Hughes & Kettner Switchblade Head

Pretty sure i have an 07 model
I play in between four year strong and hit the lights. Mainly major keys but a nice thick guitar tone.
has 4 channels like most high end tube amps. clean, crunch, lead, ultra. its a true tube amp but has on board digital effects which can be bypassed completely.
Comes with a midi pedal that stores your settings instead of having just 4 individual channels and settings on the face of the amp. so in theory, you can have 128 separate and different channels. again, extremely versatile.

lets start by saying this thing is incredibly loud and knowing how to control it and use it to your advantage is key. ill admit it does get a bit noisy in the high gains but the overall tone makes up for it. i play it through a lopoline signature 2x12 with a vintage 30 and a g12h and a mesa 2x12 with celestion c90s. cabs are daisy chained together. i use the ultra setting to compensate for my les paul i built with a seymour duncan sh-5 in the bridge. the pickup doesnt have a lot of low end but is very articulate and will not get muddy. so the ultra adds some bass and fullness to it and i get gorgeous tone out of it. kinda like a jcm900 through a mesa 4x12 cab loaded with v30s.
the distortion can get pretty harsh but if you back up on the presence itll clean up. you will find yourself using the presence knob alot on this amp. completely changes your tone.

CLEAN channel is a tricky one to work with. lose too much gain on it and you lose half your volume. too much and you might as well be on the crunch channel. but when you find your right settings its beautiful; trust me. try throwing in some slight verb and maybe light delay. itll make it really full and warm.

CRUNCH is a really versatile channel. anything from warm muddy blues to rich pre-lead settings. I save a crunch setting to a bank on the midi board for a kind of "coming out of the headphones" sound which works really well for that. just remember to balance your volumes for your saved settings, especially with the crunch.

LEAD channel is definitely meant for lead riffing. itll cut through any mix and sound good as hell doing it. Lacks the bass I like, but thats just a personal thing. Otherwise the channel is really cool and un-altered you get a four year strong type of tone.

ULTRA is for lack of a better term, the sex. You can do so much with this channel. Its warm and super full and very american-styled drive. Bring up the mids to about 7.5, treble to about 7.5, presence about 7.5, bass depending on your pickup or what your going for, (mines on about 7.5 as well) and you have a gorgeous f***ing responsive tone. I know the "ultra" thing may sound kind of intimidating and you're probably thinking its only for metal or whatever but its not.

Each channel is capable of having a gain boost which changed the tone again completely.
All in all you really can get any tone you want from this amp, given you put in the hours to find whats right for you.

Bought mine I guess technically used. It was a floor model at some guitar shop. Works great. Did have an internal fuse blow. Brought it in to a local guitar shop, simple fast fix and they didn't even charge me for it.

ONE MAJOR COMPLAINT! the first gen midi pedal was a POS. The cables were cheap and would break. After my first one went I got in touch with hughes and kettner and they sent me out a 2nd gen for free. New heavy duty midi cable although its still hardwired into the pedal itself. they really should just have a midi jack on the pedal and let you use your own cables. it would make transport much safer. I kept my old pedal, chopped off the cable, hooked up a midi jack and just use a normal midi cable. keep it as a back up.

other than the early pedal problems, the amp works phenomenally. really have no idea what the guy below was talking about. might have just gotten a bad amp.

ill give it a 7 just because of the pedal. mind you the amp still works perfectly fine without it, just makes things live a little more difficult.

yeah, when they say made in germany, they mean it. downside is, 90-100 percent of their company is german and getting in touch with them took a couple calls. but once in contact they were very helpful.

Love love love the amp. you definitely need to put the time in to get all your settings the way you want but WELL worth it. i record with it, gig with it and if i could, probably make love to it. haha it really is a great amp. speakers do make a big difference though so match carefully. ive matched it with a mesa 412 cab and got real good stuff out of it. matched it with a marshall 412 and it sounded like poop. your tone is up to you. but its in the switchblade.

