LOT 2
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JIM MARSHALL PRODUCTIONS LIMITED, BLETCHLEY, ENGLAND, CIRCA 1968 AN AMPLIFIER HEAD, SUPER TREMOLO, JTM 45, MK IV
作品估价：GBP 4,000 - 6,000
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成交状态：待拍
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拍品名称：
JIM MARSHALL PRODUCTIONS LIMITED, BLETCHLEY, ENGLAND, CIRCA 1968 AN AMPLIFIER HEAD, SUPER TREMOLO, JTM 45, MK IV
拍品描述：
JIM MARSHALL PRODUCTIONS LIMITED, BLETCHLEY, ENGLAND, CIRCA 1968
AN AMPLIFIER HEAD, SUPER TREMOLO, JTM 45, MK IV
The later logo Marshall applied to the front panel, MK / IV and JTM / 45 applied to the front control panel, labelled MA 14 to the top, a JIM MARSHALL PRODUCTS LTD. plate applied to the back panel, the rear chassis panel marked MK / IV and Super Tremolo / Amplifier, inscribed JB and stamped with serial number 7467
9 in. (22.8 cm.) high; 25 ¾ in. (65.4 cm.) wide; 8 3⁄8 in. (21.2 cm.) deepWhilst closely associated with Marshall for most of his almost six-decade long career, Jeff Beck only began using Jim Marshall's amp heads on the company's angled speaker cabinets as part of his stage rig from the late 1960s, after he transitioned away from favouring the Vox amps and cabinets through which he had played during his time in The Yardbirds. In the summer of 1968 The Jeff Beck Group, the line-up of which consisted of Rod Stewart, Ronnie Wood and Mickey Waller, embarked on their first tour of America, debuting in the Fillmore East in New York on 14 June, to rapturous reviews and ending in California in August. During this tour Jeff Beck began using a rig which combined Marshall amplifier heads paired with stacked speaker cabinets. Snaps taken by the young photographer Carl Dunn at Luann's in Dallas on 17 July show a pair of stacked speaker cabinets (one flipped on top of the other) behind Beck playing his stripped Gibson Les Paul. Dunn photographed Beck again in Dallas later in the year with a more expansive backdrop of multiple amps on pairs of stacked Marshalls, this time playing his new 1959 Les Paul Sunburst, purchased from Rick Nielsen, which would be stolen just eight months later at a gig in New York state.
After a brief move away from Marshall heads during the Beck, Bogert & Appice period, when he favoured Sunn amp heads mounted on stacked Univox speaker cabinets (see lot 6), the Marshalls were firmly reinstated as part of his recording and performance rig by the mid-1970s. Speaking to Lowell Cauffiel for
Guitar Player magazine in 1975, when asked if he had made any equipment changes on the album
Blow By Blow and the subsequent tour, Beck explained:
I'm still using the same wattage output - 200 watts with two Fender speaker cabinets and two Marshall tops. I have the amp miked, though. I used to use Sunn amps. The Marshall tops give you the right sort of gritty sound. The Sunn is a bit too clean. The Fender speakers are a bit more reliable than the Marshall speakers, but the Marshall top is better, I think. This was an opinion which still held firm five years later when interviewed by Jas Obrecht in October 1980, possibly referencing this particular Marshall head:
I'm not really worried about [equipment]
. It's amazing - I've still got basically the same Marshall amp that I had with Rod Stewart. It's the same chassis, same valves. One or two things may have blown up, but it's basically the same thing. In fact, some of the valves the tubes have rusted into their sockets, and you can't take them out!
This Super Tremolo JTM45 MKII amplifier head is an extremely rare survival and was amongst one of the first amps produced by Jim Marshall to be specifically designed for lower US power voltage in around 1967-68, following a request said to have originally come from Jimi Hendrix. Reportedly, Jeff also requested this specific feature from Jim Marshall – most likely in preparation for his first tour to America with the Jeff Beck Group.
Shon Hartman, production manager and close friend of Jeff Beck told us that when this amp was sent to Marshall for repairs, they were so astounded by its existence that they requested to borrow it for an extended period. Believed to be one of only a small number made, they were keen to have more time to examine it closely and include it in their museum display as a temporary exhibit. Steve Prior, Beck’s guitar tech between 1999 and 2014, reported that this was Jeff’s favourite amp of all time, and rarely left the home studio. Thus, following restoration at Bletchley, it was swiftly returned to his Sussex estate.
