# Katana-Artist MKII at NAMM 2020



## Steadfastly (Nov 14, 2008)

GW live at NAMM 2020: Boss shows off its ferocious Katana-Artist MkII amp | Guitar World


----------



## aC2rs (Jul 9, 2007)

I like it.
Both Pete and Rabea make it sound great!


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

I’m thinking about grabbing one of the MkII 50 watt combos.

The clips I’ve been watching sound amazing.


----------



## traynor_garnet (Feb 22, 2006)

Aargh, turn off the fucking reverb! Why are so many demos drenched in reverb? I can’t even hear the amp; it just sounds like a reverb pedal.

And now back to your regularly scheduled day.
TG


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

The same comment could be made about most modelling systems.

I guess there are also probably tons of clips with tube amps similarly drenched.


----------



## vadsy (Dec 2, 2010)

Wait 6 months and you’ll be able to get one of these pretty cheap


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

They’re pretty cheap already.


----------



## vadsy (Dec 2, 2010)

Maybe they’ll be giving them away for free at that point


----------



## SG-Rocker (Dec 30, 2007)

These look pretty cool. You tell it where the _virtual amp _is in the room and it tracks your movements, adjusting the perspective of the sound field accordingly.

Boss Waza-Air Wireless Guitar Headphone Amp


----------



## torndownunit (May 14, 2006)

traynor_garnet said:


> Aargh, turn off the fucking reverb! Why are so many demos drenched in reverb? I can’t even hear the amp; it just sounds like a reverb pedal.
> 
> And now back to your regularly scheduled day.
> TG


I like heavy music and tones, but demos on YouTube channels for that are even worse. Let's crank the gain to it's max and put 15 pedals in front of it for a demo of the amp. At that point everything sounds about the same. With less heavy music, it seems layering on reverb and modulation effects when demoing an amp is the equivalent.


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)




----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

I decided to put my money where my mouth is and bought the 100 watt head.

That’s more power than I’ll ever need, but the features are there and the power is scalable.

I also like the little speakers built into the head.

I’ll plug it in for the first time this evening.


----------



## 1SweetRide (Oct 25, 2016)

vadsy said:


> Maybe they’ll be giving them away for free at that point


They’ll pay you to take ‘em.


----------



## vadsy (Dec 2, 2010)

1SweetRide said:


> They’ll pay you to take ‘em.


you'll have to wait 8 months for that


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

1SweetRide said:


> They’ll pay you to take ‘em.


Right, well I'm interested in PLAYING guitar, not in return on investment.


----------



## jdto (Sep 30, 2015)

aC2rs said:


> I like it.
> Both Pete and Rabea make it sound great!


As they seem to do with just about everything!



Milkman said:


> I decided to put my money where my mouth is and bought the 100 watt head.
> 
> That’s more power than I’ll ever need, but the features are there and the power is scalable.
> 
> ...


Looking forward to reading your impressions.


----------



## jdto (Sep 30, 2015)

Double post


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

I plugged it into an Eminence Redcoat in a closed back Pine cabinet and just noodled around for a few minutes.

It works.

I'm reading the manual now, LOL. There's too much functionality to miss, even with the seemingly simple panel controls.


----------



## greco (Jul 15, 2007)

Milkman said:


> I'm reading the manual now, LOL. There's too much functionality to miss, even with the seemingly simple panel controls.


ENJOY! 
(the amp...and the user's manual)


----------



## player99 (Sep 5, 2019)

Milkman said:


> Right, well I'm interested in PLAYING guitar, not in return on investment.


You've missed the whole point of playing music then.


----------



## laristotle (Aug 29, 2019)

Milkman said:


> features are there





Milkman said:


> I'm interested in PLAYING guitar


I bought the 100w 112 ~ 18 months ago. I spent more time on the computer with it, checking out/programing patches, than I have _playing_ through it.
Be forewarned. lol


Milkman said:


> There's too much functionality to miss


Scroll down a bit for Katana. A lot, seriously, a lot of helpful info in this forum.
VGuitar Forums - Index


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

One interesting thing about this one is how good the onboard speaker sounds.

It was a bit of a shock to tell the truth. I spent only fifteen or twenty minutes playing through the 1 X 12 and probably an hour playing with the onboard speaker.

It sounds pretty huge.

I’ll definitely want to grab the foot controller, but so far it’s a toy box full of really cool toys.

Really got lost in the octaver / Brown amp sounds.


