Thursday 1^st July 2010

Anybody who has seen the news recently will possibly have guessed that Kings of Leon have been using both Base and Big Choppers on their new record.  It makes me very proud to say that the Base Chopper was the ONLY amp Jared used for bass on the record.  It fought off strong competition (lots of vintage stuff!) and I am thrilled, to say the least.

There was some mis-communication about the Big Chopper, but once that was ironed out, it was the only amp that Matt used, and when the band returned to Nashville to do overdubs and production rehearsals, the only amps they used on the overdubs were, you guessed it, the Choppers.

I was actually up in The Lake District when all this was happening in NY, with pretty much zero internet access and sketchy phone reception, but one night I received the following text message from Jay (KoL bass tech):

‘Well the guitar amp made its debut.. It is now the star of the show.. Blowing some minds with its tone.. Nice work geezer!’

Followed by – ‘Jacquire (KoL producer) wants one!’

Jared and Jay decided they wanted to use the Base Chopper live, so when they got back to Nashville the head was ferried back and fourth between the prod. rehearsals during the day and Blackbird Studios for overdubs, at night.  Jacquire said he needed to keep the Big Chopper at Blackbird so a chance to try it out live has not occurred yet, but it is only a matter of time…!

So fast-forward to June, and KoL are playing Hyde Park.  Jay asked if they could hire two Base Chops for the gig so they didn’t have to drag loads of their kit over.

We got two heads ready and last Sunday I had an email to say that they were in Riverside studios in Hammersmith, and could I get down there with the two heads.

Because the UK gear has been sitting in storage since last year, and they didn’t want to spend loads of time de-bugging, they brought ALL of the US backline with them.  This was fine until we tried to integrate the 240V Choppers.  For some reason (as we found out later dodgy power!) the 240V Choppers hummed like crazy when coupled with all of the 110V gear.

They had brought their own Base Chopper which had developed a fault, which turned out to be a faulty valve, but I brought it back to the workshop to have a look-over and said I would have it working by sound-check at Hyde Park on Tuesday.

Terrible West-End traffic and awkward security guards meant it took us almost two hours to travel about 4 miles and when we finally got to the back of the stage we sprinted up the back of the stage with the amp, plugged it in, and played for about twenty seconds before the band turned up.

Thankfully it was fine, and when we plugged the 240V heads in after sound-check – No hum!

In commemoration of the sessions in NYC Jay had ten hats made up by a street artist.  These were just given to the band and crew present, but after sound-check on the Tuesday he kindly gave me the last one because I had been there by default.  Very kind indeed!

Because it had been an output valve that had run away that caused the problems, I checked the bias on both heads before the gig started…Just to make absolutely sure…
It was all fine.

After the gig Jay asked if I would go along with them to V Festival, so of course I agreed.

Sadly, it clashes with the Nashville Amp Expo so I shall not be able to go… Sniff.

Never mind, there will be other opportunities no doubt, and hopefully I’ll get to meet Jacquire if he’s in town that weekend.

Wednesday 23rd June 2010

Here are a couple of bits of video evidence that Jon and I actually went to the NY Amp Show...

Thursday 17th June 2010

It's been an interesting few weeks.
We had a mad rush to get all of the amps and cabs finished, tested and sent to Sound Moves to ship to the show and because of the British Airways strike action we were not sure until a couple of days before if WE would make it to the show.  Eventually we did but had to re-book the flights which meant we shaved a day off either end of the trip so ended up flying in Friday night, doing the show Saturday and Sunday then catching a red-eye back home on Monday.
I was not quite right for a few days after we got back.

Also, on the day before we left for the show, Jon and I finished a super custom 'Squirrel Chopper' which substitutes the Alan Moulder Secret Squirrel pre-amp for the second channel in a Big Chopper.  This thing is crazy to say the least.  I also put a switch on enabling linking of the inputs so you can blend the beautiful buttery tones of the first channel with those of the second, which range anywhere from those much loved by fans of the Big Chopper channel two, up to the out-of-control grind and squeal of the Secret Squirrel.  It might have been a combination of jet-lag as well as inspiration from the amp but I was playing a two chord Stereolab-type riff on a P-Bass for about 15mins and only came to, when someone came in from the workshop next door to see if I was alright.  It was so inspirational that it took me off and away somewhere in which I totally lost track of time and my surroundings...  Sort of like a lovely musical day-dream!  Sadly the customer who ordered it became tired of waiting for it (it did take longer to design, build and tweak than I thought it would!) so I think Mr Moulder has a few potential customers lined up.  Oh, and I almost forgot to say it has been fun rolling off  the top on one channel and the bottom on the other and vice versa to create even more intricate sounds.