MARSHALL AMPLIFICATION
The axiom that necessity is the mother of invention can certainly be applied to James Charles Marshall (1923-2012). Born and raised in Acton, West London, Jim Marshall was unable to enlist in the army having suffered from tuberculosis, and so during the Second World War he was employed as an electrical engineer working on Spitfire fighter wings. At the same time, Marshall had a side gig as a singer and drummer, and, utilising his skills as an electrician, built himself a portable amplification system for his vocal performances. The post-war period found him pursuing a career as a drummer and improving his skills by studying with jazz drummer Max Abrams, before himself becoming a teacher giving drum lessons to younger musicians, later proclaiming himself to be “the first one to teach rock & roll drumming in England”. His pupils included some who would later become marquee names in the British music scene of the 1960s, such as Mitch Mitchell, Mickey Waller, Rod Stewart and Pete Townshend, the son of a former music colleague, the saxophonist Cliff Townshend. These connections would later serve him well in his next career endeavour.
By 1960 James Marshall had opened a music shop on the Uxbridge Road in West London catering to the needs of local musicians - initially a drum shop called Jim Marshall and Son, and later Marshall Amplification, alongside his son and saxophone player Terry in July 1960 in Hanwell. On the advice of his students, he ventured into stocking guitars and amplifiers and, in 1961, set out to build “the first real rock and roll amplifier” - in what would be a winning business decision (Jim Marshall in an interview with Creative Worx Motion Media, 2003).
In the late 1950s and early 1960s the market leaders in professional quality guitar amplifiers in London were those made by Leo Fender in Fullerton, California. However, the transport costs and import duty on these American marques added considerable cost to the purchase price for a working guitarist in London. Having encouraged Marshall to sell guitars and amps, musicians like Ron Wood and Pete Townshend persuaded Marshall to build amps locally.
Jim Marshall, along with employees Ken Bran and Dudley Craven, produced a successful 35-watt prototype by 1962 based largely on the footprint of a Fender Bassman. However, beyond the footprint Marshall and his team took a different approach. Rather than putting speaker and electronics with controls together as a combined unit, they chose to separate these two components into a power ‘head’ and an isolated speaker cabinet. The first speaker cabinets would employ four 12-inch speakers with a closed back. In late 1962 the Mark II amplifier was launched and would in a short time be called the JTM45.
Before long, rock guitarists would be stacking these speakers to obtain more volume. This in turn would lead to the need for more power to drive their stacks of multiple speakers. By 1965 Marshall released the iconic 100-watt amplifier known as Marshall Super Lead model 1959. The 100-watt Super Lead paired with multiple stacked speaker cabinets would become iconic and an obligatory stage addition to any rock concert.
Throughout the development of Marshall Amplification Jim Marshall, Ken Bran, and Dudley Craven were always listening to the needs of their guitar customers. They designed their amplifiers to supply both power in volume and the ability to deliver tonal distortion which the guitarist could bend and mould to their desire whilst performing. These attributes became known as the ‘Marshall Sound’ and would crown Jim Marshall with the moniker ‘The Lord of Loud’.
Image: Jeff Beck plugging into a similar Marshall JTM45 amp, 1969 © Carl Dunn.
AN AMPLIFIER HEAD, SUPER TREMOLO, JTM 45, MK IV
The later logo Marshall applied to the front panel, MK / IV and JTM / 45 applied to the front control panel, labelled MA 14 to the top, a JIM MARSHALL PRODUCTS LTD. plate applied to the back panel, the rear chassis panel marked MK / IV and Super Tremolo / Amplifier, inscribed JB and stamped with serial number 7467
9 in. (22.8 cm.) high; 25 ¾ in. (65.4 cm.) wide; 8 3⁄8 in. (21.2 cm.) deepWhilst closely associated with Marshall for most of his almost six-decade long career, Jeff Beck only began using Jim Marshall's amp heads on the company's angled speaker cabinets as part of his stage rig from the late 1960s, after he transitioned away from favouring the Vox amps and cabinets through which he had played during his time in The Yardbirds. In the summer of 1968 The Jeff Beck Group, the line-up of which consisted of Rod Stewart, Ronnie Wood and Mickey Waller, embarked on their first tour of America, debuting in the Fillmore East in New York on 14 June, to rapturous reviews and ending in California in August. During this tour Jeff Beck began using a rig which combined Marshall amplifier heads paired with stacked speaker cabinets. Snaps taken by the young photographer Carl Dunn at Luann's in Dallas on 17 July show a pair of stacked speaker cabinets (one flipped on top of the other) behind Beck playing his stripped Gibson Les Paul. Dunn photographed Beck again in Dallas later in the year with a more expansive backdrop of multiple amps on pairs of stacked Marshalls, this time playing his new 1959 Les Paul Sunburst, purchased from Rick Nielsen, which would be stolen just eight months later at a gig in New York state.