The main reason that I bought this amp was for the programmable effects and the great sounds that I had heard on the website. I love the sound of all the channels- the clean sounds great, the crunch adds enough chunk for blues without making the tone too muddy, and the lead/ultra channels have all of the gain I need to play rock and metal. The delay served most of my effects needs for solos, slap-back, and violin sounds, but I also used the chorus and flanger at times. The chorus/flanger/tremolo aren't very versatile, so if one needed to use these effects with more control, they'd be better off buying pedals. The best part of the amp in my opinion is that I was able to switch everything with one button hit--channel,effects,reverb,etc

I play through it with 2 ibanez guitars- a jetking with zakk wylde emgs and an s-series with infinity pickups. I'm in both a rock cover band and a heavy metal/hardcore band I'm able to get all the tones that I need. The clean channel remains clean even at loud volumes as long as the gain isn't cranked up. The warmth of the distortion can be changed by experimenting between the master and channel volumes, and I was able to find a very happy medium. When using the lead and ultra channels, the amp gets very noisy. I was able to solve this problem by using a boss ns-2 supressor without cutting the quality. I'm lead guitar in both bands, so I made good use of the ultra channel + delay for solos, and it sounds great. As stated before, most of my effects use was with the delay. When using the chorus/flanger/tremolo, I did notice a loss in quality. When applying chorus to a clean channel, the sound became thinner to me. That might be how all those kinds of effects change the sound, i'm not sure.

I've owned this amp for almost two years(purchased in december 2007), and it's broken down on me on a few occasions. Upon first receiving it in the mail, one of the footswitch buttons already had a malfunction (The dealer I purchased it from sent me a new pedalboard, so this was easily fixed). I always transport the amp in its gig bag, and the foot switch very snug in the pedalboard--I protect it with my life. One band practice, 10 months after purchasing the amp, it stopped working and wouldn't turn on. I got it fixed under the 1 year warranty, and 10 months later, the foot switch is no longer functioning with the amp. The amp itself functions, but this defeats the purpose of why I purchased this particular amp in the first place

Because H&K is a german company, there's no real support with them directly. After messaging the site, I was contacted by yorkville sound, the american/canadian H&K distributor. It took me about a total of 3-4 weeks to get the amp repaired-from the RA# to receiving it back. I've been waiting for another RA# for a week now, so we'll see how that goes.

I've been playing for almost 6 years now, and this is the only tube amp I've ever owned. I use it through a mesa-boogie cabinet. It sounds great, looks great, and that's why it breaks my heart that it fails even when I take the utmost care of it. I purchased it by reading all good and bad reviews. Some have gotten a fully working head, others have had numerous problems. My final line to Buyers- You'll get a great sounding, versatile amp, but your chance of reliability is 50-50

2007
This amp is very versatile, my band plays rock - hard rock and it fits very well , it has 4 channels with a midi pedal ( which broke after a year , called hk and had a brand new one in less then a week no probs since). Wish it had a noise gate, never need the ulra channel, all tube 4 pwr and 2 pre. Have used it for extensive gigging and recording with no problems, seen one review here saying it broke down all the time along with his friends hk's ( must abuse it or got a lemmon i have had the exact opposite experience, too bad for him , missing out on a great amp.

I use old (pre korean ) Aria pro 2 urchin, les paul and gibson sg
suits are style wonderfully.
little noisy on high gain

Like I listed above only one problem with foot switch and hk replaced free of charge in less then a week

replaced my footswitch in less then a week

I have been playing for 27 years and love this amp. I used to use a digitech rp-12 with art dual 15 band eq bbe 482i sonic maximizer and a powere amp sounded good but had to carry aroun a lot of stuff. Not Now

This switchblade was made in 2008. I was planning on buying one Brand New from Long & McQuade for $1750 CAD because they don't go up in the classifieds very often. Coincidentally, the very night before I was planning to go out and buy it, an ad popped up on the local craigslist.

I play mostly Post-Hardcore and Progressive, though my current band sounds more Saosin-esqe. I was looking for a good versatile tube head (I had been considering Dual Rectifiers), and I heard that they used this amp in the studio on their self-titled debut LP so I decided to check it out.

One of the main things that sold me on this amp is it's versatility. It has four different sounds (Clean, Crunch, Lead and Ultra) that all operate from one channel. Normally this would pose a significant problem to anyone Who wanted to use more than one sound in quick succession, but the included MIDI footswitch makes my life (and the lives of many others) quite simple. The footswitch stores up to 128 presets (32 banks, four presets each), each retaining the master volume, presence, three band EQ and gain settings you were using at the time it was saved as well as weather your FX loop was activated. This Amp has no headphone jack, but Who uses headphones with a 100w tube head?