So, the New York Amp Show - Well we were sharing a room with Damien Probett, of Probett guitars, who had brought some extraordinarily lovely guitars with him.  As I mentioned earlier, Jon and I flew in late on Friday and Damien and his friend Eoin had the fridge stocked with a few beers so we arrived, had a couple of beers and then went to bed, knowing we would be up early enough to set up all of the amps ready for the crowds at 10am on Saturday.
The first day was great, in spite of fatigue, and we had the pleasure of meeting some really great guitarists and thoroughly pleasant people.  Early on we had an interview/ video done by Premier Guitar magazine which was rather nerve-wracking, but they seemed to think it went well so keep an eye out for that on their website.
Most folk who were genuinely interested tended to stay checking the amps anywhere from 20mins to over an hour for a couple of guys who came back after lunch and decided to buy a Little Chopper and 1x12" cab.  We had quite a few younger guys working for other exhibitors come by and spend lunch-breaks with us and also met a great guitarist called Chuck Hammer who refused to leave until we had organised to meet Gene of amp dealer extraordinaire Ultra Sound in NYC.  Subsequently Chuck has expressed a desire to help us spread the word in NYC and beyond, which, considering his stature as a player and composer is both humbling and thrilling.  
Sunday was much slower on the whole, although we did manage to meet Gene briefly and agreed to talk further, and I ran into a lovely guy I had sold pcbs to many moons ago, which was superb.
Through all of the tiredness Tim, our US distributor, guided and prodded us in the right direction and took care of things when we lost the plot.
All in all we had a great time, didn't really take any pictures, but did get some video footage which Jon is editing even as we speak, so hope to have a little YouTube action up in the coming few days.  We met some kindred builders, Jim of Soloway Guitars and Honda of Far East Electric to name but two, and got a feel for the amp buying public in a country which both Jon and I love, and which I am looking forward to re-visiting for the up-coming Nashville Amp Expo...

See you there!

Tuesday 4th May 2010

April has been and gone and quite a bit has happened in the past few weeks. 
I have actually been up in The Lake District for the past couple of weeks walking up mountains and enjoying the contrail free skies which has been a welcome
relief from the hubub of London.

US Distributor Info

I can now confirm that Timothy Penn of Boutiquetronics is our guy in the US so any sales enquiries for that side of the pond can go to him on 
timothy@boutiquetronics.com

Any amp related questions can go to either Tim or me and, as ever, we will endevour to answer ASAP

Tim went to the big guitar show in Dallas over the 16th-17th and received a large amount of attention for a relatively small pitch and unknown brand.
Next stop NY!!!

And speaking of NY, here are a couple more pics of the Big and Base Choppers that went over there at the end of March.  The Base Chop is the only bass amp used on the new record and after a couple of false starts, the Big Chopper is consistently beating down ALL competition both vintage and current.
They are begining rehearsals in mid-may and are taking the amps back to see whether they will be used on tour.  I hope and pray so.

And speaking of Nashville, Tim told me he has booked me in for the Nashville amp show in August, my good friend Reeves Gabrels has promised to come and hang out at our pitch and perhaps I can persuade a couple of other Nashvillians to come down...  Who knows?!

I exchanged text messages with Judah Bauer late of JSBX and now touring with Cat Power as he was over in London for a few days.  Sadly I missed him as I was up in The Lakes but he came into the workshop, tried and liked the amps and borrowed one of my Probett guitars for a session.

Pixies want to try some amps the day I fly out to the NY show... It's all go here.

Wednesday 31st March 2010

Apologies for there having been such a long time since the last update, but it has been pretty busy here of late.

I've made a few more bits for Kasabian, re-designed the back end of the Big Chopper, and got a pretty heavily modified Big Chopper and a Base Chopper plus respective cabs built, and shipped to NYC for a certain band, who are set to begin recording their upcoming 5th album there next week.  All that plus keeping up with orders that keep on coming in!  A chap from Austria has asked me to make him a heavily customised Big Chopper with a Squirrel in place of the existing second channel...!  Watch this space, as they say.

On top of  those things, I have been in discussions with a repeat Audio Kitchen customer who is setting up to be our US dealer.  This is really great news for me because up to this point, having to deal with all the shipping/ import tax  has been a real headache, and not having demo amps in the US has been a headache, so I'm really pleased this is happening.  Once he gets his official email address up and running, I'll post it up here and on the Contacts page of this site.

And, on a related note, whe are proud to announce we will be exhibiting at the New York Amp Show  www.ampshow.com .

So if you're in the area or coming down to the show anyway, please drop by and say 'Hi' to us.

Monday 1st February 2010

The first day of the second month of the New Year already.  I can hardly believe it.  Another thing I can hardly believe is that it snowed in London again last night and it was icy enough on the roads that I fell off my bike this morning.  Slight groin strain was the only real discomfort, apart from the thought of having to do the return journey in the dark in about an hour's time...

Anyway, I thought this dark cold evening was as good a time as any to post a picture of Dib from Kasabian, with a pedal board I made him a couple of months ago.

Pedals blackened to protect the innocent...

Friday 15th January 2010

We finally put the finishing touches on an oak cabinet Little Chopper for a customer who wanted to use the same batch of oak used as flooring in his house.  Yes, seriously.

It turned out pretty well for something made from flooring grade oak, and actually I think all the funny faults and imperfections make it look rather interesting...

Saturday 9th January 2010

So Happy New Year and all that!

Now down to business.

A customer asked me a few months ago if I could make him a stand-alone valve based reverb.  I said yes.  After a few months of kicking ideas around we came up with this:

He was pretty thrilled with it, and I must say, it was a pretty enjoyable project, especially since the end result was so fun to play!

Tuesday 15th December 2009

We did a limited run of tee-shirts as Christmas presents for all of our loyal customers, and to comemorate the year of the Secret Squirrel amp for Alan Moulder.

We delivered his shirt to him at studio and he was thrilled.

Here is the shirt as modeled by the man himself, and a close up of the graphic...

