Blackstar Ht STAGE 60

[matt86ie]

Today is the third day with this amp & I was starting to get a little frustrated with the sound. I figured I would start from scratch so I took the EQ out of the effects loop, put all knobs back to center & started trying it again. After a little while I started getting some very decent sounds out of this.

First - This is a very loud amp. I have a 100 watt marshall JCM 800 & this is at least as loud & maybe louder.
With the master volume low the sound comes out sounding muffled & somewhat fizzy on the OD channels.
After turning it up a little bit it cleared up & started sounding more the way I thought it should.

Clean channel - Voice button pushed in, volume at about 1/4(first line) bass middle, treble almost 3/4 & reverb a little more than 1/4 I'm getting a very good Fenderish clean sound. Tried on guitars with single & humbuckers, both treble & neck p/u's sounds good on all . Master is: resonance & presence a little more than 1/2, master volume at 1/4. Turn up the clean volume & it adds some dirt but in a good way ,breaks up a little with agressive picking. I've been playing on this for about an hour now & I can't believe how good it sounds. (it sounds good without the reverb too)

The OD channels have a lot more knobs to adjust so it took longer to start getting a sound I liked. Again, as the master volume goes up the sound opened up & the fizzy sound got less fizzy.
OD1 - Voice button in, Gain at 1/4, Volume alittle more than 1/4. Bass, middle & treble all a little more than 1/2, ISF at 1/4, master set the same as above. Getting a real nice crunchy rhythm not overly distorted sound. If it's too crunchy turn the gain almost all the way down & its similar to the clean channel but with a little fuzz. turn up the gain a little & I'm getting a real good rock rhythm sound. Sounds a little like early AC/DC.
OD2 is heavy. Voice button out, Gain between 1/4 & 1/2. everything else tha same as OD1. Real heavy rhythm tone, really nice & articulate on leads with good sustain when holding a note.

This is what I've found so far. I'm starting to have a real good time playing through this & starting to get the sounds I wanted.

excellent work there and it must have taken some time to do this, anyway i have taken these settings and tried them on my ht 60
and i`m impressed but one question i`m just curious about, on setting the master volume only 1/4 way up are we not underdriving the amp here ?
but the sounds you got from the clean and both od channels are exactly as you described them,
the sound i have in my head is Status Quo , brian adams ,
i do love acdc too, but don`t play any of their music in my band, perhaps someday i might try thunderstruck !!!!!!!

[matt86ie]

What country are you in mate?

I know Thomann in Germany are selling the HT60 for around £630, plus they do free shipping to the UK. Obviously try first. I also saw they had a B stock HT40 going for a steal, might still be there.

The HT`s you tried might have sounded muddy because you had them at very low volume. Most amps sound muddy at low volume because they aren`t pushing the power tubes OR the speaker. Also, that could be related to the guitar you tried them with.

hi there i`m from ireland and yes i know thomann as i do buy a lot of bits and pieces from them i did not buy the ht 60 from them due to anything going wrong i can bring it back to the shop where i bought it as it`s only 15 mins drive from me, your correct on what your saying about the amp, i said last night i was taking it to a top class musician that knows how to get a top sound and he said the very exact same thing as you on under driving them
anyway he put it through a variety of tests and said it`s a brilliant amp and get any sound you want from it once you know how it operates
the guitar used was a fender usa tele year 2000 which is what i mostly use on stage and he was getting sounds i never knew was there
well i did but could not find them, he also said be very carefull when putting a mic (sm57) in front of it and setting the channel on the mixer as what you hear coming from the amp could be totally different front of house, especially with the overdrive, he said that it could sound right to you on stage but colud sound like rashers sizzling F O H, so overall he said great amp only to make it work for you not the other way around, i paid 780 euro for mine and now i dont think i will be selling it, i have heard many a musician say fender guitar - fender amp, but he really got this baby singing today, as for the ear piercing sound i was on about on the first string, we just dropped the pickups a little away from the first 2 / 3 strings and problem solved,