One drawback to this amp is the construction of the footswitch. The MIDI cable is hardwired into the board, so transportation is a bit precarious. The wiring is also flimsy. When I first bought it I was having trouble getting it to Switch, so I opened up the plug on the amp-end. One of the wires was touching and grounding out the others stopping the signal from reaching the amp. If you ever have a problem switching, the first place to check is the cable. I had to re-solder mine to get it to work again.

I haven't had the opportunity to use this amp Live yet, or in the studio, but I'm confident it will be more than capable in both environments. Taking the volume up to 9 o'clock is enough to rattle the windows in my studio, but this is with my slant cab. With a closed-back 1X12 cab, I see no reason not to use this amp in the studio. As I said before, Saosin did, and they got some pretty legit sounding results as far as guitar sound goes. Just be sure your iso booth is bomb-proof. ;)

Another great feature is the onboard FX section. The amp has digital reverb, delay and modulation and they all sound very good for digital FX. The fact that you don't need to waste time or money on pedals is a huge bonus, but if you rely on a complex rig night in, night out, don't be hasty to get rid of it. I use very basic FX.

I've been using my Gibson SG Standard with stock ceramic pickups (498T in the bridge, 490R in the neck). I've been wanting to build a guitar for quite some time now, in which I plan to put an EMG 81/85 tag-team, but for now the SG sounds fine.

I'm amazed at how well this amp does what I need it to do. Again my band is a modern geared hardcore-emoish type thing. We tend to vary between clean and heavily saturated sounds frequently. This amp nails both and all points in between.

A really cool thing about this amp is that you can get it to sustain at bedroom levels of volume. It sings like crazy. It doesn't have much background noise at all moving into the higher volumes, and consider that I don't even have a noise-gate. I have been in close proximity to the amp whenever I've used it, and feedback has never been an issue as long as I pay attention and dial the volume on my guitar down when I'm not playing (I used to use a little 15w Marshall solid-state for practice, but it sounds so bad compared to the H&K that I even use the head for quiet practice).

The clean channel is quite interesting. The presence setting really affects the character of the sound, and I find myself tweaking presence a lot more than I used to on other amps. Since the gain knob is universal, it affects the clean channel just as it would the hi-gain channels. With the gain cranked I can get some nice breakup once I move past 9:00 on the volume, and a decent blues sound when below that (although I rarely play blues, and I doubt one would buy this amp for solely playing blues).

The crunch channel is not one that I use often. As the lead guitarist in my group I tend to gravitate towards the Lead and Ultra settings for more articulation, but the crunch setting is excellent in it's own right. It retains the californian sparkle of the clean channel, but the gain structure is inherently british as one would expect from an EL34 tubed amp. You can take the gain to a point where it would be capable of doing Metal, but I would reserve this channel for more pop-punk oriented music due to it's loose attack and lack of over-saturated gain. It reminds me of a Mesa Dual Rec or something similar.

The Lead channel is where it starts getting fun (or more fun than it already was if that's possible). You can take the gain right out of the Park on this channel, and since it's rich in overtones even without too much out of the presence knob, it really cuts through a band mix. The Ultra voicing is very similar, although it sounds more American and has the tighter attack of the two. It doesn't cut through the mix quite as much, but is my preferred channel because it's very articulate.

This amp is built like a tank, in Germany no less, so you know it's gonna survive a good beating. I haven't gigged with it at all yet, (as my band is in the writing process for it's first album) nor do I have a backup that would even remotely cover what this amp does, but I'm confident I wouldn't need a backup, though maybe a backup footswitch would be nice. I'm considering just sticking a MIDI jack in the board and buying a bunch of MIDI cables incase one fails.

I haven't had this amp long enough to judge it's long-term reliability, but I baby it. It usually sits on standby for five minutes before I cut the power, and I only crank it when I really get the urge. I give it a 9 based on other people's experience with the amp long-term.

I haven't dealt with H&K.