The Secret Squirrel and its keeper:

Thursday 17th December 2009

Today I got to spend the day with the legend that is Tony Iommi, in his studio.  Yes, I did take some amps with me, and no, they didn't have enough gain ha!

He did like them though, and I was amused when Jim Marshall's son turned up with a prototype for Tony to try, and my amps were all set up in the live room.

So now I have to make a high gain amp that Tony prefers to all the other stuff he has played over the years.

There's nothing like making life hard for yourself...

Audio Kitchen against the might of Marshall.  I love it!

Tuesday 1st December 2009

We had a little video shoot at the house Jon is living in at the moment.  Dom Brown, long time friend and Duran Duran guitarist came down to play some geetar, Damian from Probett guitars brought some of his wares down and as usual, Jon took the helm/ video camera, while I recorded the sound.

Jon, as ever, did a great job on the video.

Check it out:

Monday 19th October 2009

I had been hassling Russell Lissack for weeks to let me come and film him playing through one of my amps and this is the first lot of footage that Jon has edited together.

Thanks Russell!

Friday 25th September 2009

We finally got the full demo video up!

 

Friday 18^th September 2009

Our first proper effort at a video went live while we were having a band reunion at the King’s Arms in Waterloo this evening.
The first view was on Jon’s iPhone.

Tuesday 8^th September 2009

I received a text from Steve Prior today with this pic saying ‘Yep, they like it!’
Jeff Beck is using it in the studio.

Tuesday 1^st September 2009

Today was the day that we did the first filming for some amp demo videos.
It’s been a long day.
Damian from Probett guitars brought some guitars down, Les Bantleman came over to play some guitar and Jon-the-faithful-Kensington took care of the cameras.
It’s time for bed.

Friday 14^th August 2009

Over the past week I have been working on modifying Alan Moulder’s Secret Squirrel for more distortion.  Sadly he has been in LA so hasn’t been able to hear what I’ve been up to, so I decided to make a little video and put that up on Youtube.

I sent him a link and when he woke up I got this email right back:

Hi Steve,

What a fantastic thing to wake up to! That is f*****' brilliant! I am going to show that to Josh and John Paul Jones. Incredibly flexible...... I love it and can't wait to try it out. Sounds like it still has all the other tones too?

Great work sir!

Alx

Yes, he has been recording and producing Them Crooked Vultures.

Here is the video:

Thursday 30^th July 2009

Gwen from Yann Tiersen’s band kindly sent me these pics of Yann and his amp!

Remember; go and see him if you get a chance!!!

Wednesday 29^th July 2009

Jon and I went to have lunch with Flood today.  He brought his youngest son who is about the same age as my daughter; almost 3 years old.

You’ll be surprised to hear we didn’t talk shop too much as Flood’s little one commanded most of the attention, ha!

‘Twas good fun though.  We promised to meet again sans little ones after he returned from his summer holiday road trip around France.

Monday 20^th July 2009

As I had booked my ticket on Eurostar, I had to have Yann’s amp finished by today.  I managed to have a rather fraught weekend chasing my tail over a silly problem but managed to get to St Pancras with the amp and cab in their flight cases.

Sadly the maximum weight for oversized luggage is 30Kg.  The speaker and case together weighed closer to 60Kg.  Fine, I’ll check them separately.  However, you can only check two pieces of oversized luggage…

The amp weighed 45Kg in its case.  My seat was in Carriage One on departure so manhandling the amp into the carriage was interesting, but I managed it.

At the other end, Carriage One becomes Carriage Eighteen

I had no Euro coins so I couldn’t get a trolley.

Eighteen Eurostar carriages add up to quite a long distance.

There were bruises.

But I had time to have some food and a beer before the return trip an hour later.

Thursday 16^th July 2009

So we took the Demo Big Chopper down to Brixton for about 3pm and then hung about for the band to turn up.  They went straight into sound check, but Jay loved the look of the amp and at one point he told me to come and take a picture of it while they were in the middle of playing as it had landed itself in the spotlight…

Jay had already said he wasn’t sure he could justify spending money on a new amp, but was up for having a blast.  He runs A LOT of pedals and has a bit of a struggle getting a decent clean tone out of his rig, but as a first test we just did an A/B test between his current setup and the Big Chopper, with the guitar going straight in to the amp.  It was chalk and cheese.  Suddenly he perked up and got really into trying different combinations of pedals etc. through the Chopper.  He used a couple of fairly fruity similes with regard to how the Chopper and old amp sounded, and then at the end asked Dave what they could sell so that they could buy one…

 

Friday 10^th July 2009

 

When I went up to see Bloc Party at Olympia on Easter Sunday, I met Evil Dave who was deputising for their regular bass tech.  His normal gig is Kasabian, and today we met at a pub for lunch to discuss a new pedal board for Dib, the bass player.

Dave is not evil at all.  I think he is great.

After we had had lunch we came back to my workshop for him to have a blast on the amps.  He loved the Big Chopper and organised for us to take it down to demo to Jay when they play at Brixton Academy next Thursday.

Sweet.

Saturday 28^th June 2009

I’m off to France for a week with my extended family tomorrow.  See you in a week or so…

Friday 26^th June 2009

For the last few years I have been trying to get in touch with Larry Cragg who is Neil Young’s tech.  Periodically I email him via his instrument hire firm’s website.  Of course I have never had a reply, but I must keep plugging away, so I emailed him again today.  I can’t dream of ever getting an amp to Neil, but if I could get an amp in front of Larry and get his reactions I’d be a happy boy, indeed!