Good news matt. I`ve been playing a bit today and I think this amp sounds great with single coils, often quite transparent and glassy, which is great. You must have some big gigs lined up if you need mic yours into the PA!

well as i said at the top when i first started this topic, I have a 3 member band, playing mostly wedding and social functions
could be anything from 100 to 450 people at a venue, ok perhaps it`s a little bit daft to mic the amp on stage, but reason i do it is because
i do not want to have my amp too loud on stage because of the drummer and keyboard players ears, placing a mic in front i can keep it at a reasonable
level on stage and turn up the mic to push it more front of house, but one musician told me that the sound of your amp on stage is definately not the same coming out front, what colud be fine on stage could sound like sizzling rashers out front, i have to laugh at that , well put
anyway keep expiermenting with the HT 60, and any good settings worth sharing write them up here just like Barreldog
take care,

[trinity]

I bought the stage 60 and absolutly love it!!!
so many different settings and each has really remarkable character.

It took a few hours to dial it in, but today I mik'd it up and played with the band
and it was stunning to say the very least

I love channel 1 cleans, either Twin sounding or AC30 sounding
hard to decide.... I am using the Voxy voice and it has a nice warm sparkly tone

OD 1 is super dynamic I run the gain about 10:00 and it has a boutiquie crunch
...that cleans up nice with the volume rolled off

OD2 crazy gain !!!! I run it about 11:00 use the boost pedal jack on the back to push solos

I got a sparkle drive to boost the front
but the clean channel hates it .... it's off to Keeley to be modded
if it dosent sound better its going out to the bay for sale

the button footswitch is quirky on button 1
it dosent want to switch back to clean every time

I will post clips soon from the studio

best sounding amp I ever owned (and have played 39 years)
period.

[matt86ie]

I bought the stage 60 and absolutly love it!!!
so many different settings and each has really remarkable character.

It took a few hours to dial it in, but today I mik'd it up and played with the band
and it was stunning to say the very least

I love channel 1 cleans, either Twin sounding or AC30 sounding
hard to decide.... I am using the Voxy voice and it has a nice warm sparkly tone

OD 1 is super dynamic I run the gain about 10:00 and it has a boutiquie crunch
...that cleans up nice with the volume rolled off

OD2 crazy gain !!!! I run it about 11:00 use the boost pedal jack on the back to push solos

I got a sparkle drive to boost the front
but the clean channel hates it .... it's off to Keeley to be modded
if it dosent sound better its going out to the bay for sale

the button footswitch is quirky on button 1
it dosent want to switch back to clean every time

I will post clips soon from the studio

best sounding amp I ever owned (and have played 39 years)
period.

yeah i have to agree it is really good, and yes it did take some time to master it, used it 6 times on stage since i started this fourm
and really getting to love it, it`s mostly od 2 i use for my overdrive, i`ll post what settings i`m using later, just getting ready for a gig now
youi say your getting it modded why so ? what sort of band do you play in and your style of music, read the very start of mine and it will fill you in on my band , be back later

[trinity]

Hey Matt

I play Contemporary Christian Worship on the rocked out radical side. I build my own guitars typically strat and tele styles
It was the sparkle drive pedal I am getting modded. The Channel 1 on the HT 60 sounded nasty boosted with the stock sparkle drive

I also have piezos in my bridge i am considering mixing piezos with the preamp through the TC effects and blending them all back together
into the EL34s, so I may have a use for the sparkle drive after all.
I have always used piezos to get super clean sounds, but I havent even plugged them in
after hearing the cleans on the Blackstar

I played this morning with the full band and the sound guys were grinning at the sweet guitar tones
I never even went into channel 3 for the set today
clean and OD1 did everything .... they really sounded incredible

I will put some audio and video clips together in the next few weeks as the rest of the rig comes together
I am adding a TC G major in the loop and a few other goodies

I am thinking I want 2 HT 60s in stereo with midi switching of the 6 preamp channels
that would be insanely great tone, and could blend vox and fender cleans, and vox clean with od1 layered