For a player oriented toward heavier (but not apocalyptic) music like myself, this amp is perfect. The onboard FX have really kickstarted my riff-writing and helped me break through a bout of writer's block. I've only been playing guitar for five years, but I play 24/7 so I think I have a pretty good idea of the ins and outs. I've used Mesa Rectifiers and Marshall JCMs and JVMs but none of these amps compare to the versatility and outright good sound of the Switchblade. If it were stolen I would buy it in a heartbeat, but since I don't have the money right now, I'll just get a pitbull or something to guard it. The best thing, I think, is that such a good sound can come out of a tube-modeling amp. I never thought I'd find an amp so versatile, but so good-sounding. There's not much to hate about this amp other than the MIDI cable.

I tried Mesa Dual and Triple Recs, Marshalls, Oranges and Traynors before settling on the Switchblade. I think I ended up with the H&K because of it's versatility, and it hasn't let me down.

This is the worst **** I have ever played in my life!!!!!!!!
The sound is pretty good but that doesn??t matter when on three of our gigs the amp has just died and i??m standing their like a clown and do nothing !!!!!!!! I had it on service for three times and then it works for a week but then same thing again , the amp brakes down... All the frieds I talked to have the same experience and this must mean that all this good reviews at harmony central must be done by employes of Hughes & Kettner since I haven+t heard a positive word regarding this amp from anynone I know using it??+ And on this forum everybody has great review of the amp??? The amp sucks sucks sucks and before you buy it please check with other people who has bought it because I??m sure they will never use a H&K amp again!!

The sound is good but who cares when it only works a couple of hours??

Please check my comments above?

I have mailed and mailed and mailed and maile but H&K doesn??t have customer support?? Made in Germany, Kiss my ***

What do you think

Mine was made in 2007, got it used, eveything works perfectly.

Amazing versatility; every knob is savable via the midi. The way that this works is because of the 256 resistor switches located behind every switch but the global master volume. The clean is a little flat, but I use effects with it so it sounds good to me. I play in an 80s metal band, covering classic to heavy metal sounds.
The crunch channel is great for rhythm. With the gain all the way up (the boost is engaged whenever it is past around 9) you can get some great tones. This is a very full channel, easy to get ACDC, Aerosmith tones here.
The lead is my favorite. Lynch tones are the obvious designation for this channel. The mids are naturally a little scooped via a set tone voicing for all channels. The gain is amazing, and with a little delay this is the lead tone.
The ultra channel is great for anything of the newer metal genera. Almost like a triple rec with EL34's, the gain is amazing! Other reviewers have said like a mesa, but different... that is defiantly correct.
The verdict; with the midi, this is the most flexible rig in a head out there.

I use a Fender Showmaster with the stock humbucker in the bridge. A great guitar, pinch harmonics a la Zakk Wylde is easy to pull off with the gain of 1/2 on the lead channel. Even on the crunch it is possible.
This amp is made for metal, not recommended for blues...
The distortion is amazing at all levels, but a noise gate might be wise.
One reviewer mention replacing the tubes; do it. The tubes it comes with are ok, but after new ones, this is even better.
If you really worry about the tubes, check out the new version, the TCS @ HK's website. It had a system that automatically re-biases the tubes every so often.

I havent had much experience with it, but the amp i own is two years old, midi footswitch hasn't pooped out yet... Keeping my fingers crossed. I have heard a lot of bad raps about the midi lead cable...

The warranty is 2 years. When i had questions, they got back to me within a few days. I am lucky, i have a service center near me so if it goes bad i can get it fixed.

I have been playing for around 6 / 7 years, metal metal, metal, classic rock, and many other styles. Great all around head.

It would be nice if the effects had a depth knob.
The midi would be great if it had a din plug in the pedal instead of it being hardwired.

I purchased this amp in mid 2008.

tube head
4 channels
chorus, flanger, tremolo and delay on-board
programmable, 128 presets
footswitch, tap delay possible

...and some other features I haven't used yet

I mostly play guitars equipped with humbuckers, mainly a Gibson LP Classic (1993) and another G-style guitar I built (2008).
I play alternative rock and this amp somehow seems to be made for me. I use it live as well as in the studio.

Before going into sounds I need to point out that the main reason for purchasing this amp was not the sound itself but rather its versatility. Before the switchblade I played a Laney LC30 Combo over a 4x12 box, using several effect pedals. What really pissed me off was that I had to step on 3 foot switches to change from "clean with slight delay and chorus" to a "dry high gain". With the Swtitchblade I'm able to do so with only one step!