Wednesday 24^th June 2009

I had a repeat order from a guy who used to be Prince’s engineer at Paisley Park during the Diamonds and Pearls era.  He wanted something different.  I tried out an extra octal base and a switch on a Little Chopper so he could switch between output valves.

For a laugh, I put a KT88 in and tried it; it sounded amazing!

Friday 19^th June 2009

You know I said the Bent Amp seemed fixed?  After I had called to tell them to come and get it, having played music, tones and instruments through it for two days, I decided to have one last test…
You can guess what happened.
There are worse things in life than intermittent faults, but in work-life, they are pretty much as annoying and frustrating as it comes.
 
9:30pm sees me sitting in my car waiting for the driver to turn up and collect it.
 
Not a great start to a weekend, but as there wasn’t any negative feedback over the course of their two gig weekend, I assume the amp is working fine again.
Now if I can just get the demo amp back…

Tuesday 16^th June 2009

I got in this morning at 7am because the demo amp wouldn’t go quietly, and as they wanted to pick it up at 8:30am there was a certain degree of urgency in the way I got out of bed.
At 8:05am I literally had the first screw in the box when the driver called to say he would be there in 5mins.
 
That kind of stress I can do without.
 
I got the Bent Amp back, took the back off and saw this…




The output transformer had made a bid for freedom, and railed against its mounting lugs: I decided to beef those up with some right-angled steel.

When I started to poke around inside I traced the problem to a certain point, prodded that point with a chopstick, and away it went.  That was rather disquieting because if you can’t make a fault re-occur, it is difficult to fix!
Anyway, I did what I thought was required, then as I was going down to O2 to see Kings of Leon again, I asked Jay if we could blast the amp through their two 8x10s to see if I could make it go wrong again.
The drive all the way across London was a hot one, and security at O2 had somehow fumbled my clearance so I ended up sitting in my hot car and waiting for them to sort it out for 15 mins or so.   They finally allowed me across the threshold and I parked up, un-loaded the Little Chopper rig (that I was lending to Matt again) and the misbehaving Bent Amp.
Jay plugged the up the Bent one straight away, loved it, pounded away on it for 45mins during sound check, and not a single problem occurred.  So was it fixed?  You would assume so, wouldn’t you?
We went and set the Little Chopper up in the ‘Warm-Up’ room for the band and then went for some dinner.
Jay was slightly sad that there was no band sound check that day as he really wanted Jared to hear the bass amp, but such is life.
The show was a great one, and for some reason Caleb decided to start speaking to the crowd - which he never does – and said it was the best gig he had ever played…
‘I’ll bet you say that to all the stadia.’
This time I went and stood in the Front-of-house pen so actually got to hear what it was supposed to sound like rather than the normal side-stage mush.

Monday 15^th June 2009

D-Day for Alan’s ‘Secret Squirrel’ amp.  It had just about got to where I was happy with it on Friday and did a few tweaks this morning.  It had been arranged that I would be at Assault & Battery at midday so left here at 11am.
While in the car I had a call saying the Bent Amp that was not at all well.  Being an accommodating fellow, I said they could borrow my demo amp while I looked at theirs.
I got to A&B a bit early and then Flood turned up so we took the amp in together with Al’s wife Toni.  Al wasn’t sure what to say or think when we walked in, but suffice it to say he was pretty overwhelmed and when the dust had settled and everyone bar the assistants, Al and I had left, it transpired that the amp I had made was pretty close to exactly what he would have spec’d if he had had a choice; which was handy.
He played some bass through it, a Les Paul through it, and then cut to the chase and re-amped a bass part on the mix he was doing for the new Wolfmother (wolfmother.com) record.  There was a bass part which was played fairly high up the neck and was lacking some bottom end, so they were trying to fill out that missing bottom end by treating the DI signal.
A/Bing saw the Secret Squirrel win hands down, and that’s where I left it…
TBC
 
I got back to the workshop to realise that the demo amp I had promised to lend out was in bits (I must stop tinkering!!!) and rather a long way from working well enough to lend out.
Cue: Late night.

Saturday 13^th June 2009

I had a few missed calls from a band who had managed to dump their amp off the back of the truck at load out.  Big amp + big transformers + big drop = big mess?
I gave them some instructions and told them to try it in the production rehearsal venue, but call me if there were problems.

Tuesday 2^nd June 2009

Avid readers might remember I mentioned that Flood had asked me to design what will become a signature amp for the 50^th birthday of a good friend of his.  Well writing this after the fact, I can reveal that it was, as you might have suspected, Alan Moulder.
I had to pick myself up after the Blur build and get down to designing and building this amp, and incidentally it was to be presented to him in its prototype form on the 15^th.  So that’s two weeks then, along with all of the day to day stuff.
Ahem.

1^st June 2009

Today was the end of what seemed like a long tiring journey that has seen very long days/ nights and working weekends to try and get Alex James’ rig ready for the beginning of rehearsals today.  Work as we might we couldn’t get it all done in time for the load in yesterday evening, but we did get it there at 4pm when all the techs were still working away.  Jason (whom I’d not met before) was the first to plug in and give it a blast.  He loved how the low E string on Alex’s P-Bass didn’t mush-out like on other amps, and everyone bar no-one kindly drooled over how lovely it looked.