I am really diggin this amp

[matt86ie]

Hey Matt

I play Contemporary Christian Worship on the rocked out radical side. I build my own guitars typically strat and tele styles
It was the sparkle drive pedal I am getting modded. The Channel 1 on the HT 60 sounded nasty boosted with the stock sparkle drive

I also have piezos in my bridge i am considering mixing piezos with the preamp through the TC effects and blending them all back together
into the EL34s, so I may have a use for the sparkle drive after all.
I have always used piezos to get super clean sounds, but I havent even plugged them in
after hearing the cleans on the Blackstar

I played this morning with the full band and the sound guys were grinning at the sweet guitar tones
I never even went into channel 3 for the set today
clean and OD1 did everything .... they really sounded incredible

I will put some audio and video clips together in the next few weeks as the rest of the rig comes together
I am adding a TC G major in the loop and a few other goodies

I am thinking I want 2 HT 60s in stereo with midi switching of the 6 preamp channels
that would be insanely great tone, and could blend vox and fender cleans, and vox clean with od1 layered

I am really diggin this amp

well you sound like you really know your sonuds and the type you want to achieve, you use clean and od 1, so what are your settings for them
i would like to try them out, i presume you had a look at my first post all about my band and the type of music played, the tele i use is the 2002 model orignal with it`s shop pickups, i will get to post my settings on here in a day or two i`m just in from playing and fairly tired now
what is this sparkle pedal you talk about, anyway some guitarists tell me to change out the pickups and get better ones, but have no idea what to get
i played through a behringer combo one night and it really sparkled it was a twin 12 as for exact name not too sure now it`s belong to a mate of mine
i know whan you read behringer first thouight cheap not a great name but really did well for country rock and no perdals attached to it
if i could just get to really master my blackstar

[trinity]

matt here are my settings
the gain cleans up a lot when the master volume goes up past 9:00

[trinity]

The sparkle drive is a pedal based on the 808 tube screamer
but it adds a clean boost and the clean and dirty sounds can be blended together
they sound great Brad Paisley uses one modded by Keeley
Brent Mason uses one modded by someone else

..... but the stock one sounds like crap in front of the HT60 clean channel to my ears


I have a brother in law who has the Behringer 212
it does sound very good

I wont be buying anymore Behringer
I have had way too many pieces of their gear broken
and most of it sounds really cheap and nasty

I am waiting for the G major to handle effects
and It needs a compressor in front of the amp I think

I really love this amp

[matt86ie]

The sparkle drive is a pedal based on the 808 tube screamer
but it adds a clean boost and the clean and dirty sounds can be blended together
they sound great Brad Paisley uses one modded by Keeley
Brent Mason uses one modded by someone else

..... but the stock one sounds like crap in front of the HT60 clean channel to my ears


I have a brother in law who has the Behringer 212
it does sound very good

I wont be buying anymore Behringer
I have had way too many pieces of their gear broken
and most of it sounds really cheap and nasty

I am waiting for the G major to handle effects
and It needs a compressor in front of the amp I think

I really love this amp






That is class the way you put the settings up, how did you manage this ?
you know you have opened up a whole new way for other users of the blackstar ht 60 to put up their settings up on here the way you just did
ok heres an experiment for you , get the behringer 212 and compare it to the blackstar 60
my mate told me the blackstar has a harder type sound than the behringer 212 which has more sparkle to it
quote me if i`m wrong here, I was intending to put up my settings tonight but instead i had to tidy up my studio here
gear and leads all over the place, but I really like the way you did it so tell me how and for others to see and do the same
also these settings you have what are they most suited to in music, e.g country - rock - heavy - rhythm - lead

[trinity]

the forum has a simple way to host pictures
when you hit reply there are square buttons above the text box
one shows an icon of a picture
this one--->
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or you can just type

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the icon just to the left of the insert picture
this one --->
is an image hosting add-in to the blackstar forum board
click choose file and browse to the pic on your computer and click host it
it will give you links to insert in between the