CLEAN:
Other reviews pointed out that the clean channel is harsh. Well, I'd rather call it cold, which is not a disadvantage for me. I never use the clean channel without effect and the direct and cold character of this channel allows to us plenty of (on-board) effects and still sounds clear. The Laney LC30 clean channel is definitely warmer. It depends on what you need. For me, the Switchblade clean sound is more than ok!

CRUNCH:
Provides quite a wide range of gain. Like the clean channel it is also pretty direct. I use this one more than the clean channel, again with the on-board effects. Clear and direct sound...cuts through the band pretty well.

LEAD:
Definitely the on I use most and I really like it. Unlike clean and crunch, this channels sound warmer to my ears. I use this one with pretty much gain but no effects on it and it provides a modern heavy rock sound with plenty of punch.

ULTRA:
Brutal...too much for me, so I can't really comment on it!

EFFECTS:
Nothing special but good quality...I can't complain!

CONCLUSION:
This amp sounds really good and fits to the kind of music I play. But I also need to say that in general, it tends to be cold, especially on the clean and crunch channel.
Comparing the Switchblade with a Mesa Triple Rectifier, it doesn't reach the Mesa's sound quality but it comes close. I'm not the kind of guitarist who can hear the grass growing, especially when a whole band is playing, and for me the comfort of the HK is more important than the slightly better Mesa overall sound...not to mention the price ;-)

I use this thing for about a year now, live and in the studio. No problems with the amp so far (and I carried it around a lot) but the foot switch is a weak point. The components seem to be OK but the midi plug showed really bad soldering work. I repaired it myself and had no problems since.
Anyway, since this concern was already raised in other reviews, HK should react and put more effort in making the pedal more reliable.

No need to contact them so far -> no opinion!

I'm playing for 15 years now and had the chance to check several amps. Speaking of sound quality only, the Mesa Triple Rec. is my favorite...but sound is not everything. A year from now I was doing gigs with too much stuff to haul (especially effect pedals). With the Switchblade, all I need is the head and 4x12. Comfort on all sides ;-)

I don't want to leave a wrong impression: The equipment I used before (Laney LC30, Silvertube 4x12, Damage Control Demonizer, Line 6 Modulation Modeler, Nobels Stereo Chorus, Ibanez ?? Delay, Ibanez ?? Flanger) sounded pretty good and I liked it a lot! The Switchblade is easily able to keep that sound level adding the huge advantage of versatility and easy handling!

If you're up to buy this amp, check it out first! Others don't like it! I do!

Cheers,
Thomas

There is no need to go into the features as they have been listed by many other reviewers

Just wanted to put in my 2 cents as I have been using the switchblade head for almost a year in a very active coverband. Let me start off by saying the cabinet/speakers you use as with any head greatly effect your tone, I currently have 2 different cabinets, I have the Hughes & Kettner 4x12 cab (sc-412a) and a b-52 2x12 cabinet loaded with Celestion v30's,, I find the v30's sound best with this head as they give it a much darker beefed up sound,,,now to the channels!

Clean - I don't really use this channel much, but it is a crystal clear clean, I find it lacks warmth thou

Crunch - This channel ROCKS! You can get that nice Marshall 'brown' sound aka, AC/DC, I use this channel alot,,even for clean stuff,, I just lower the gain down,,I find this channel 'cuts' thru the mix really well,,the gain on this channel is not really overwhelming,,reminds me alot of a Marhshall jcm800

Lead - I probaly use this channel the most,, sounds like a "beefed" up marhshall,,tons of gain, great for rythem/lead,,it sounds like the crunch channel, but with alot more gain and also more compressed sounding

Ultra - I don't use this channel at all,,it's geared much more to the "Nu-Metal" generation,,scooped mids, very compressed sounding,,it's not bad sounding just not what I'm geared towards

NOTE - The lead/ultra channels are VERY noisy,,the only really downside to this amp in my opinion, a noise gate is a MUST, I use the mxr smart gate,, some noise still creeps thru, although thru the years I have gotten very good with my volume pot on my guitar so it doesn't affect me that much

