Hughes & Kettner Blues Master

Today there are a few small amps to choose from that put out approx 5 watts. Compared to the competition today, and what was available when this unit was new, (18 years ago) the crunch master still kicks ass. 1 channel instrument input on front or back of the unit, gain and master volume and treb, mid, and bass control plus a bright switch on the1 front. The back of the unit lets you plug in a speaker cab(a real speaker cab) using the power of the unit its self. That's ~5watts EL84 and a 12AX7. OR you can use the switchable line/instrument out that has a H&K Red Box built in. Or skip the box and just use the raw sound how ever you want. The variable attenuator is a smooth variable no preset notches where you go from 5 to 1 to 1/4 watt or what ever. You set it to where you want it. I have used this for many different situations. I've used it live line out to marshall 9100 into 2 2x12 cabs. Or into a Theil small mesa 1x12 using the blues master's power. I've also used it line out into a pair of m-audio bx8a power monitors. I have also used it with the foot switch, which by passes the amp and then used the line out into another preamp (quad-x into power amp) which lets me have the ability to get other sounds. It works well with all if you use it correctly.

I play a strat with an alembic blaster on it. I also use a custom tele with dimarzio D 100 & D104 in the neck. Sound is so subjective. For me I can get anything I want out of this unit. For those who are so quick to judge this unit based upon the various "cork sniffing" types of tubes they've used, I think they have left out a serious part of their critique, what kind of cabs and speakers did you use? This unit handles pedals very well. I have my blaster set up with a small knob so I can adjust the output without a screwdriver. Using the strat without the blaster directly into the amp I can have the master full up and the preamp on 2:00 and the damn thing has the sweet sound of glowing glass flowing forever. A big muff-> MXR phase 90 -> boss dd2 = pink floyd dg sounds. Back off the preamp to 10:00 -> furman reverb -> straight into the amp and turn up the master and you get a great CLEAN sound...Little twangy AHH so sweet. 5 watts of Tube amp is a lot of volume but it ain't for the stage. While 100 watts from valves is going to make your ears ooze goop from your brains. It's unusable. Crunch master -> mixer using the attenuator, sounds very good. The tubes and be cooking but without the deafness. I am currently using a mullard reissue EL84 and a Russian 12AX7a. I use lord valve for my tubes. He has a good selection and he is a smart guy... not a wise guy.

It's old now and works like new. I have had the thing cleaned. Dust blown out and it is suprising how "new" it feels. I use the crunch master along with a H&K Metal Master which is 2 12AX7s plus its own SS 4 watt power amp as a backup for my live rig. I can add to that a Crate power block for the power amp and I can get by for a night. Never had to but this thing is always with me.

Never used them for any thing. They do have the manual on line if you need it. Under Alte, for OLD.

I'm 99 years old and played for 86 of em....
Sorry I've played for almost 30 years now and that's all I do. Stolen I'd get another one. And I WOULD shoot the one who took it. I really love this amp. I would not get rid of it. I have plenty of other amps but this one is the one I love to record with and practice with now. I hate that H&K has not smartened up enough to reissue these things. They screwed up when they first sold them and said they were preamps. They are not. With the number of low watt amps coming out now H&K could look at the market and see the light and reissue this amp.

This product has been out of production for years. It has tons of features such as built in attenuator (power soak), built in Red Box, Speakr out jack, Instrument level out jack, Line level out jack, foot switchable bypass switch and/or jack and ALL tube!

If you have read the reviews on the Hughes & Kettner Cream Machine (CM) and notices the huge review ranting and raving about how fantastic the Cream Machine is, that was me! I still feel that way and that the CM is one of the BEST overdriven power tube small watt tube amps for heavy distortion on the planet. The only downside is that without taking it apart and resoldering (bypassing the preamp section) the beast cannot be tamed.

I found a great deal on a Hughes & Kettner Blues Master and went for it. I have absolutely no regrets. With a couple of the right pedals, the CM tone and sound can be achieved yet even brighter dynamics and harmonic possibly due to the EL84 as opposed to the CM???s 12AX7 power amp section. BUT, with the Blues Master you can also get beautiful soft guitar tones, incredible smooth saturated blues tones, and again, with the right pedals a screeching Marshall growl yet smoother and more controllable IMO.

