Dr. Z 35th Anniversary Carmen Ghia 1x10 Combo in Black

Presenting the all new Dr. Z 35th Anniversary Carmen Ghia 1x10 Combo.

Marking their 35th Anniversary in business, the team at Dr. Z present the Carmen Ghia as a 1×10 combo, an amplifier design that has been in continual production in their lineup and is the first model sold under the Dr. Z banner.

With its inception in 1988, the original Carmen Ghia launched the business: a company that has weathered over 3 decades in the musical instrument marketplace without faulter, firmly establishing the Dr. Z name amongst music’s greats, past, present, and future.

Today Dr. Z is recognized by many as one of the foundations of the "Boutique" amplifier business, with his amazing designs, attention to detail, and incredible level of construction.

The Carmen Ghia is the distillation of the company’s goal: manageable volume, jaw-dropping tone, without compromise, utilizing a pure, direct signal path from amp, to speaker, to audience.

Early in the company’s history, Dr. Z would visit Ohio area guitar shows with the Carmen Ghia in tow. A seemingly diminutive 18-watt amp was a curiosity in the 1980s, a musical era marked by the mantra of “more, more, more.” More watts, more channels, more knobs, but backbreaking weight, headaches from complex signal routing, and frustration from multiple points of failure.

Dr. Z had a unique package with 2 knobs, one channel, all hand-wired; a striking concept. During the hours before these events were open to the public, other vendors would have the opportunity to peruse each other’s gear and to his surprise and amusement, the majority of the sales he would make during these shows would be to the guitar shops and luthiers that were exhibiting alongside him! The typically jaded vendors who had thought that had “heard it all” found the Carmen Ghia to be the perfect vessel to exhibit the various guitars they were selling, as it was a no-frills, plug-and-play amp that sounded great and demonstrated the genuine voice of the guitar and player that were plugged into it. This experience birthed Dr. Z’s credo: “volume, tone, what more do you need?”