After a brief move away from Marshall heads during the Beck, Bogert & Appice period, when he favoured Sunn amp heads mounted on stacked Univox speaker cabinets (see lot 6), the Marshalls were firmly reinstated as part of his recording and performance rig by the mid-1970s. Speaking to Lowell Cauffiel for
Guitar Player magazine in 1975, when asked if he had made any equipment changes on the album
Blow By Blow and the subsequent tour, Beck explained:
I'm still using the same wattage output - 200 watts with two Fender speaker cabinets and two Marshall tops. I have the amp miked, though. I used to use Sunn amps. The Marshall tops give you the right sort of gritty sound. The Sunn is a bit too clean. The Fender speakers are a bit more reliable than the Marshall speakers, but the Marshall top is better, I think. This was an opinion which still held firm five years later when interviewed by Jas Obrecht in October 1980, possibly referencing this particular Marshall head:
I'm not really worried about [equipment]
. It's amazing - I've still got basically the same Marshall amp that I had with Rod Stewart. It's the same chassis, same valves. One or two things may have blown up, but it's basically the same thing. In fact, some of the valves the tubes have rusted into their sockets, and you can't take them out!
This Super Tremolo JTM45 MKII amplifier head is an extremely rare survival and was amongst one of the first amps produced by Jim Marshall to be specifically designed for lower US power voltage in around 1967-68, following a request said to have originally come from Jimi Hendrix. Reportedly, Jeff also requested this specific feature from Jim Marshall – most likely in preparation for his first tour to America with the Jeff Beck Group.
Shon Hartman, production manager and close friend of Jeff Beck told us that when this amp was sent to Marshall for repairs, they were so astounded by its existence that they requested to borrow it for an extended period. Believed to be one of only a small number made, they were keen to have more time to examine it closely and include it in their museum display as a temporary exhibit. Steve Prior, Beck’s guitar tech between 1999 and 2014, reported that this was Jeff’s favourite amp of all time, and rarely left the home studio. Thus, following restoration at Bletchley, it was swiftly returned to his Sussex estate.
MARSHALL AMPLIFICATION
The axiom that necessity is the mother of invention can certainly be applied to James Charles Marshall (1923-2012). Born and raised in Acton, West London, Jim Marshall was unable to enlist in the army having suffered from tuberculosis, and so during the Second World War he was employed as an electrical engineer working on Spitfire fighter wings. At the same time, Marshall had a side gig as a singer and drummer, and, utilising his skills as an electrician, built himself a portable amplification system for his vocal performances. The post-war period found him pursuing a career as a drummer and improving his skills by studying with jazz drummer Max Abrams, before himself becoming a teacher giving drum lessons to younger musicians, later proclaiming himself to be “the first one to teach rock & roll drumming in England”. His pupils included some who would later become marquee names in the British music scene of the 1960s, such as Mitch Mitchell, Mickey Waller, Rod Stewart and Pete Townshend, the son of a former music colleague, the saxophonist Cliff Townshend. These connections would later serve him well in his next career endeavour.
By 1960 James Marshall had opened a music shop on the Uxbridge Road in West London catering to the needs of local musicians - initially a drum shop called Jim Marshall and Son, and later Marshall Amplification, alongside his son and saxophone player Terry in July 1960 in Hanwell. On the advice of his students, he ventured into stocking guitars and amplifiers and, in 1961, set out to build “the first real rock and roll amplifier” - in what would be a winning business decision (Jim Marshall in an interview with Creative Worx Motion Media, 2003).
In the late 1950s and early 1960s the market leaders in professional quality guitar amplifiers in London were those made by Leo Fender in Fullerton, California. However, the transport costs and import duty on these American marques added considerable cost to the purchase price for a working guitarist in London. Having encouraged Marshall to sell guitars and amps, musicians like Ron Wood and Pete Townshend persuaded Marshall to build amps locally.
Jim Marshall, along with employees Ken Bran and Dudley Craven, produced a successful 35-watt prototype by 1962 based largely on the footprint of a Fender Bassman. However, beyond the footprint Marshall and his team took a different approach. Rather than putting speaker and electronics with controls together as a combined unit, they chose to separate these two components into a power ‘head’ and an isolated speaker cabinet. The first speaker cabinets would employ four 12-inch speakers with a closed back. In late 1962 the Mark II amplifier was launched and would in a short time be called the JTM45.
Before long, rock guitarists would be stacking these speakers to obtain more volume. This in turn would lead to the need for more power to drive their stacks of multiple speakers. By 1965 Marshall released the iconic 100-watt amplifier known as Marshall Super Lead model 1959. The 100-watt Super Lead paired with multiple stacked speaker cabinets would become iconic and an obligatory stage addition to any rock concert.
Throughout the development of Marshall Amplification Jim Marshall, Ken Bran, and Dudley Craven were always listening to the needs of their guitar customers. They designed their amplifiers to supply both power in volume and the ability to deliver tonal distortion which the guitarist could bend and mould to their desire whilst performing. These attributes became known as the ‘Marshall Sound’ and would crown Jim Marshall with the moniker ‘The Lord of Loud’.
Image: Jeff Beck plugging into a similar Marshall JTM45 amp, 1969 © Carl Dunn.