I cannot say enough about this device either as with the CM. It took me a few months to find the right pedals to get hair raising distortion out of it. AS always I use an old 6 band MXR (blue one) EQ to drive my tube amps. I then added a DIY Overdrive/Booster pedal I built. I never play super clean so the MXR is always on and with the guitar volume knob turned down it is smooth yet when the strings are struck harder it still has some bite to it. Notch the guitar volume up and step on the Overdrive/Booster pedal and it is sonic glory!

This device is capable of a large variety of rich natural tones. It runs on one 12AX7 for the preamp section and one EL84 for the power amp section. I believe it is only 1 watt. Has a built in attenuator and many other features. I run it into an ART Tube Parametric EQ, then into a Rocktron Xpression FX unit, then into a ART solid state power amp. It ???BLASTS!???. Like stated in the CM review, once you get your FX post pre AND power amp and hear how crystal clear they sound, you will never go back to an FX loop or cramming them in the front of an amp ( some exceptions; Chorus, Phaser, Tremolo, Wah).

Built like a tank! These are from the 80's and I have to date (Nov 2007) never heard of one breaking down ever.

This product has been out of production for a long time but I think it is awesome that H & K still posts the manuals for it and they did respond to my email when I sent them one in regards to how impressed I was with these devices (CM & Blues Master).

I am an active musician and a tone fanatic. If your looking for a more brittle or modern pre amp distortion type tone or one with all the bells and whistles and control knobs all-in-one this may not be the amp for you. But if you are looking for a simple straight forward pure warm tube amp distortion with pure authentic power tube saturation, grab one if you ever get the chance. You can always build and add. The core of any electric guitarists sound (other than the guitar and pickups) is indeed the amplifier amd it???s tone. You may need to add a pedal for more drive and and EQ but that???s a small price to pay for achieving ultimate tone. A used Marshall TSL100 (which I sold after trying out the Cream Machine) will cost you about $1000.00 on Ebay. Why pay hundreds for a 50 or 100 watt tube amp (or even more for a low super low watt tube amp) and another $300 for a Hot Plate just so you can achieve real power tube saturation tone without going deaf or having the club owners and sound man continuously telling you to turn the thing down. Save yourself a lot of time and money! Running this through a power amp you have the options to play at any level you want yet with the same saturation at every level (minus speaker breakup at very low levels of course). This way you can still blast the thing (which I live for!) at home when you need to vent or have fun yet keep it at a professional level while performing live or at practice.

I have been playing guitar for 36 years. I have owned many Marshalls, some Rocktron amps, Fender, KMD, other not as popular brand names and tried out a couple of Mesas and Riveras but this is what it took to get my personal signature tone. If I could give it an "11" I would!

I am told this is a 4 watts tube amp...in a half rack.it feels very professional with all it's outputs

it's very loud. incredible tube sounds for such a small rack. impressive and definitely recommended

feels very ncely built

yeah...definitely recommended. if you love tube tone,dont waste your money on transistor or digital shit,or even on tube preamps..this is really like a vintage amp in a tiny box. excellent and very impressive

FIVE watts ,Class A amp in a tiny half rack! the eq is not the most powerful in the world but neither is the one in a marshall. however,unlike a marshall,you can carry this great gizmo easily...it's got about 10 different outputs for so many different needs

wow...I cant really complain as this is pentode sound.excellent! I have changed the preamp tube with a low gain 12ax7 (philips 12ax7wa)...it really sounds like a classic amp!

built better and more solid than any pedal I have ever seen

unique....I definitely recommend to buy it and to dispense with the usual transistor crap

this is a 5 watts little amp, very scarce on features....it has 3 band EQ but it's pretty useless because it's wired before the overdrive stage..in other words it's not post -EQ.