Now the the effects:
Chorus/Flanger/Tremelo,,the effects are good, there is no "mix' option which is another downside, but all 3 effects are good, my band does everything from Journey to Korn, and I'm pretty much able to get any crazy sounding effect I want
Delay - the delay is GREAT,, sounds like any rack/pedal delay out there, plus the "tap" function is great

My current equipment is: I have TWO Gibson Les Paul standards,,one is stock the other I replaced the pickups with Dimazio super distortions
Fender American Strat with seymour duncan hot rails to beef up the sound
Fender 72 Tele re-issue
pedals are: Dunlop volume pedal, Tube Screamer, Boss Tuner, MXR Smart gate, Wah pedal

I find the stock Les Paul to sound the best.

Haven't had any issues so far (knock on wood),,I know some people have had problems with the footswitch,,I keep my head and pedal in roadcases.

NON existant,, tried getting in touch with them a couple of times via email,, never got a response. I just recently found out that Pearl handles H&K repairs in the US,, never tried contacting them

Like i said before I play in a very active cover band, to me this head is just great. I can pretty much dial in any sound I want,, and yes it sounds like a tube head thru and thru,,because it is. This amp is VERY tweakable,, you need to sit down with it and have patience to get the sound u want,, a good way to start is with the "rockstar" presets as a beginning point. This amp is the LOUDEST head i ever heard,, way too much power in my opinion, wish it came in a 50w version,, my volume never goes past 1 1/2 and i play in some large venues. Like I said it is extremely noisy so get good with ur volume pot and get a noise gate. I've been playing for 20 years and have tried alot of gear,,to me this head is up there with much more expensive equipment, my other guitar player has a marhshall jcm900, I personally think my sound blows his away. If you're sick of having alot of pedals and need something versatil this is the amp for you, if it were lost or stolen I would probaly try something else as I'm a gear head and am always looking for something better although I would have no problem getting this again.

This amp is amazing. The progammable channel feature is the best thing to come out period. With a simple foot stomp I can switch my tones from Steeler's Wheels to Metallica and everything in between. The on board effects are *ok*. Nothing awesome, but a nice little feature to have incase of a dead battery on stage or some other circumstance. The effects loop is way underrated. Sounds awesome when you get set it right with your outboard effects.

I'm currently running a H&K Switchblade 100w head through an ashdown 4x12 cab wired to 4 ohms (Makes a huge difference over the standard 8), and I use a Tonelab LE running through the effects loop with a midi cable to do channel select and use the board effects (no amp models), a boss super overdrive and a Gibson Les Paul Studio with EMG 81/85. I can make any tone I want come out from this amp. I play in a very active cover band, and almost everytime (between a combination of stompboxes in my board and amp tone) I can match a tone perfectly to the original song. Always getting comments about how it sounds like the original song.

Haven't had this break down yet and it's coming up on a year.

Bought it as a *B Stock*. Full warrenty, but more than half off the original price. Had some questions at the start and was answered quickly by H&K

Love this amp. I would never give it up. When I go to a music store and try out their high end Marshalls (JVM and TSL) or even the Mesa Rectifiers, I'm always let down. Nothing competes for me.

My amp was made in 2007. Very versatile for metal and classic rock.The chorus and delay come in handy and the Flange is nice. 100 watt head is very loud and powerfull can push any 4x12 cab. Sounds best with vintage 30s loaded in cabinet.

I play a Jackson with seymore duncans, and a Peavey Wolfgang with Dimarzios.Both guitars sound great. Lots of susutain, can hold a note for days. Be carefule with the gain easy to feed back and loud. You will have to fine tune your sound and then your set.I get lots of people telling me how great this amp sounds.

Ok my first amp from AMS the volume pot went out but American music supply replaced it fast and easy. They are the best. The second amp was fine.

I did call them once to ask something and they did call me back.

I have been playing over 20 years and have owned several amps and I have to say My Hughes and Kettner Switchblade blows them all away. Ive had Marshalls,Peaveys, Carvin, ADA mp 1 rack pre amps and this bad boy rocks harder than all of them. Now I did replace the tubes which greatly improved the the tone and distortion. Groove Tubes (el34) and electro harmonic for the 12ax7s. I am a Hughe Alex Lifeson of Rush fan and after hearing his Switchblades in concert I knew I had to get one and I wasnt dissapointed.