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

I may try a 2 X 12 or something else with a bit more bottom.

The 1 X 12 sounded a bit thin to my ears. I had to dial the bass up and the treble down a fair bit.

In the meantime it’s a great stand alone practice amp.

I have yet to try it as a headphone amp.


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

This thing is amazing. I love the sounds.

SO much bang for the buck.


----------



## High/Deaf (Aug 19, 2009)

Cool amp. I just HATE the control location. I guess they could have made it a little less convenient and mounted them on the underside of the back instead of the top. Just a dumb place to put knobs, IMO (and I think that with all amps with this config - no real good reason to do this with an SS amp).

And with SS amps, I don't think you can have too much power. The last thing you want is a clipped SS power section. Yech! I bring all the power I can carry with SS amps, whereas I try and match a tube power section with the band/room/situation I'm playing in.


----------



## laristotle (Aug 29, 2019)

High/Deaf said:


> Just a dumb place to put knobs, IMO


I worry about putting my beer on top now.


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

It’s pretty simple to just orient the head (flip it over) so the controls are facing you.

That’s assuming you have the head.


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

High/Deaf said:


> Cool amp. I just HATE the control location. I guess they could have made it a little less convenient and mounted them on the underside of the back instead of the top. Just a dumb place to put knobs, IMO (and I think that with all amps with this config - no real good reason to do this with an SS amp).
> 
> And with SS amps, I don't think you can have too much power. The last thing you want is a clipped SS power section. Yech! I bring all the power I can carry with SS amps, whereas I try and match a tube power section with the band/room/situation I'm playing in.


Just my soundman coming out, but if 100 watts (tube OR SS) isn’t enough, things may be too loud in general.


----------



## vadsy (Dec 2, 2010)

100 watts SS is hecking different than tubes, I'm not sure it even matters or how it would be measured when it comes to solid state. is it all in the volume?


----------



## High/Deaf (Aug 19, 2009)

Watts is supposed to be a universal measurement of power, a standard unit like meter or gram. Marketing has messed it up.

A watt, whether sourced by a microwave transmitter, an RF transmitter, an optical transmitter, or an audio amplifier, is measured using heat. The amount of heat is translated into the amount of watts. Easy peasy.

But then you get into peak or peak-to-peak or RMS. And the amount of clipping or distortion at a rated power output. Power ratings are useless without bandwidth and distortion components. But consumers fall for it all the time. Home theatre receivers claim "9 channels @ 180 watts/channel" out of a 1500 watt 120V power outlet. How can an amp produce 1620 watts of output power with 1500 watts of input power - not to mention power lost to heat and displays, etc. 

Tube watts in audio seeming to sound louder is mostly because as they get close to their rated output, they aren't as horrid to listen to. Human ears are more tolerant of tube clipping than SS clipping, tube distortion is more pleasing to hear. In early microwave tube transmitters, a watt was a watt was a watt because you don't run tube uwave transmitters any closer to distortion than you do SS transmitters. So no difference in watts when human perception isn't involved.


----------



## butterknucket (Feb 5, 2006)

Am I the only person who thinks they don't sound very good?


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

butterknucket said:


> Am I the only person who thinks they don't sound very good?


Probably not.

But if you don’t, that’s just a matter of taste.

There are players who many here think are almost godlike but who sound like bbq’d ass to me.

Same goes for gear.


----------



## Guncho (Jun 16, 2015)

butterknucket said:


> Am I the only person who thinks they don't sound very good?


I think they sound horrible.


----------



## butterknucket (Feb 5, 2006)

Guncho said:


> I think they sound horrible.


They sound like Boss overdrive pedals to me, which I don't like at all.


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

butterknucket said:


> They sound like Boss overdrive pedals to me, which I don't like at all.


I’ve never been a fan of Boss dirt pedals. I think of Randy Rhodes when I think of Boss dirt and that’s not a tone I enjoy.

But this amp doesn’t sound anything like that.

I’d say try one if you haven’t.

If you have and that’s the way you feel, ok.


----------



## High/Deaf (Aug 19, 2009)

butterknucket said:


> Am I the only person who thinks they don't sound very good?


I had one of the worst tones ever playing through one at an open mic one night.

We had a quick setup, using the provided backline, to play our 3 songs. I got my pedalboard set up and only needed a clean channel. Turned on the amp and it was previously set to a Marshally sound, which wouldn't work for me. I recall, a few years ago, playing through one at L&M and I recalled they had a voicing control beside the gain and volume. So I rolled it all the way back to the clean setting (couldn't actually see the control because of the dumb control layout and where the amp was located). Everyone's like "hurry, hurry, get playing" so away we go.