The silver knobs set it off perfectly (www.endlessknobbing.com) thanks Jason!

There was a feeling of extreme relief both on my part and on theirs that the rig had been delivered and sounded as good as we had all hoped.

Phew.

26^th May 2009

It was my birthday yesterday.  Thankfully the authorities saw fit to declare a national holiday so I got to chase my daughter around Kew Gardens, have lunch followed by a siesta (yes, I am so rock and roll!), drink a beer with my brother-in-law, then have a meal out with my wife at a pub.  Happy days.

This morning James and I went down to State of the Ark Studios, where Nick Cave was beginning the recording of the new Grinderman (www.grinderman.com) record.
I showed Nick how to play a Dmin chord on the guitar when they were in our studios 18 months ago – how weird is that?!
Nick had spoken to me about wanting to try out my Mutator (no we don’t sell them anymore!) and I agreed to ferry it down to SotA and told him he’d better get thinking about a ‘Quote’ to put up on our users page to go with the photo I was going to take of him.
 
'This amp makes me feel like I am playing in a band, not twisting in the wind.  As soon as I plugged in I sounded like Eddie Hazel, and I could play Maggot Brain, for God sakes!  No turning back, no turning back...'

15th May 2009

At 10:47am my phone rang and it was Ant, to say that they were in the carpark, and could I come and find them.

When I got down there with my sack barrow, I opened the door to the carpark to be confronted by a huge tour bus, and the whole of the band and crew (15ish) stretching their legs and preparing themselves for the trip to Minehead.

Yann bounded up to me and said he had had an amazing gig (best of the tour so far, affirmed by the rest of the band!) and absolutely HAD to order an amp.

The Ondes-Martenot (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ondes_Martenot ) player said Yann’s violin had sounded amazing through the amp, and did I think her instrument would benefit from the Audio Kitchen sound.  Of course, I said undoubtedly it would…Ha!  Then the bass player came up and asked what he had to do to try a bass amp.

Ant said he was seriously thinking about a Big Chopper for himself, which is a pretty resounding endorsement as he doesn’t really play guitar, other than when he is teching.

Very kindly, Yann dug out five records and a cool badge/ bottle opener as a ‘thank-you’ for the use of the amp, then they all piled onto the bus and away they drove, leaving me standing slightly dazed, in the blustery car park with arms full of records and a Big Chopper and 2x12” cab to get back up to the workshop.

 
Here’s some violin through the Big Chopper:

 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fLOUzLHhkJg&NR=1

14^th May 2009

Jon was in today, for the first time in about seven weeks, and I must say it was great to have him back (not least because it shares the work-load!)
He has been away doing various things including a tour playing bass with Duke Special ( www.dukespecial.com ), and before that with Iain Archer ( www.iainarcher.co.uk ).

This afternoon I went up to The Electric Ballroom in Camden to see Ant (Nick Cave’s backline tech) and his current charge, the excellent Yann Tiersen
( www.yanntiersen.com ).
The idea was to let Yann have a go with the Little and Big Choppers, as Ant had shown him the amps on the website and spoken to him about them, then be on our way and let them get on with sound check.

Yann really wanted to use the amp for the gig after playing all of his different guitars and violins through it.  That was fine by me, but as they were going to ATP ( www.atpfestival.com ) the next morning, the only way we could get it back was for them to drive the tour bus to my workshop on the way to the M4, and drop the amp off…

Yann was a happy man.
I am gutted that I couldn’t stay for the show, but I was on baby-sitting duty!
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVqnj3cVgts
 
You can just see the Big Chopper below and behind his keyboard.

13^th May 2009

Alex from Blur wanted a slightly different speaker cab design, so today was spent tweaking the original design to his needs.
Photos will follow…

11^th May 2009

There are two sorts of components I get really excited about; transformers and capacitors.  Today I finally had the chance to try the newest prototype output transformer that my good friend Simon has made for me.  This one was for the Big Chopper.  Simon loves to try new ideas out on me and really understands transformers, so it is always fun a/b’ing and reporting back.
The first thing that hits you when you open the box is the smell of the varnish…Mmmmm!
Anyway, the transformer sounded great so it looks like we have a new OT.

7^th May 2009

Lloyd called me today to say Alex definitely wants to buy a couple of Base Chopper rigs for the Blur gigs this summer.  Nice.

 
Also today we had our invite-only demo evening down at Kore Studios (www.kore-studios.com ).  I think Mimi has put up a load of pics on the Facebook group so head over there for a taste of the evening’s highlights.

5^th May 2009

First day back, and it was spent driving around delivering/ picking/ re-delivering gear around London.
Base Chopper back to Blur for their rehearsal, delivery of a Little Chopper to The Hours, collection of an Impressor from Flood and Editors, and collection of the Big Chopper demo rig from James McCartney.

 
Oh, and I forgot to say before I left that there is a Facebook group for Audio Kitchen amps, so go and have a look if you are at all that way inclined.

17^th April 2009

I hired this thing to Calvin Harris (http://www.calvinharris.tv/ ) for a video shoot today.
It’s an old drum machine from the 80s (oh yes!)

