I had been looking for a head to pair with my Marshall vertical 2x12 cab that I’ve loaded with V30s. I have a couple of Fender combo amps which give me great cleans but pretty ordinary drive sounds. So, I wanted something with...
1. A great sounding/generous drive channel, but also a decent/usable clean.
2. Good balance between channels so there are no issues when switching between them.
3. Reverb on board.
4. Smaller form factor to fit on my vertical cab.
5. A good match with my cab, in both looks (Marshally) and performance (work well with V30s).
6. Budget priced.
Not asking too much, hey?
I actually have an Orange TH30 head which sounds pretty damn good but misses on a couple of my check points – no reverb, too big and the ugliest amp I have ever seen.
Blackstar Venue - Studio HT20 Head
This amp ticks all my boxes and has turned out to be a real winner for me.
Aesthetics:
Man it is a big box for just a 20 watt amp. I appreciate that amps need cooling and ventilation but I don’t understand why so many manufacturers build such huge cabinets for their heads. This is taller than my huge Orange head and way deeper! Thankfully it is slightly narrower than my speaker cab, so doesn’t look too bad sitting on top of it. Surprisingly though, the rear opening/vent is actually very small. Wouldn’t it be cheaper in materials and packaging/shipping to make the whole thing smaller but with larger air vents? And, it would be more convenient for the end user as well. Beats me??
The carry handle is a bit of blight on the otherwise elegant design. It looks a bit primitive and doesn’t lie flat! Well not unless you stick a screw driver in it and widen the metal loops inside the leather and then it still doesn’t lie properly.
Apart from those issues I quite like the look. A little retro, a little modern but very professional looking, if not slightly derivative. I would have preferred white piping to match my Marshall cab but I appreciate that they didn’t want to make it too similar to a Marshall.
Construction:
From the outside this amp appears to be well constructed, with quality fittings and attention to detail and after looking inside, I am only more impressed. It looks like a plywood cabinet that is very neatly finished, although the preamp tubes are a little awkward to replace. It comes with TAD preamp tubes and Ruby power tubes.
I like Blackstar’s philosophy of quality construction/design but from a Chinese supplier. Too many manufacturers go for the cheapest options when manufacturing in China. As a consumer I don’t really care where it is made as long as I can see good value for money. A cheap price and cheap quality does not always appeal to many.
Usage:
This amp is clearly well thought out and a pleasure to use. I like the way the knobs are labelled and grouped on the front panel – clear and logical. The functionality of the control panel is well thought out and makes many other amps look embarrassingly bad. There are few bells and whistles but the bare minimum to make it work extremely well.
Some people have complained about the lack of standby switch but if you read the manual you discover that there actually is one – only invisible. I don’t have a problem with pulling out the guitar lead, and doing away with unnecessary features makes more room for necessary ones.
I like that there is a boost knob on the send/return loop and the speaker connection options on the rear panel.
Clean Channel:
It makes so much sense to have a tone knob on the clean channel, which works very well, and sounds very nice too. I appreciate that on a small, budget model you can’t have full EQ on both channels but having no EQ on the clean channel, just does not work. So Blackstar have done well here. Usually, the drive channel requires very different EQ setting to the clean channel, so shared EQ amps are pretty much one-channel-at-a-time. You cannot switch channels during a song/performance because you have to adjust lots of settings. What’s the point of making it two channels?
The HT 20 could do with a bit more clean volume but getting a good balance between the channels is no problem with the 3 volume controls – one for each channel and a master. The drive channel also has a gain control so you don’t have to compromise the level of gain you want to get the volumes balanced. Again, this should be standard fare on every two channel amp.
Drive Channel:
The drive channel sounds pretty good to me. I have a couple of Fender amps for my clean sounds, so I wanted something with a generous amount of gain. Some people think it is a bit excessive and moderate crunch sounds are hard to find, but with my single coil Strats it sounds great to me. In this sort of amp, having too much gain is probably preferable to having too little.
The drive channel, not only has the usual 3 EQ controls but also has an ISF control. It’s kind of like a tone shaping knob. At first, I didn’t notice much effect but with some experimentation I did find it helpful in moulding the tones and ended up quite liking it. You need to keep the mids low for it to have the greatest effect.
I also like that they include a foot switch, which makes sense as the channel switching is so usable and functional.
As you might guess I am pretty wrapped with this amp and probably even more so, after buying a Peavey VK20 head that was very disappointing. Admittedly there is a $300 difference between them.