Turns out the problem was an I/O problem (Idiot Operator) as the first setting is for an acoustic simulation. The _second_ setting is the clean amp setting I wanted, as I found out later. Made it through the 3 songs but was not happy with my tone at all. I don't know how many of the bar patrons noticed or cared. Typical.

Generally, I don't think they sound that bad. Better than probably the first 3 or 4 amps I owned. It serves a purpose and is great bang-for-the-buck, IMO.


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

High/Deaf said:


> I had one of the worst tones ever playing through one at an open mic one night.
> 
> We had a quick setup, using the provided backline, to play our 3 songs. I got my pedalboard set up and only needed a clean channel. Turned on the amp and it was previously set to a Marshally sound, which wouldn't work for me. I recall, a few years ago, playing through one at L&M and I recalled they had a voicing control beside the gain and volume. So I rolled it all the way back to the clean setting (couldn't actually see the control because of the dumb control layout and where the amp was located). Everyone's like "hurry, hurry, get playing" so away we go.
> 
> ...


I haven’t tried the acoustic channel yet, but I’d imagine it doesn’t sound much different than plugging a Strat into a DI.

The clean channel (and variation) sounds a lot better of course.

Right now I’m still lost in the Lead and Brown channels.

I’ll dial back the delay and emerge at some point.


----------



## torndownunit (May 14, 2006)

High/Deaf said:


> I had one of the worst tones ever playing through one at an open mic one night.
> 
> We had a quick setup, using the provided backline, to play our 3 songs. I got my pedalboard set up and only needed a clean channel. Turned on the amp and it was previously set to a Marshally sound, which wouldn't work for me. I recall, a few years ago, playing through one at L&M and I recalled they had a voicing control beside the gain and volume. So I rolled it all the way back to the clean setting (couldn't actually see the control because of the dumb control layout and where the amp was located). Everyone's like "hurry, hurry, get playing" so away we go.
> 
> ...


I think they also do a decent job in a fairly portable package for heavier genres. I have heard some nice high gain tones out of them.

I think a neat feature with the 100 head is that it has a speaker in the head. Kind of a cool idea for practice or warming up.


----------



## laristotle (Aug 29, 2019)

torndownunit said:


> I think a neat feature with the 100 head is that it has a speaker in the head


Also that it's midi capable.
A few times I've been think of trading my combo for a head.


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

torndownunit said:


> I think they also do a decent job in a fairly portable package for heavier genres. I have heard some nice high gain tones out of them.
> 
> I think a neat feature with the 100 head is that it has a speaker in the head. Kind of a cool idea for practice or warming up.


The quality of sound from that little speaker was a bit of a shock to me. I haven’t bothered plugging it into a guitar cab since I checked out the internal speaker.

It’s a great practice rig right out of the box.


----------



## High/Deaf (Aug 19, 2009)

Milkman said:


> I haven’t tried the acoustic channel yet, but I’d imagine it doesn’t sound much different than plugging a Strat into a DI.
> 
> The clean channel (and variation) sounds a lot better of course.
> 
> ...


The acoustic channel's pretty good --- as an acoustic channel. Kinda passible as a clean electric guitar channel, but very honky / middy when I hit a drive pedal or two. 

We were probably 36 bars into the first song when I hit a pedal and that's when I noticed something wasn't quite right. Again, it wasn't the amp's fault - more a combination of bad eyesight and poor amp/control placement.


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

I’m going to grab the Katana 2 x 12 cab. If it is as well engineered as the onboard 5” speaker I think I’ll be pleased.

It’s a fair sized cabinet, and obviously more than I need for my purposes, but I’m confident it will give me a nice chunky low end even at barely audible volumes.

It’s convertible from open back to closed back. I prefer closed.

I have the head and now the foot controller. Might as well jump in with both feet.

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/Kata212--boss-katana-150-watt-2x12-inch-cabinet


----------



## Guitar101 (Jan 19, 2011)

Did you check L&M for this cab?
Boss - Katana 150W 2x12 Guitar Cabinet


----------



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

Guitar101 said:


> Did you check L&M for this cab?
> Boss - Katana 150W 2x12 Guitar Cabinet



Yes, that’s the cabinet, and I will buy it at the local L & M.

I just posted the sweetwater link because it had a decent description.


----------