 
This evening we are off on a family holiday up to The Lakes for a couple of weeks, to see our friends - The Audio Kitchen Sheep – so I’ll see you in a couple of weeks…

14^th April 2009

Today Paul, our wood man, got the prototype 1x10” bass speaker cab made up and we had a listen. Happily, in timbre, it sounds pretty much like the 4x10” and it has been designed so that it is the same width and a little deeper than the Base Chopper (hello studio!).  Below is a pic of it with the Big Chopper for scale, as the Base Chopper is the same width and a little taller than the Big Chopper.

8^th April 2009

Lloyd called me to say that Alex and the rest of the band loved the Base Chopper to bits.
Watch for further developments here.

7^th April 2009

Today was the day that we took the Base Chopper away from Editors and delivered it to Blur c/o Stuart - Alex’s tech – up at John Henry’s.
Stuart set it up and I must say Alex’s signal chain is nothing if not minimal: P-Bass – Fuzz pedal with true bypass – amp.
So, he likes the sound of his bass straight into an amp, apparently.
Stuart introduced me to Lloyd, who like Stuart, was a very amenable and likeable man, who has been with the band since year dot, and as soon as they plugged it in, the now familiar eyes-open-wide-chin-drawn-into-the-neck reaction occurred to both simultaneously.  They predicted that Alex would feel similarly.
The mighty Graham Coxon, a hero of mine, wondered in at this point and made similar comment, and then realised that it was related to a Little Chopper (owned by Steve Prior – Jeff Beck and Brian May tech amongst others) he had used on his last record.  I told him about the Big Chopper and he asked if I could bring one down for him to try out at rehearsal of his solo project sometime soon.
I said I’d think about it. Ha!

31^st March 2009

Flood texted me today to say now he wants a 4x10” to go with the Base Chopper head.
Thought he might.

30^th March 2009

Tom Kelly who used to be head engineer at our studio brought a friend in to try a guitar amp today.  That friend was James McCartney.
He brought his beloved strat along and we had an hour of trying and talking amps, and generally shooting the breeze before he had to go to a meeting.  He fell in love with the Big Chopper and has asked if it would be possible to make one in Zebrano with matching 2x12.  French polished, of course.  Talk about making a rod for my back.
I leant him my copy of ‘Pisces Iscariot’ by Smashing Pumpkins and they went on their way.

27^th March 2009 pm

Flood has commissioned me to design a piece which will bear the signature of one of his long time friends and cohorts, in honour of his 50^th birthday.
I can’t quite believe it!!!
Watch this blog…

27^th March 2009

As Duran Duran had finished recording on the 26^th, we went and picked up the Base rig and conveyed it straight to Flood who was in the studio with Editors ( www.editorsofficial.com ).  They have been using Flood’s LC for lots of the guitar sounds on the record so were very interested to hear the low end version.

When we got there (I have just realised I need to start taking pictures on my phone again!!!) Flood and Russell welcomed us and were having a debate about the best sounding string on a bass guitar.  Russell was maintaining the ‘A’ string sounded best and Flood was arguing that ‘E’ strings on some basses were better.  Russell was unhappy with the way that the ‘E’ string tended to sound woolly whereas the ‘A’ was always tight.

We plugged Russell’s Ricky straight into the Base Channel 1.  Russell changed his view on the ‘E’ string.  Tight all the way down past 40Hz.

The Audio Kitchen amp-bulance strikes again…

26^th March 2009

I’ve been making an LC head cab out of Zebrano wood recently, and have decided to French polish it in an old school styleee.

It’s hard work but looks pretty cool…

25^th March 2009

We took the Base Chopper and cab to John Taylor of Duran Duran today.  They were in the studio writing with Mark Ronson, and after hearing Dom Brown’s Little Chopper, John asked if we would mind bringing him something to play with.

John, it must be said, is a very pleasant and gracious man.  I liked him very much indeed.

23^rd March 2009

Jason Cox put me in touch with Blur’s tour manager, Craig Duffy, today, who said it would be good to get Alex to have a go with the Base Chopper.  He gave me Stuart – Alex  James’ tech’s number, I spoke to Stuart, who was totally up for it, and we agreed to get an amp to him on the 7^th April for Blur’s next rehearsal.

That is pretty exciting.

19^th March 2009

Nick Cave called me today and ordered a Little Chopper.
He said it was the only amp he has ever played with which he hasn’t felt he was wrestling.
It doesn’t get much better than that.

17^th March 2009

Text from Garrett received at 13:53:
‘We used the Base Chopper and Little Chopper for our bass sound.  Superb. G’

16^th March 2009

As I said previously, Garrett kindly agreed to bring all of the amps up to State of The Ark Studios (Link www.stateofthearkstudios.com ) in West London, where he was doing some recording with Snow Patrol.  I went down to see him on the set-up day and he played me some of the tunes that he had done with Bloc Party, using my amps.  It is always interesting hearing how different players and producers find/ interact with the amps and this was no exception.  Russell’s guitar lines sounded crystal-clear even though they were pretty distorted, and the bass sound was super solid and present.

Garrett said he would text me when they had decided if and what Choppers they were going to use the next day.

9^th March 2009

 
I got in touch with Garrett ‘Jacknife’ Lee ( http://www.jacknifelee.com/ ) to arrange pick up of the amps, and he mentioned that he was going to be up in West London recording with Snow Patrol in a few days.  He then kindly offered to bring the amps up with him, at which point I said I would bring a Big Chopper down to the studio for him to play with as well.

