Hughes & Kettner StompMan! (Tiny 25w Amp!)

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Have you guys heard of this little amp? I got mine last week and I've been digging it! It's basically a one channel 25w (at 8 ohms) solid-state amp. So it's essentially just the clean channel of the Spirit line (Amp Man, Black Spirit etc.). At first I didn't think it was for me but then I started to see some potential here.

To begin with, the clean tones are really sweet and dynamic. The sagging control (as with the other Spirit amps) let's you dial in the desired amount of emulated tube sag (compression and saturation). So you can get a lot of nice clean tones out of this actually. You can also dial up the gain to get some nice overdrive as well. So by default it's not a very gainy amp but as a clean/breakup amp it's just sweet. The tone, resonance and presence controls are very welcome too by the way.

However, what's really cool to me is that you can bypass the preamp section and leave the poweramp active, including the controls like the sagging, presence and resonance. This makes for a versatile but compact solid state power amp with some unique features! 25w might not be enough for everyone though but it would probably have to be bigger for it to have more power.

I made a little demo and review so you can see/hear this thing in action:



What do you think of the StompMan? Yay or nay?
 
Excellent vid! I got a Stompman about 1-3 weeks ago and I’ve been really happy with it. I use it as a clean pedal platform. I like it best with the preamp on when using it with my distortion pedals. It really has fantastic tone and feel. I completely forget I’m playing through a solid state amp. I have it running through a 4x12 8ohm cab.
 
that's cool. I've been checking out vids on those joyo amps..little clone tube amps from bumfackistan or china. thinking about one of those. Stompman would be perfect if I was a pedal guy. That ltd firebird sounded killer.
 
Sounds pretty good and a nice price..but the low wattage and odd 24v 2.5A external power supply are big drawbacks for me. It is not THAT small and your video thumb pic is very misleading!

Nothing wrong with bedroom/recording stuff like this..but don’t think you’re going to take it to a rehearsal or gig and be able to keep up. SD Powerstage 200 is still my favorite in this department.
 
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My buddy works for them and he said it was a cool device. He speaks highly of the power section. Have you tried the Quilter UK pedal amp thingy?
 
Oh that’s cool…..yeah the power amp section is really cool for sure. Im planning on trying an amp modeler through the power section of the Stompman with the preamp turned off.

I haven’t tried that particular Quilter pedal amp, but In 2016 I did have a Quilter 101 mini head. Im not sure how long I had it for but I eventually got rid of it. From what I can remember I could never bond with those EQ controls. I could never get enough highs out of it when using it as a pedal platform. My pedals also sounded slightly dull to me. Whereas with the Stompman I have the opposite problem. I have to keep the presence at 9 o’clock - off because the highs are way too much and shrill with the presence higher than 9 o’clock. That’s using it as a pedal platform with the preamp on. I can turn the presence up if I turn the preamp off but I don’t care for the sound with the preamp off. I’m sure it’ll be great that way with a preamp or amp modelers but with a distortion / amp in a box it doesn’t sound good to me.
 
Scordare said:
Sounds pretty good and a nice price..but the low wattage and odd 24v 2.5A external power supply are big drawbacks for me. It is not THAT small and your video thumb pic is very misleading!

Nothing wrong with bedroom/recording stuff like this..but don’t think you’re going to take it to a rehearsal or gig and be able to keep up. SD Powerstage 200 is still my favorite in this department.
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Thanks for the comment. I'm learning now that people sometimes take my thumbnail more serious than I intend them to be. I was just having some fun but I'll be a bit more careful in the future. Cheers!
 
I have gigged three times with the Stompman so far with two different classic rock/pop dance bands. Very small restaurant to fairly large Casino stages. I've been very happy with it. I'm using the Bluguitar Nanocab and the rig is very loud and sounds very good to be so compact. It cuts through very well, no issue at all. I have mounted the Stompman to my Pedaltrain pedalboard. My band mates were telling me that the rig sounded great. The Bluguitar Amp1 is great as well but a bit larger footprint so I haven't mounted it to my pedal board. I didn't have to twist knobs much, The Stompman just sounded great with most knobs around 12 o'clock and I haven't had the master volume above 9:00 o'clock for all three gigs. Great product! I have been using my old BF Princeton Reverb, Friedman Runt 20 or a Fractal FM9 turbo. The Stompman also makes a lightweight backup amp
 
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