Hughes and Kettner GrandMeister 36 Amp Stack

By Chris Loeffler | April 10, 2014

By Chris Loeffler

Building on the legacy and philosophy of the Tubemeister series (Hughes and Kettner Tubemeister 18 Amp Head reviewed here), the Hughes and Kettner Grandmeister 36 Amp head is an all-tube, 36 watt amp head powered by four EL-84 power tubes and three 12AX7 preamp tubes that features four channels, power soak and DI box, serial FX loop, onboard digital effects, proprietary Smart Knob rotary controls, and MIDI in/out. The amp is handsomely housed in a sleek, flat black and chrome chassis and features blue LED illuminated glass front and back plates that frame the transformers and glowing tubes when the amp is turned on.

The Grandmeister features four main channels (Clean, Crunch, Lead, and Ultra), each with slightly different gain characteristics, distortion saturation and their own EQ and presence controls. The Clean setting yields warm, high fidelity tones that can have the rounded warmth of vintage jazz or the sparkle and cut of a classic Class A clean depending on how the EQ is dialed in. The Crunch channel ups the ante on gain, maintaining the open frequency of the Clean channel while introducing enough grit and tight early-breakup to easily bounce between classic rock gain and focus cleans depending on how hard you dig in. The Lead channel focuses and slightly compresses the tone further, producing saturated modern lead and rhythm tones with complex harmonic overtones in extreme settings that quickly jump into controlled, musical feedback. The Ultra channel produces the sort of excessive gain and wool that would be at home in the heaviest of metal without sacrificing the fundamental clarity and definition of the guitar.

Unlike many multi-channel amps, the Grandmeister offers completely independent tone and gain controls for each of its four channels. Obviously, to accomplish this with physical knobs would require almost 60 controls and would be more than a little unwieldy in practice… this is where the unique Smart Controls technology comes into play. Each of the controls on the amp can be dialed in and stored to a preset for each channel (up to 128 presets in all), meaning that when a player jumps between channels they aren’t just changing the preamp gain settings but also the entire tone stack. The Mid knob on Clean channel can be set to a totally different setting than where it is at on the Lead channel without having to tweak the knob at all (once the channel setting is saved). In addition to essentially having 128 distinct amp voicings available at the touch of a foot pedal, the internal effects can also be stored (with exact settings) on each preset.

As alluded to above, the Hughes and Kettner Grandmeister doesn’t stop at creating hundreds of amazing amp tones; it also features onboard digital effects as well as a noise gate and boost. The digital effects are high-sample, no artifact Modulation, Delay, and Reverb. The Reverb is based on classic American spring reverbs, bringing the character and warmth of the classic effect without the boxy or tinny qualities sometimes associated with spring reverb. The Delay effect is a standard digital delay effect; pure and clean without being sterile. The Modulation effect is actually selectable between four modulation styles- Chorus, Flanger, Phaser, and Vibrato. The effects all faithfully create high-quality, non-intrusive imitations of the gold standards of their pedigree. The noise gate level is controlled via the back of the amp to tame hiss and white noise, and the Boost control has a slightly different voicing for each channel, pushing the Clean channel into louder volumes, kicking up the crunch in the Crunch channel, and absolutely squashing the Lead channel distortion into infinite sustain and saturation.

A mainstay of the Tubemeister line has been the onboard power soak and DI box, and the Grandmeister carries on this proud tradition. In essence, the amplifier allows players to dial in their ideal amount of preamp and power amp distortion and then cut the wattage from 36 watts down to 18, 5, 1, or even 0 (silent) watts, resulting in true power amp distortion at reasonable levels. Those familiar with wattage versus perceived volume know that 5 watts isn’t 1/7^th the perceived volume of 36 watts, but it is certainly more manageable for those looking for the tone of a cooking power amp section without the excessive volume that typically accompanies it. Additionally, the Grandmeister features an “always on” Hughes and Kettner Red Box direct box XLR output for silent recording or to feed directly to the PA in a live setting. While there’s no superior substitution for a speaker pushed to compression when it comes to feel, the Red Box does a more than convincing job of sounding lively and present for recording or into the mains.