Watch this space…

3^rd March 2009

Today we took a Little Chopper for Charlie Chandler to keep at his shop (www.guitar-xperience.com ) in Hampton, who had heard about the amps from various clients.

It looks kind of like this one I built last year, but with red control plates:

It was good to finally meet Charlie after speaking on the phone over the past few months, and on having a good old play with the amp said it reminded him a lot of the first ‘proper’ amp he had made for him back when he was a teenager..

Anyway, when I’m in there next I’ll take a picture of it on my phone just so you know I’m not fibbing!

2^nd March 2009

 
On Friday we finally got our 4x10 bass cab up and running after eagerly awaiting the delivery of our custom drivers for 8 weeks.  We compared to the reference cabs in the workshop and it really did sound great.  I got in touch with Gordon from Bloc Party as I knew they were going to be in recording with Jacknife Lee (http://www.jacknifelee.com/) the next week, and he said he’d love to try it.

So, on the 2^nd we drove down to Kent with a Little Chopper for Russell and Kele to use, and the Base Chopper with its 4x10 for Gordon/ Jacknife to play with.

 
The next day Gordon Facebooked me the following:

9:33am Gordon

We had a little play and it sounds really crisp and clear, like no amp I've tried

9:33am Stephen

really?

9:33am Gordon

It's hard to judge in a room I don't usually play bass in

It's definitely powerful and big

9:34am Stephen

That's the comment I have had from everyone who has played it. Like a bass amp with the blanket taken off the speakers!

9:34am Gordon

Yep! We're going to mic it up later and just compare. I'd like to try it in rehearsal/stage. Garrett (Jacknife) likes it

9:34am Stephen

Happy days!

26^th February 2009

 
On the 10^th February we drove down to see Massive Attack at their studio in Bristol.  It was a funny old journey with more and more snow on the ground the further we got from London, in fact two snow ploughs passed us going in the opposite direction…

We arrived and had a chat with Neil Davidge (http://www.neildavidge.com/) about the gear we had taken for him to try, over a cup of tea and then once Gee and Dee had arrived, and we had set up the gear we said our goodbyes and made our way back to Acton.

 
Today we drove back down and picked up a couple of bits, but Neil asked to hang on to some of the gear for the rest of the record so we came to an arrangement and very much look forward to hearing the results!  Oh, and he wants to buy a Little Chopper.

 
24^th February 2009

I had an email from Tom Rothrock today in response to an email request I sent him for feedback on his experience with the Big Chopper.

This is some of it:

Steve,

The amp / cab are great.  Usually an amp that flexible has short comings… I can say that when the next guitar project comes up I will be asking you to build one. No further research needed. Thanks for helping in the project!

Tom

22^nd February 2009

 …and yet more awards for KoL!  Well done on the Brit awards!

9^th February 2009

We are really delighted to be able to congratulate Coldplay and Kings of Leon who both took awards home from last night’s Grammy Awards!

Well done lads.

3^rd February 2009

I went back to Metropolis this morning to meet Tom, Mike (both of whom I forgot to say, are really lovely gents and masters of their art!) and the band.

Tom was making very good noises about the Big Chopper and 2x12.

They have gone back to Athlete’s studio to do overdubs and vocals with Tom and Mike, and you never know, Tom might even buy a Big Chopper…

2^nd February 2009

 
The Five inches of snow on the ground when I woke up threw me a bit and I thought about staying at home, but remembered that I had promised to drop both Big and Base Choppers to Athlete (www.athlete.mu) and Tom Rothrock (www.myspace.com/mrrothrock) who were booked into Metropolis Studios in Chiswick.

I hung around for a bit to show Carey the ropes on the Base Chopper, and just made sure Joel knew his way around the Big Chopper after only being used to his own Little Chopper.

Mike, Tom’s engineer, said both were sounding great through the control room speakers, so I went home to build a snowman with my daughter and nieces.

That evening I got a text from Joel to say the Big had beaten his vintage British amp hands down in a head to head, and Carey just sent me a smiley face.

 
Oh, and they both want amps of their own.

23^rd January 2009

 
After finally stumping up the money, Dom Brown (www.dombrown.com) came and picked up his Little Chopper last week.

For the next few weeks he is writing with Duran Duran and Mark Ronson for the new studio record.  Already, he has called to say how much he and the rest of the band are enjoying the amp.

22^nd January 2009

 
I had to go up to John Henry’s today, after having done some mods to the pedal boards I made for Kele and Russell from Bloc Party last Summer.  I took up a Little Chopper for 5^th Dan Scrabble Master, Russell, to try and he was only able to plug in for a few minutes but wants to have a proper go at some point.  I’m going to try to get one to him in a month or so.

20^th January 2009

 
Flood called me from LA today, and ordered a Base Chopper.  He said he had been thinking about the amp since I had taken it up to his studio in September, and about how it managed to sound very immediate at low volumes, which his other all valve bass amp didn’t manage to do until it was REALLY loud.

Good!

22^nd December 2008

 

It took me 17 minutes to get to Wembley Arena from my workshop, and they even let me into the carpark!

How many of us have dreamt of being able to park there for gigs?

In the intervening three weeks I had been tinkering with the Big Chopper to try and hone in on Matt’s sound on the current record.  I also had the idea of having a hinged top half of the back of the 2x12 = Open back or closed back and all stops in between.

