond to pick attack...if you are good with your picking hand you can go from clean to crunch just like that!
I have since bought a Rivera Venus III as it has the closest breakup to Gibson with a master volume and reverb. it might just be the last amp I ever buy.
I bet your 335 would be killer through the Gibson.
Post pics when you get it...hopefully the price is reasonable? I sold my GA-20, which was in amazing shape, for 600$ which is at the higher end.
Cheers

 

Thanks! Well the asking price is double that(about $1200)! But it's a hard amp to get a value on especially with the dollar where it's at now.
And still cheaper than brown face Princetons which I've been looking at(yikes)....

 

That's a lot of dough. You could get one custom
Built for less than that. There's a 5 watt phaez on kijij now.

Also garnet made a lot of these. (Era good be different). $600

A 6v6 bassmate would kill this. There's a '62 bass mate (earliest version ) mint on kigigi for $650. Good value. These ones are almost replicas of tweed deluxe circuit.

1968 Traynor Bass Mate on Kijiji http://www.kijiji.ca/v-amp-pedal/city-of-toronto/1968-traynor-bass-mate/1118216811

More reLiable too. IMO. Very modable too.

 

In terms of bang-for-your-buck with vintage Gibson amps, it's pretty hard to beat the low/medium power early 60's models (up to ~'64). Amps like the GA-19RVT for instance can stand head-to-head tonewise with comparable Fenders (i.e. 60's Princeton & Deluxe) but cost 1/3 to 1/4 as much. Go figure! Replace the original speaker with something efficient (e.g. C-Rex) and you'll be in heaven for ~$600. Trust me, I know...

 

Unless I'm looking at the wrong amp, bass mates are bigger than I want in a combo. I do see Garnet stuff come up occasinally, but I always wrote them off as being poorly built. Maybe I'm wrong on that? I need small foot print amps.
Given the current exchange rate. About 1200 Canadian is the going rate for nice condition GA's. I'd rather not have to pay that. In reality if I could get a Vox tone ( not the current Vox stuff) in a small low power amp I would be happy. Haven't been able to find that in my price range without having something shipped that I might hate.

 

1200$ is ridiculous.
Pass.
I sold mine for 600$ and it was 100% original, and in amazing shape.
At 1200$, there is not even room to haggle.

 

I'll probably follow your advice. Although these days of $1300 Princeton reissues with pc board guts are driving up the prices of the old stuff even more!

 

Get the bassmate, sell the cab, send the chassis to Derrick bell to get him to make your dream cab combo. $$100 for the cab $250 for the custom cab and speaker.

Offer $600
Sell, order combo cab
$750 slick machine.
Even keep the name plates. Classy stuff.

And if it's solid pine, lightest thing you'll have ever lifted.
Heres a good example of value. Built to military spec pretty much.

Size similar. And excellent value.
http://toronto.craigslist.ca/mss/msg/5373489133.html

 

That is a great looking amp! Shipping to the west coast would be a deal killer, however.

 

I f you want really good crunch at lower volumes, I would look into getting a Phaez amp. They are very reasonable and are very good quality and sound awesome.

 

Even Better value.
$450. Shipping would be $35.

Phaez Daisycutter 18Watts on Kijiji http://www.kijiji.ca/v-amplificateur-pedale/ville-de-montreal/phaez-daisycutter-18watts/1123791946