Any thoughts on the Boss Katana or Fender Mustang GT amps?

[DrPete]

I've seen these new digital amps online on Youtube and in my local guitar shop.

Any thoughts on here? They would be pretty handy for me, but I'm skeptical. The distorted sounds do sound thin and fuzzy to me.

Anyone here play their offset through one?

[Jaguar018]

What are your needs for the amp?

For home/basement noodling, I don't see any problems with these amps. I have one of the Line 6 Amplifi amps at home (along with a Princeton Reverb). I don't think it's the best idea to buy one expecting to sound like Hendrix at Monterey or whatever, but it's fun to be able to mess around with all sorts of basic amp sounds beyond what your standard vintage tube amp has. Alas it can't ever really nail a reverb-drenched Fender surf amp experience, but I manage.

For practicing with a band, or playing on mic'd on stage I'd be a lot more leery. There are some really good solid state amps (like Quilter) that have been proven to be reliable 'live' amps. I haven't read/seen as much of that with these digital modeling types.

Personally, I think the people that want to play a modelling amp live, and switch their 'core amp' sound every other song are kind of weird, but maybe that is the nature of being in a wedding/cover band.

[ElephantDNA]

I got a b stock katana over the holidays at a good discount. It's a very nice piece of gear. The clean sound is really good. To my ear, some of the amps and effects are a lot better than others. I really like the sde3000 model on there as a base delay tone. Some of the gain settings are good (guvnr, big muff), some are not so good.

I'm using it in a stereo setup with another amp mostly to add fullness and low end. I'm not sure if I would gig with it as my primary amp, but it's certainly good enough, especially if you need a good clean tone.

There are a lot of good reasons to buy the amp. For me, there are certain effects like chorus that I rarely use but want access to occasionally, and I'm not expecting it to sound amazing on its own since its not my primary amplifier. It's fantastic for bedroom at .5 watts, and sounds pretty good through usb for recording ideas or demos. You also get to explore all kinds of weird effects like slow gear that might help you creatively.

For the price its an excellent buy, but as a primary gigging amplifier it's certainly not for everyone. It's hard to evaluate in a store because the tone studio software tweakability is really the most important part of the amp.

[The Dead Ranch Hands]

I have a Fender Mustang amp. Not a huge fan of the overdriven models, but the clean Twin setting is a nice tone, provided you take some time with the EQ settings. There are some fun effects, and you can also connect another sound source to it and jam along with things. If you connect it to your computer there are a lot more effects available than are accessible from the amp itself, and you can adjust a lot more perimeters on the amp models.

The reverb is decent, delay is fine but not enough external controls to make it very useful on the fly. Nice tremolo, other modulation effects are okay. Decent Big Muff effect. Nice practice amp for very little money

[higgsblossom]

I have a Mustang III V2. 100 presets and I only ever use two of them: Tweed and Twin, basic amp models.

I think the best description sound wise is that they sound like the recorded originals, not like the original amp. A bit... HiFi-versions of Fender amps? Still very good practice amps, though.

[wooderson]

I had a Katana 100 for a moment but gave it to a friend who lost all of his guitar stuff to disaster. The clean was quite nice and it seemed like it could do chugga-chugga metal well but everything in-between and the effects seemed pretty blah. I did not hook it up to a computer to explore all the 'Sneaky Amps' and other effects or dialing it in deeper, though.

I wouldn't buy one if I was looking for the sound of an overdriven tube amp - but if you want a good, pedal friendly clean the Katana is a very nice deal. I got a Roland JC-40 as a replacement that works better for me, on sale it wasn't a ton more than a Katana.

[Embenny]

I had a Mustang 1x12" combo for a couple years of apartment living that precluded cranked tube amps.

It had nice cleans, and some satisfying lightly-overdriven tones. I used pedals for anything beyond Tubescreamer levels of gain.

It got the job done as a home/practice amp, but I wouldn't personally choose it as a gigging option, unless those clean-to-mild OD tones are your wheelhouse.

