Music videos that feature Thunderbirds

[4stringer77]

Chuck Garric votes for tb+ pickups and a three point bridge on his bird.

[66Atlas]

a little Roll Over Beethoven with an Ebony 60s bird

[Stjofön Big]

I think that T-bird player is Billy Kinsley who was one of The Merseybeats, John Gustafson replaced him in the band as he left. He late returned to The Merseys who had a hit with Sorrow. Great song, by the way.

[Granny Gremlin]

What the hell amps/cabs they using?  The orange dustcaps make me think early Japanese stuff (specifically Foster which became Fostex)

[Alanko]

You get a squint at the logo at the start of the video. Looks like the Randall logo to me, but I don't think that fits the timeframe.

[Kingface66]

Not sure if this one's been posted yet, but thought since Todd is an old friend of mine, and has always been a (mostly!) Thunderbird player, and sporting a lovely one here, thought I'd offer it up.

[66Atlas]

Randall existed in the early 70's but I don't think that looks like anything they made.  At first glance It looked like somebody turned a Sound City upside down but it's clearly not that either.



Maybe some obscure Japanese or Italian make?  Given the video quality it might be a long shot to read...

[Alanko]

There are some higher definition videos of Chuck Berry's Beat Club session. The problem is most have either those psychedelic overlay effects or the prominent blue background used to adding the psychedelic effects (like the Deep Purple video of 'No No No').

The chunky chrome logo does suggest 'Italian' to me, but I'm at a total loss. With Beat Club the house amps were Orange, so these mystery amps came into the studio with the band.

[Granny Gremlin]

I googled around for speakers with Orange dust caps.  Obviously esoteric Italian stuff wouldn't show up.  As I said before I could see this being early Japanese stuff.  What google found was some vintage Tannoys (not going to be that) and a sghort run of JBLD series units where the alu dustcap was coated/anodised:



"Yeah those are original JBL dustcaps that have been treated with a special translucient orange coating, Some kind of treatment to limit the tarnish that collects on aluminum dustcaps.
I can't remember the name for it but those drivers were one offs for the early solid state Fender Zodiak series amplifiers.
I had a pair of 10's in my Taurus combo, they are very bright & articulate, too much for my tastes."

Can't find images of weither of those amps with such speakers (only standard plain Alu) but that don;t mean the dude's wrong.  Doubt those 4x12s Chuck n co are using are Fender tho.

[Alanko]

In one of the videos (don't ask which, they all sound the same!) Chuck is bouncing around near that double-head stack and you can hear a spring reverb unit shocking away. I wonder if the amps are solid state? There is a bit of an un-nuanced grit to them on the recording, though this may be the recording techniques used? If solid state then I reckon the heads wouldn't be that big? Who knows!

I found those Tannoy speakers online as well. I didn't find a 412 cab anywhere that fitted the bill. The annoying thing is that those amps have a familiarity to them! The logo looks a bit like the block logo Schaller used on some products. They definitely look to be of the early '70s, and they don't look British. They look a tad crude, with the small knobs and the odd ganging together of the inputs an channel controls. The white face plates suggested Laney to me, but it clearly isn't that. Sound City? Burman? I did some hunting, and there are just too many also-ran and unloved European amplifiers from that era.

From what I can gather, Chuck basically demanded a backline from each venue. Beat Club might simply have rented something from somebody in Bremen, where the thing was filmed? On the same tour (presumably?) he was filmed by the BBC and he is using a dark Fender amp of some sort, and there are Marshall heads sitting on the floor behind him.

Watching the Beat Club stuff, with out takes and all, he seems a somewhat dictatorial and menacing character. He is a f***ing task master! For a guy that basically rented bandmates like he rented his amps, and made do with whatever turned up, he cracks the whip. His whole stage presence has an air of menace about it, like he is always just on the cusp of getting seriously pissed off while working the stage and pulling off all his wee moves. Odd guy, but definitely a pioneer!

[Granny Gremlin]

Early solid state heads were made to be just about as big as standard tube heads (first because they still had large iron, and then later, so as to not look stupid on top of a 4x12).  An example being the Randall RG100ES I just sold.  Most of the cab is empty space or oversize heat sinks with large blade fins.

[Alanko]

The amplifiers are made by 'Blackfield', and were built in West Germany. They were the Beat Club house amps for a while, as I spied them in a New Riders of the Purple Sage session done for the show. The amps are on clear display here:

[Granny Gremlin]

Good sleuthing! Now off to google. Thanks.

... speakers OEMed by RCF (Italy); quality units apparently.  Lower resonance than vintage greeenbacks so should be good for bass too (as per the Chuck Berry vid).  Interesting.

[Alanko]

I think we found the same reference page.  I was looking up New Riders of the Purple Sage as I wanted to see if I could find studio footage of them with Jerry Garcia, as I'm sure I had seen some before. Garcia was playing pedal steel through a leslie speaker. Instead I found their Beat Club session, with a different but totally kick-ass pedal steel player, and noticed those amps! In one shot I read 'Black' and in another shot I read 'field', so  I did some Googling! Then I found the page with the Pacific Gas and Electric footage, where the name is clear to see. I could have trawled Beat Club videos for ever otherwise. I did find some Kinks footage, but while they were using the cab with the orange dust caps, Dave Davis was using an HH IC100 head.

[66Atlas]

Nice detective work gentlemen. Never heard of Blackfield but FBT is an Italian amp company from the period and the general look reminds me of them. I wonder if the FBT models were some sort of joint design for the two companies.  It would be cool to come across one but Im willing to bet they're not that common over here.   

I have lots of experience with RCF speakers though and love them. My 80s rig loaded with RCF 18's & 10's was ear splitting in a good way