So when you turn up the bass,you dont hear more low end,just muddiness. Same goes with mids. Also,it's power amp it's very clean,I was expecting an excellent power tube sound (Gilmour,SRV) but instead the power amp it's clean and sterile. If you want an EXCELLENT little tube amp (still 5 watts) buy a CRATE V58!! You will be very glad you did!!!

well...nothing to write home about. It's quite noisy even on low gain. It gets VERY,VERY HOT!!! Far too much! I am talking temperature,not hot sounds

well,as I said,it gets very hot...not particularly reassuring,there are electronic components inside andcan fail at this temperature. they should really have installed a little fan inside

have been playing 10 years...own various tube amps,Seymour Duncan,Peavey.

the Crunch Master would have been an exceptional idea if it's power amp would work the way a nice tube amo would,but as it is...an it gets so hot

Very well thought out thing. Gain, master, bass, mids, treble, bright switch. Tons of output options, built in speaker emulator. The manual also tells you how to bypass the speaker emulator for certain setups. That way you can switch it off automatically when you switch to bypass with the switch in the back or a footswitch.
I just got back into using this thing and have used it with a speaker to practice and through the power amp of a combo. Earlier I ran this through a multiFX into a stereo and had a very luxurious practice amp.

Great for all my guitars (HBs, P-90, single coils). This thing was made for tube style clean to overdriven, but I just rediscovered how much gain it really has. No brutal distortion, but really pretty gutsy. It should work for any style of music where you don't need multiple gain stages. The clean stays clean until about 12 o'clock. As soon as you wind it up further you have to be careful with how much bass you feed it. It gets flabby.
Just now I am trying it with the AX7 in the preamp replaced by a AT7. That makes it even cleaner and I will try this with a distortion pedal soon.

I have had it for twelve years, but I have seldom gigged with it. Not even tube problems so far.

I have been playing for a long time but I have never gigged much with electric guitar. So my combo amps just sit around. I also own a Korg modeling thing, but that seems more like a toy. The crunch master is basically ideal for my needs. If it broke I would probably try to get a combo amp the same wattage (5!!!!) and if I had to go onstage I would rout that through the PA or another amp. I have actually played one gig with only the crunch master through the PA. Worked fine for the audience, but I wished for a better monitor.

Layout up front is pretty much what you would see in a standard guitar amp and reacts just like its bigger tube brothers. It's whats in back that's happening. Input is in back and in front. Many types of line level outputs and both cab sim and direct outs. Last but not least is the loudspeaker out. A BIG 5 watts of Class A. Run it into a 4-12" and go nuts. I'm using it for both LIVE and Recording.

Now here's where it gets interesting. I'm a Blues Harmonica Player. I set it up just like a 59' Fender Bassman. Go straight into the board from the cab sim output. Run the direct no cab sim to a Fender Blues Deville 4-10 "Amp In" loop return (no preamp). Mics are the JT-30 and SM-57. What does it sound like? It sound like a modern Bassman with a little Vox AC15. The low end is a bit loose but can be tighten up with correct tube choice and tweeking with the input level. Out front on the house mix I found that boosting the low mids can bring back alot of that gut punch. Now on tape (Hard Drive I mean) IT SMOKES. It's all there!

I also play a Strat and use the Blues Master the same as the the Harp. I use a small mixer and run two Blues Master into it and the outputs to the Deville and to the House. Engineers love it because there is that much less to worry about.

Harp > JT30/SM-57 > DOD690 Twin Speed Chorus > HK Blues Master > Delay > Mix
Strat > OD,Chorus,Tremolo > HK Blues Master > Delay > Mix
Why the delay after the Blues Master? It stays tighter that way.
In short, It is a Great Tube Sound. It warms up any amp you are using.
Try using a Bass through it. I did! Old Tone Plus!

I have 5 of these and a BATT (the Bass version). I've owned one of them since the late 80's. Its been to Holland and back, been to more stages they I can remember. The cat even pissed on it. Still workin'. I had one fail on me and called HK who got me in touch with "The Guy Who Knows". An IC that controlls the switching is at fault. We in stalled a socket and now if it ever goes bad again we can swap it out without soldering. If you got one and it's dead, it that IC.

Other then that....NOTHING except for tubes.

GREAT Help guys and gals.

I've been playing since 1969. Had it, Played it, Sold it, A few pieces I could have retired on if I had them now.

These little guys are fun to have for anything you can think of. Small jams at home, Recording, Live, as an Effect.

