Katana

Nikko

A decent review of the new Katana. I think it sounds fantastic...

monquixote

The problem is Tom Quale could fart into a bean tin and it would sound like a choir of angels.

earwighoney

Another video (50w one though)


I think it sounds great.  A lot of amp for £165

rossyamaha

Sounds great. 

menamestom

Sounds pretty good.  I'm swinging towards the line 6 Spider V for the acoustic/electric versatile house/jam amp slot.  But i'm going to just wait until they are both available and try them out side-by-side.  But certainly from some of the later clips they sound good, especially in the lower gain range which I play.

xSkarloey

That's an excellent review and it sounds great. I know Tom Quayle is a great player and has a seriously good tone anyway but he clearly like the amp.  

One to try I think. 

ennspek

I quite fancy one of these. Why is the head more expensive than the 100w 2x12 combo though?

ennspek

No it's not, I'm an idiot. It's more expensive than the 1x12 100w.

RandallFlagg

Sounds like a Roland Blues Cube with more gain and effects. Sounds like it has that same harsh upper mids.

digitalscream

ennspek said:

I quite fancy one of these. Why is the head more expensive than the 100w 2x12 combo though?

ennspek said:

No it's not, I'm an idiot. It's more expensive than the 1x12 100w.

I think the head has more features than the combo - certainly it has MIDI, which the combos lack.

Grumpyrocker

digitalscream said:

ennspek said:

I quite fancy one of these. Why is the head more expensive than the 100w 2x12 combo though?

ennspek said:

No it's not, I'm an idiot. It's more expensive than the 1x12 100w.

I think the head has more features than the combo - certainly it has MIDI, which the combos lack.

The head also has a small speaker in it, so you can use it for quiet practice even without a cab.

p90fool

Regarding that first video, does anyone outside the world of guitar wankery actually gig with that much gain?
I've never heard anyone who gets paid on a weekly basis use anything remotely approaching that much compression and sustain, it's just silly.

I'm left with the impression it's being marketed as a children's bedroom amp, which seems like a waste.

Sassafras

I lost the will to live 3 minutes into the video.

monquixote

p90fool said:

Regarding that first video, does anyone outside the world of guitar wankery actually gig with that much gain?
I've never heard anyone who gets paid on a weekly basis use anything remotely approaching that much compression and sustain, it's just silly.

I'm left with the impression it's being marketed as a children's bedroom amp, which seems like a waste.

I made a very similar point on one of the previous videos. 

I imagine channels 3 and 4 will probably be completely unusable outside of a bedroom, but that's probably not an issue for most of the target market.

Grumpyrocker

You don't have to gun those channels. I've got a high-gain valve amp. I can get some lovely lower-gain tones on the lead channel that I can't get on the other channels.

Rather tempted by the Katana head. Especially since I looked up the USB software and the number of effects on offer in that.

p90fool

That's why I'm disappointed, I play clean-ish country style guitar but always use high gain heads - usually a JCA100HDM but currently a pair of Custom 22s in stereo. 
They clean up beautifully from the guitar and are way more versatile than the obvious choices for my style. 

I know these videos have to show how much gain is available, but that totally squashed, guitar-patch-on-a-home-keyboard type sounds tell me absolutely nothing about how the amp responds to dynamic, musical input with a bit of light and shade. 

monquixote

p90fool said:

That's why I'm disappointed, I play clean-ish country style guitar but always use high gain heads - usually a JCA100HDM but currently a pair of Custom 22s in stereo. 
They clean up beautifully from the guitar and are way more versatile than the obvious choices for my style. 

I know these videos have to show how much gain is available, but that totally squashed, guitar-patch-on-a-home-keyboard type sounds tell me absolutely nothing about how the amp responds to dynamic, musical input with a bit of light and shade. 

Ooo @p90fool I have a JCA22, but I'm quite interested in the Custom 22. 

Does it have a real clean channel, or is it like the others that have a distortion and "more distortion" channels?

DrBob

monquixote said:

p90fool said:

That's why I'm disappointed, I play clean-ish country style guitar but always use high gain heads - usually a JCA100HDM but currently a pair of Custom 22s in stereo. 
They clean up beautifully from the guitar and are way more versatile than the obvious choices for my style. 

I know these videos have to show how much gain is available, but that totally squashed, guitar-patch-on-a-home-keyboard type sounds tell me absolutely nothing about how the amp responds to dynamic, musical input with a bit of light and shade. 

Ooo @p90fool I have a JCA22, but I'm quite interested in the Custom 22. 

Does it have a real clean channel, or is it like the others that have a distortion and "more distortion" channels?

I very briefly had one of the Custom 22's and whilst the 'clean' channel did seem cleaner than the JCA22 I'd tried before the revolved drive channel was a lot 'heavier' to my ears than the JCA22. On reflection I should've bought the JCA22..

Grumpyrocker

Andertons have a vid that's a bit more varied than some of the others.

Grumpyrocker

Oh they've done two vids, get to see it used as an acoustic amp on this one.

Plectrum

Grumpyrocker said:

Oh they've done two vids, get to see it used as an acoustic amp on this one.

I can't quite work out why someone would need to put an acoustic through it. Around here we put the acoustics straight through the PA. Acoustic combos often have a mic channel for those doing solo acoustic gigs without a PA but I don't think Katana has a mic input?