Blackstar has restored my faith in budget amps, but maybe ‘budget’ starts a bit higher than I thought.
1. A great sounding/generous drive channel, but also a decent/usable clean.
2. Good balance between channels so there are no issues when switching between them.
3. Reverb on board.
4. Smaller form factor to fit on my vertical cab.
5. A good match with my cab, in both looks (Marshally) and performance (work well with V30s).
6. Budget priced.
Not asking too much, hey?
I actually have an Orange TH30 head which sounds pretty damn good but misses on a couple of my check points – no reverb, too big and the ugliest amp I have ever seen.
Blackstar Venue - Studio HT20 Head
This amp ticks all my boxes and has turned out to be a real winner for me.
Aesthetics:
Man it is a big box for just a 20 watt amp. I appreciate that amps need cooling and ventilation but I don’t understand why so many manufacturers build such huge cabinets for their heads. This is taller than my huge Orange head and way deeper! Thankfully it is slightly narrower than my speaker cab, so doesn’t look too bad sitting on top of it. Surprisingly though, the rear opening/vent is actually very small. Wouldn’t it be cheaper in materials and packaging/shipping to make the whole thing smaller but with larger air vents? And, it would be more convenient for the end user as well. Beats me??
The carry handle is a bit of blight on the otherwise elegant design. It looks a bit primitive and doesn’t lie flat! Well not unless you stick a screw driver in it and widen the metal loops inside the leather and then it still doesn’t lie properly.
Apart from those issues I quite like the look. A little retro, a little modern but very professional looking, if not slightly derivative. I would have preferred white piping to match my Marshall cab but I appreciate that they didn’t want to make it too similar to a Marshall.
Construction:
From the outside this amp appears to be well constructed, with quality fittings and attention to detail and after looking inside, I am only more impressed. It looks like a plywood cabinet that is very neatly finished, although the preamp tubes are a little awkward to replace. It comes with TAD preamp tubes and Ruby power tubes.
I like Blackstar’s philosophy of quality construction/design but from a Chinese supplier. Too many manufacturers go for the cheapest options when manufacturing in China. As a consumer I don’t really care where it is made as long as I can see good value for money. A cheap price and cheap quality does not always appeal to many.
Usage:
This amp is clearly well thought out and a pleasure to use. I like the way the knobs are labelled and grouped on the front panel – clear and logical. The functionality of the control panel is well thought out and makes many other amps look embarrassingly bad. There are few bells and whistles but the bare minimum to make it work extremely well.
Some people have complained about the lack of standby switch but if you read the manual you discover that there actually is one – only invisible. I don’t have a problem with pulling out the guitar lead, and doing away with unnecessary features makes more room for necessary ones.
I like that there is a boost knob on the send/return loop and the speaker connection options on the rear panel.
Clean Channel:
It makes so much sense to have a tone knob on the clean channel, which works very well, and sounds very nice too. I appreciate that on a small, budget model you can’t have full EQ on both channels but having no EQ on the clean channel, just does not work. So Blackstar have done well here. Usually, the drive channel requires very different EQ setting to the clean channel, so shared EQ amps are pretty much one-channel-at-a-time. You cannot switch channels during a song/performance because you have to adjust lots of settings. What’s the point of making it two channels?
The HT 20 could do with a bit more clean volume but getting a good balance between the channels is no problem with the 3 volume controls – one for each channel and a master. The drive channel also has a gain control so you don’t have to compromise the level of gain you want to get the volumes balanced. Again, this should be standard fare on every two channel amp.
Drive Channel:
The drive channel sounds pretty good to me. I have a couple of Fender amps for my clean sounds, so I wanted something with a generous amount of gain. Some people think it is a bit excessive and moderate crunch sounds are hard to find, but with my single coil Strats it sounds great to me. In this sort of amp, having too much gain is probably preferable to having too little.
The drive channel, not only has the usual 3 EQ controls but also has an ISF control. It’s kind of like a tone shaping knob. At first, I didn’t notice much effect but with some experimentation I did find it helpful in moulding the tones and ended up quite liking it. You need to keep the mids low for it to have the greatest effect.
I also like that they include a foot switch, which makes sense as the channel switching is so usable and functional.
As you might guess I am pretty wrapped with this amp and probably even more so, after buying a Peavey VK20 head that was very disappointing. Admittedly there is a $300 difference between them.
Blackstar has restored my faith in budget amps, but maybe ‘budget’ starts a bit higher than I thought.
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