Hughes and Kettner FSM 432 MK-III Phantom-Powered MIDI Board

The optional Hughes and Kettner FSM 432 MK-III takes all the flexibility of the Grandmeister’s functions and places them conveniently at your feet in an 18”x16” foot controller and enables complete control of all major amp functions via MIDI. In addition to allowing access to all 128 presets of the Grandmeister in Direct mode, the FSM 432 MK-III can be set to Stompbox mode, maintaining the amp’s preset settings but allowing the individual assigned internal effects of Modulation, Delay, Boost, and Reverb to be manually switched on or off.

Adding expression pedals or single footswitches to the Control 1 and Control 2 inputs increases the sonic possibilities exponentially when assigned to effect parameters like Delay Feedback, Modulation Intensity, or even FX Loop On/Off for expression controlled adjustments in real time. This functionality allows for live volume swells, controlled delay oscillation, and even on-the-fly EQ adjustments without ever needing to bend over. Tap tempo, assigned to the Delay effect, works the same in both Stompbo and Direct modes, allowing refinements in delay time to synch to the beat in live settings.

The looks and aesthetic of the FSM 432 scream “German engineering” and mirror the quality and functionality of the Grandmeister head. Footswitches are staggered to take up less space and provide less opportunity for stepping on the wrong control, and they have a solid, satisfying click when engaged. In practice, the board works incredibly intuitively, with clear displays and a logical method of switching between Direct and Stompbox modes.

Hughes and Kettner GM36 RemoteGrandmeisterApp for iPad

In addition to the power of the H&K FSM 432 MK-III MIDI board, Hughes and Kettner provides an alternative way to remotely control the power of the amp in an intuitive, graphic-centric manner with the Hughes and Kettner GM36 Remote Grandmeister App for iPad. Utilizing a (not included) iPad enabled MIDI interface like iRig MIDI, users can dial in, edit, name, and even share their presets with other users. Real time control adjustments on the iPad is both intuitive and satisfyingly futuristic feeling.

Hughes and Kettner Tubemeister TM212 Speaker Cabinet

Designed specifically to be paired with the Grandmeister and Tubemeister, the Hughes and Kettner Tubmeister TM212 speaker cabinet features two 12” Celestion Vintage 30 speakers and is rated at 120 watts handling. The closed back cabinet design allows the twin Vintage 30s to express the bass and punch that have made them mainstays of modern music, and they make a match made in heaven to the sonic characteristics of the Grandmeister 36. In a clever display of over delivering in engineering, the TM212 is sized as such that it can be used in the traditional horizontal position to accommodate even the biggest amp head or flipped vertically and still perfectly fit the Grandmeister while giving a little extra lift to the speaker stack.

Limitations

For extremely visual players, it is a little jarring to go through multiple presets with extremely different tones and see the physical knobs on the amp stay static. The blue indicator labeled Store illuminates when the indentation in the knob points at the actual setting, but it takes getting used to.

Without the optional FSM 432 MK-III footswitch, half the depth and functional magic of the amp are hard to access in a live setting.

Conclusions

Hughes and Kettner has built quite an ecosystem around their Meister series, and the Grandmeister truly lives up to its not-too-modest name. Combining the tonefulness and out of the box accessibility of a traditional amp with the depth and flexibility of a high-tech rack system, the Grandmeister is set to serve all masters equally well. To be honest, it was a challenge to think of functionality the amp doesn’t include (I came up with mechanically controlled knobs for presets, but have to admit that’s a pretty petty callout)… warm cleans, tight crunch, over the top gain, studio quality effects, and foot control over every conceivable function within the amp is what the Grandmeister is all about.