How good is BLACKSTAR for METAL? 

Which one is your favorite and why? Shoot!

I heard Katatonia and Swallow The Sun playing the same backline of Series One 100 amps on their 2010 tour and they sounded great.

Another great one. Thanks a bunch for the content mr Kohle. Cheers from 🇧🇷🤘🏻

Thanks, I like the 6L6 St. James 50. love the sound on clean and dirty, and weight especially since I have back issues ( have 3 of these amps now and simply love them). I have never tried the other amps / heads you reviewed, but they seem great as well in a traditional fashion. I have had Mesa, Krank, Marshall and Peavey in the past. Anyways happy for the St. James Series - really enjoy. Nice review and best of luck :)

Gotta admit, Blackstar is starting to seriously get my attention, in terms of being a possible go to brand for multiple applications for me in the future.

They sounded great for recording. Dynamic, lots of clarity and nice tone overall. People who are most used to chug on their home all by themselves adding extra gain and bass on their settings might find this a bit underwhelming. Those tones in a mix would be crushing, no doubt.

I have the HT stage 60 El-34 tubes, switched out the 70/80 Celestians & installed WGS ET-65 & RETRO 30 speakers. It was night and day difference in the tone!!!! I also have the ID Core TVP 60, & The FLY 3 with ext. Speaker. Love my Blackstars, I have a 1993 Randall RG 100 head & 4x12 cab, Laney half stack, soldono combo, Line 6 spider 4 combo, etc... These other amps haven't been played with since I got my Blackstar

i never has any good experience with blackstar amps @ high gain, i had the big series one 200 and the 104 6l6 amps and they both had some kind of earmelting high end fizz that i was never able to dial out and massive feedback and noise at higher gain setting. even after sending the 200 head to tonehunters back then didn`t help with that so i sold both and never looked back..but maybe the HT series will perform better for that kind of music i was always interested to find that out, cheers! 👌🎸

I really, really liked the Artisan with the OD. VERY surprised!

I would love to hear you attempt modern metal tones with the St. James

As a dutchman I am childishly amused by that KAK acronym

Of these I liked the 200 the best, it was fuller sounding. Where do you have the gain set? I have a HT40 and a HT60, and they both can sound a little buzzy.

Well done!!!!!!!

Think I preferred either the Artisan or the 100 6L6. But really I would need to play the types of riffs I would play to know for sure which one is right for me. 😁

I had a Blackstar HT Club 40 as my first amp that wasn't a crappy little practice amp. I never ever found "my sound" with it. Saved up for an Orange Rockerverb and never looked back. Edit: actually I love Laney as well. I've got an old AOR and an Ironheart 120 that are fun

I play the Amped 1 + Dual Distortion live and in the studio these days. Really nice combination that I can actually carry. Also: there is almost no noise when not-playing so you dont need a noise gate when tracking.

I have the series-1 100-6L6 and love it still....

why no close up on your settings Kohle, i can never get my series one dialed in like that.

Would love an episode about the HT dual on bass!!

st james has the best mids & articulation here. Maybe less harsh mid spikes and added presence will be good in mix with clean vocal.

Always wanted to like Blackstar but hated the sound of the HT amps (has the same high end thing that I dont like in H&Ks) and have never really had a chance to play their more boutique stuff (artisan and series one), Nice to hear these amps because they do sound great dialled in right. Still want to try the Artisan 30R as a fan of matchless and vox, not for metal metal but for clean and indie rock tones.

All of these amps sound fine, Blackstar amps never got me excited. But I really want to know where you got this cool Sunn guitar from!

I would have liked to hear the 100 or 200 with a boost. A bit more gain would have been awesome for them I think. None of them were really voiced in a way I liked for my style. But I'm sure others can make them speak/sing

I have a blackstar 100 tvp (solid state) head and I think it sounds very close to the tube versions. No one ever talks about Blackstars solid state models. I would like to know why.

I like Blackstar they make fresh stuff, for the modern guitar player and good prices too.

I would love to see Alex Scholpp (Tarja, Farmer Boys, Tieflader) on the channel. The tone he gets from his Series One 100 is sooo good. And he's a bloody funny guy too.

The ISF knob does most of the tone shaping with Blackstar imho

The original Marshalls had 5881 and KT66 tubes before they used El34s They also used 6505 tubes as well.

I love my HT METAL 100 with matching cab. But i would like to try new speakers in the cab one day

You should have tested these amps with very low tuned Guitars. I find out that Blackstar Amps managed low tunings very well.

Blackstar is very cool!!!

The St. James sounded less fizzy to me. I was surprised how it sounded. It did sound slower.

why they are so thin? :-(

Having owned/gigged the series 104 6L6 for the past decade, I can safely say that it is a very fickle amp. There is waaaay too much ugly top end that needs to be dialled out and it can be very difficult to get rid of the ever present 'fizz' once it gets up to show volumes. Seems like I'm having to constantly fight with the presence, treble, preamp and power stage to try and mitigate. I think the thin/cold sounding description was actually quite generous... plus it weighs an absolute frikkin ton at nearly 29kg!