Sadly the band got stuck in a load of traffic in central London and consequently Matt didn’t have much time to try the amp, but I did get to hang out with Nacho for a couple of hours, speaking about catching fish in flooded streets and talking tech, and again Brent came and mangled some Stairway… (not really!!!).  Nacho also said that Matt had been using the Little Chopper most days in the dressing room, which was nice to hear. Also whilst there this time, I ran into Caleb and Nathan in catering after sound check. Thoroughly nice chaps!

The Kings were off home the day after the Wembley gig so I collected the various amps and headed back home, but Nacho, Jay and I exchanged email addresses and we are going to meet up again when they come back to play at The O2, for further amp messing…

 
Happy Christmas!!

1^st December 2008

 

After missing them rehearsing at Earls Court, Jon and I drove down to The Brighton Centre with a Little Chopper and Base Chopper, and had the pleasure of meeting Kings of Leon (www.kingsofleon.com).

When I got there Jay, who tech’s for Jared and Nacho who tech’s for Caleb and Matt, had a listen to the amps and looked pretty surprised at the sound that came out of them!  Nacho also radioed their front of house engineer, Brent, to come and have a listen, who also dug it.  He even bashed out a few chords through the Little Chopper!

Anyway, long story short, Matt came and tried it after sound check, liked it, I said he could hang on to it and I’d see then at Wembley.

Jay took the bass amp and kept it in his bunk on the bus…

What a thoroughly nice bunch!

30^th October 2008

 
The Hours (www.thehours.co.uk) support Oasis (www.oasisinet.com) in Ireland and their Big Chopper performs impeccably!

October 2008

 
Dan Austin came and collected his and Jez Williams’ amps and drove up to the Doves’ studio with them.

A few days later I had independent calls from both Dan and Jez to say how thrilled they were with the amps.  See comments on the Users page…

September 2008

 
The Base Chopper was slung in the boot when we went up to Assault And Battery studios on an un-related matter.

The band in the studio with Flood were trying to nail a bass sound on a particular track and had been through many amps and basses but had not quite succeeded up to that point.  I was standing at the back of the control room when one of the band jokingly asked if there was an Audio Kitchen bass amp that could save the day.

“Funny you should say that…” I said.

Ten minutes later they were recording.

3^rd September 2008

On the second day of the LIMS show a certain pedal-steel guitar legend wandered onto our stand.
BJ Cole (www.bjcole.co.uk) and I stayed in touch, and when he finally had a break in his hectic schedule, he came over to my workshop one sweaty day in September.

Here is a pic of him playing Claire De Lune on his current favourite instrument through a Little Chopper which was screaming its' lungs out!

He captured a Little Chopper and it is apparently inspiring a whole record’s worth of material.

Watch this space…

August 2008

Flood had been working with The Hours (www.thehours.co.uk) for a few months on their new studio record. The band and engineer Dan Austin were keen to speak to me about the amps so I went up to see them in RAK studios in early June. RAK Studio June 2008

Later on in August, Flood asked me to come up to his studio as they had their ordering hats on…

When the dust settled, I had orders from The Hours for a Little Chopper and a Big Chopper to be used live, and a Little Chopper for Dan Austin, all with associated cabs and speakers… and another sight un-seen order from Jez Williams of Doves (www.doves.net) who decided to order one on the strength of Dan’s enthusing down the phone at him!

24th July 2008

It's been a couple of weeks since our demo days now, and we were pleasantly surprised how well they went! The orders we took have ensured that the waiting time has extended by a couple of weeks which is good for us, but not so good for you...!

Anyway, we are pretty convinced that there will be regular demo days from now on, and it's just a case of fitting it all in, so if you are interested give us a call and we can let you know dates etc.

I'm off to finish another Sapele Chopper...

Audio Kitchen and Probett Guitars Demo Days:

We are pleased to be able to announce that the first Audio Kitchen Amps, post LIMS 2008 demo days will be held on Friday 11th and Saturday 12th July at our studio in Acton, West London. (Details below)

These days will be an opportunity to bring your own guitars and pedals down to check through an amp in a non-pressured environment and see if the amps are what you want/ need for your specific playing situations.

We are thrilled to have also a number of Probett's (www.probettguitars.com) sublime guitars for your perusal. Damien's guitars are incredibly beautiful and his obsessive attention to details of sound, ergonomics and finish must be witnessed.

Ideally we'd like to give people 2hr slots, so there is no time pressure at all.
If you could email us a prefered time then we can get back to you and tell you what's available.

We will be running more of these days, so if you can't make these first two, don't despair, just keep your eyes on this page and/ or email us.

We are all really looking forward to it!

Venue:
Mark Angelo Recording Studios
13 Impress House
Mansell Road
Acton
W3 7QH
Tel: 020 8735 0040

12^th June 2008

On the way to the first day of LIMS 2008 I had a text from Matt who tech’s for Jonny from Coldplay (www.coldplay.com).

A few months before, I had lent Matt and the band a Little Chopper at the very tail-end of the recording process for Viva La Vida.  Because it was so late on in the recording of the album, I didn’t dare to hope that it might make it onto the record…

The text message set me straight; “Lovers in Japan, left speaker intermittent riffage” were the words which made my day.

Cheers

Steve