Yes, you are correct, vacuum tube amps have higher levels of distortion (and noise in most cases) compared to solid state amps. For vacuum tube amps the charact

Yes, you are correct, vacuum tube amps have higher levels of distortion (and noise in most cases) compared to solid state amps. For vacuum tube amps the characteristic curve of distortion is a quadratic function called the second harmonic (frequency double the original sound and an overtone factor produced by most musical instruments - eg. a stradivarius - that gives depth and richness to sound). Solid state amps on the other hand produce tertiary and quintic harmonics that are not as pleasing to hear (which is why they try to reduce distortion for solid state amps to zero).