Series One 200 and the Blackfire 200 are behemoths!

My choice would be 104 EL34😎💪 Don´t know why, but the 6l6 is nothing for me.

Love the 6l6 tube. It adds a raw sound to any amp.

Jimmy Page used KT88s in his super leads from the mid 70s up to the end of Zep .

i don't like a lot blackstar amps, i find them a little polite sounding and cold, but i like a lot your little sunn mustang :)

Series one 100 6l6 👍

Ich besitze bereits seit Jahren, einen S1-200. Bin durch Zufall darauf gekommen und habe mich leider SOFORT in den verliebt. Ein Monster, der bläst einem das Dumme aus der Mütze, so brutal laut.

first? 🎉

Ah its steve!i know steve!

I owned series one 45 and for some rock tones it sounded decent. For more overdriven tones it was bad. Shallow bass, harsh treble and dead middle. There is something wrong about this amps. It's like they have not a lot od tone in the tone.

200

They sound alright.... But just do not sound inspiring to me at all, To the point where it's hard to find reason to buy/reccomend/use one, A lot of better boutique metal amps are more expensive granted and that puts theese withing peoples price ranges... but then when you look at amps like BOSS katana amps thats cheaper and wayy better sounding/usable or even venture into Axe Fx cheaper units It makes these amps a hard buy. I've never heard a Blackstar and thought wow that sounds amazing.

The 200 sounded the best.(decent tone, not really my flavour exactly but better than the rest for sure) The 100 and the Dept 10 sounded EXACTLY the same (decent sounding but pretty boring sounding to my ears) I really did not like the St James, it sounded thin and weak to me. Blackstar really not my style. I own the really old Tube pedals (HT Dist and HT Dist X) and they are fine and all that, but I never use them because they are just not my thing (I prefer to use the Two Notes Le Lead for a tube pre if needed, much better modern metal tone IMO) the 100 and dept10 were decent but a bit "Meh" to me the St James sounded a bit shit if I am honest and the 200 , might actually be the first Blackstar Amp tone I thought was good. Never thought they were bad...just "Meh" in general, but the 200 sounded good, just like I said earlier not really my thing (My thing is 5150/Soldano style amps)

BlackStar = Sonic GNAR

GLEEEEEEEEEN is going to be pissed

All of them are kind of... soft sounding, I guess? A bit too much "give".

too bad that Blackstar doesn't make the Series One amps anymore, that or they just sell them to friends and family, because no one online has them for sale outside of sellers on reverb and Guitar Center's used inventory. Your Sweetwater links are completely useless and are their for reference information only.

captor doesn’t have a proper impeda curve, don’t ever use it for anything serious. you had cabinets there, why don’t use them as a load? just a dibox between amp/cab and you get a proper amp direct

Blackstar never really excited me. And it doesn't after this video. Not that they sound bad. But to my ears they just lack character. There is nothing recognizable in their sound. Nothing that stands out. It's "good" in some way but so boring to my ears. My bandmate has played a Blackstar for years and it never made my head turn. It was just...a sound. If anyone gets what I want to say :D

Useless sound samples. I'm a huge fan of the brand, have their HT distortion pedals as my main sound, but unfortunately cannot find any good sound here... Next time ask a cab with a mic.

Everything is metal when you boost the 500hz section, Kohle 😅😂

Sound generic, Just ok. Really not great. This is why they are not loved. With Splawn, Friedman and Fractal just never be

As good as the player.

I’ve always found Blackstar just kinda bland and uninteresting. I’ve had a couple of their amps over the years because on paper, they offered everything I was after for a decent price. But each time, I spent hours turning knobs only to be disappointed. There isn’t anything that they do very well in my opinion. The midrange is sorta honky and twangy at the same time on most of their amps, not very flattering or musical to my ears. Considering how many Marshall, Mesa, and Fender clones there are out there, Blackstar is just low on the list of considerations. I keep hoping they’ll change their approach and really find their niche, but so far I’ve been disappointed. Seeing them on your channel had me hopeful, but the demos kinda highlight the characteristics I personally don’t like about them. All this is strictly opinion, totally aware of that and don’t want to take anything away from people who are enjoying their stuff. This could be my jaded perspective, but it seems to me especially lately that Blackstar is more focused on sponsorships with artists and getting people talking about them than they are with addressing any of the feedback that comes their way. Just my sour perspective 😆

They are NOT good amps...they had the right idea (they said they were going to make a better Marshall...) THEY FAILED MASSIVELY. They sound anemic and wanting for something in every amp...(and lets NOT get started on that little dial...the funky one that is supposed to give you American or British tone...worthless)

the series one 100 head i tried was just too fizzy and noisy for me to keep it but the features, options and build quality have been ahead of its time imo 🦾