Too bad they don't make them any more. I'll rate it a 10 but they're going to get up there soon and this will drop that 10 quick.

blues master is the us name but in europe, home of H&K it is called "crunch master". released in late eighties and way ahead of its time, it was marketed as an all tube recording device with build in power attuenator and speaker simulation. too bad. the speaker sim. was also sold as a stand alone device, called "the red box" and it wasn't a very sophisticated thingy, it took basicly just some harsh treble from a direct guitar signal but compared to an real amp through mike signal it failed sadly. sure, you could plug the blues master between your guitar and amp but it was a bit bulky and an inexpensive rat or od-1 sounded better for marshall lead tones. But it was also a low (3-5)watt tube amp and gave exellent power amp saturation and there was simply no other amp on the market that could do that (now there are a bunch of them) Problem with al the "small" 15 watt amps is that they are still way to loud for bedroom playing and way to soft for real world purpose. Power attuenator/speaker simulation/low watt tube amp... as I said, way ahead.

I had one back in the eighties, sold it and when I remembered what great devices they were I bought a couple of them some time ago (the crunchmaster, metalmaster and creammachine go for around 100 euro on ebay germany)back again. Is the cream machine tailord to a Marshall JCM sound (very convincing), the blues(crunch)master mimics a fender amp (a silver panel vibrolux comes to mind) The creammachine wont do clean very well but the blues master sounds wonderfull on that teritory, no problem for nice warm stringy strat sounds or twangy fiercy tele pick'n. It is still too loud (it pluged it on my Pro junior 10 incher) for turning the thing wide open in your bedroom but the master is located after the power tube (1 el84) so no comprimising in sound here. Turn the preamp open and the tone will distort like a fender amp does. My only complaint here is that this also increases the highs so you have to adjust the treble almost to zero at that point to get that californian creamy. But I set it on fairly clean and it is really fun to use all your stompboxes with it cuz it behaves like a real big fender amp.

too bad the circuit uses a solid state device as an op amp, I blame this bugger for the sometimes too trebly sound. Someday I will fix that so it will be a real "all tube" amp.
Those machines are very neat and sturdy built, all (3) of them I have still have the original tubes that came with it (they are stamped H&K)After 15 years, they finaly have some competition but prepare to pay at least 600 dollars for a good low watt tube amp and these things go for a third of a price of a original ts9. It is a silly world hu?

H&K are very supportive, manuals all over on their website.

playing for twenty years, the ususal strats, tokai and Gibby's, chandler tubedriver, ibanez tone king, Menatone Howie, Sun Fuzzface, Fender reverb, Fender bassman, Legend rock'n roll, Dynacord Rex

one watt valve power amp/pre amp with cabinet emualtion/power soak and a multitude of outputs.

For output valve distortion and direct recording, this no longer made unit is the current holy grail of direct recording.
It has a vox like quality to it(El 84 valve) and has an instant fat responsive tone .No wonder the "amptone "site raves about it.Even the cabinet emulator sounds excellent.
Spent ages traking one down and its been well worth it.
Replaced the groovetubes 12ax7 with a NOS RCA 5571 valve and the unit has a greater top end response.
The combination of power amp distortion and great cabinet emulation has made this unit light years ahead of anything else.
H+K should look at re releasing these, as the pod and their ilk still dont quite cut it to my and many other guiarists ears.
For direct recording for alternative rock and blues this unit is unbeatable.

This unit gets hot, and one of the transistors had to be replaced by hughes and kettner, since then-no troubles.

reiable, fast back up from H+K

9-its no longer made-cmon hughes and kettner

This is a follow-up to my earlier review. The Blues Master is very sensitive to the type of power tube used. I found that the tube that came with my unit needed some help. Sovteks weren't much of an improvement, but the Yugoslavian EI tubes do quite nicely. Too bad that they are now out of production... NOS Brit tubes may do nicely as well. All in all, I have to revise my sound rating, increasing it to an 8. The clean tones are still there, with full base and a strong, sparkling treble. Again, I'm also using a Telefunken 12AX7 which makes no small contribution. Broken-up blues tones are possible at low volumes. The bass may get a little flabby if pushed hard but no more so than most tube amps.