[Futuron]

I have a couple of Fender Mustang amps (haven't heard any Katana's - I assume they are just Roland amps with Boss digital pedal effects). I've not used the small bedroom ones, but I imagine that they'd be terrific for that situation. The newer GT200 (basically v3 of the Mustang IV) twin combo has a lot of very useful sounds (not all of them) if you want to use those. I personally like that it has stereo effects loop & line-outs, so even if you're only using 1 amp on stage, your stereo effects are maintained in the PA. Then there's all the available fiddling with presets and so on if you're really keen. I created one preset for fun that included 4 reverbs. That was a swirly atmosphere...

Being modelling amps (not to mention solid state), the purists don't like them on principle, and perhaps many players can only find a small number of useful sounds, but for the relatively super cheap price it's totally worth it. Even if you just pick one or two basic sounds (even just cleans) and use pedals for the rest it's far cheaper than buying any other Fender twin combo (with probably only 2 sounds, and mono). Having a tuner, looper & customisable presets built-in means if you really want to, you can just grab a guitar & the amp and rock straight up to a gig, practice or demo recording with minimal fuss. No wheels or coasters though.

The GTs are a big improvement on the original release for certain, and plenty of people are impressed with the possible sound. As to whether they are up to scratch for the seasoned audiophile and worthy of the big stage or studio, that is another question. Maybe only you can say.

I've got a guy who loves the GT200 and when on stage just likes to keep it on the Purple Rain preset and just use his guitar controls for variation, no pedals. However, if I'm playing on stage I prefer to use stomp boxes with (2) clean amps (plus the guitars' controls of course).

[jagstang]

I use a mustang III V2 in bandpractice. Really like the tone (i use a clean reverb, a driven bassman and a slightly driven ac30model). A really good tubeamp sounds better but i don't mind the last 5%. To me, the mustang sounds are very nice and useful in bandcontext. And it is really nice to have a xlr-out for monitoring the drummer and a tuner onboard.
If you're a soundpurist, you will find a better amp for 3k bucks, but beating 250 bucks is difficult...
If something went wrong during gig-transport or some beers in rehearsalroom or on stage, i don't mind. I would mind if it were a boutiqueamp.

[higgsblossom]

[jesterpunk68]

The band Moon Taxi uses the mustang gt live, here is their rig rundown.

https://www.premierguitar.com/articles/ ... -moon-taxi

[higgsblossom]

The band Moon Taxi uses the mustang gt live, here is their rig rundown

I found this very interesting: they use those amps because they can dial in the same sound every night and because they can go direct. But they only use one preset, the 65 Twin.

That is the same experience I have with the Mustang III V2. Stuffed with unnecessary presets and effects, because what players really need is good models of the classic amp palette.

[The Dead Ranch Hands]

The band Moon Taxi uses the mustang gt live, here is their rig rundown

I found this very interesting: they use those amps because they can dial in the same sound every night and because they can go direct. But they only use one preset, the 65 Twin.

That is the same experience I have with the Mustang III V2. Stuffed with unnecessary presets and effects, because what players really need is good models of the classic amp palette.

Yeah, I just use the Twin too. Good sounding amp model. The others, I haven't been able to make work for me. The 63 spring doesn't sound like outboard reverb at all, but it's a decent onboard type reverb sound. Other than that I skip most of the other stuff on it. Which is fine. I have the Mustang II V2, and it only cost me $100. I think it could handle a small gig, and it's perfect as a practice amp.

[jesterpunk68]

The band Moon Taxi uses the mustang gt live, here is their rig rundown

I found this very interesting: they use those amps because they can dial in the same sound every night and because they can go direct. But they only use one preset, the 65 Twin.

That is the same experience I have with the Mustang III V2. Stuffed with unnecessary presets and effects, because what players really need is good models of the classic amp palette.

Yeah they really only use it for the twin preset and its light, reliable and has a direct out and sounds good with pedals. I dont play live but I would think reliability, setup/ tear down time and consistency are all pretty important at that level. It also explains why a lot of bands use things like eleven rack or axefx live over more complex tube amp rigs.