Amps that punch above their weight

The Fender Blues Jr can be a great amp. There are a few different generations and few different speaker/tube combos that come with some of the different models. I’ve played on more than a few and they range from “meh, that sounds pretty decent”, to “holy shit that’s nice”. So try before you buy.

The Fender Pro Jr. is a good little amp. Dead simple. I bought one years ago used, and haven't done a thing to it. It just sounds good. I keep thinking I'll sell it sometime, but I don't know what I'd replace it with, especially given what I paid for it.

I think you want the current, most recent revision.  The best one I played had blonde tolex with a brown/burgandy grill cloth.  Not sure what speaker or tube combo it had but I'm pretty sure it wasn't the standard setup.  I know the tweed ones have a different speaker.  

The Supro Delta King is killer if you like a little jangle. I'd take it over the Fenders any day unless you need that classic sound. It's the best small studio/home recording amp I know of.

The Mesa TA15 is discontinued but can be had fairly cheap used..,by far the most versatile amp I have ever had. Vox, Fender, Marshall, and Mesa tones. All good. Excellent for recording as it goes from 5-15-25 watts. Sold mine stupidly to a bandmate.

Engl Retrotube, of course they discontinued it because it actually sounded good. Tight, can do multiple styles etc..

i did like ~50 live gigs in the past with a the first orange tiny terror through a 1x12 celestion vintage 30 speaker - classic crunch rock sound. took pedals surprisingly well. and was great for recording in the studio too. loved it but sold it. regret it now.

First time I ever used an AC30 was at a power pop festival in L.A. 5 or 10 bands a night playing through backline etc, and I think the assumption was that every band in that genre would know the Vox inside and out. But when I tried getting a tone out of it, it was the wimpiest sound in the world! With limited stage time, I just went with what I got, but ugh!!

The next time I used one was in studio. The amp started crakling just as we were rolling. The engineer walked over to it, gave it a kick and we carried on with the session. And the tone we got was hardly wimpy this time! 

And keeping with the theme of the topic, my main touring amp in recent years has been the ZT Lunchbox. Love that thing. It's very practical on several levels, but it does also just sound good. Now that my basement studio is up and running, I'll be curious to have the Vox, my Princeton Reverb II and the ZT all do battle. Three amps with very little in common...

The Fender Bassbreaker 15 W. is really good, (it's a poor choice of a name though).

The first setting does the usual Fender thing nicely, but it has two other settings using different tubes. Setting 2 sounds quite Vox-ish, and is better than my hand built 15 W. Vox AC15 was. The 3rd setting is a joke. People who want a heavy metal sound are unlikely to like a Fender high gain setting.

I think it's a bit of a hidden gem. I like it WAY better than the Blues Junior I had. To me that amp was an audio ice pick.

The stock speaker in all those 'Blues - - - - - ' (series) amps are atrocious. Get you a hemp-cone speaker like a Tone Tubby, and they improve 100%

ERMERGERD . . . .stop!! I still have two kids to put through college yet!

If we're literally talking punching above weight, the battery powered Pignose 7-100 amps – even the newer non-vintage ones – are cool sounding and versatile, and because they're so miniscule, the tone tends to cut through a mix.

The back lid is hinged, so it can be run in any configuration from closed back to fully open back, and together with the pig's nose-shaped volume control, guitar controls, and of course mic choice and positioning, this is the tone shaping you'll get.

If I recall correctly, it was used by Frank Zappa here and there, and also in several places on Meat Loaf's Bat out of Hell album.

You can own one for something like $100, and it will follow you anywhere. And because it is battery powered, ground issues won't happen. Just remember to switch it off when not playing, and to pull out one battery before travelling, so you won't have to change batteries all the time.