Marshall Amplification plc - Bigger and Louder Amps
Bigger and Louder Amps
In 1965, Pete Townsend came to Marshall with a new request. The Who were driving the volume of rock to previously unheard levels. Townsend asked Marshall for a 100-watt amplifier capable of producing sounds louder than anything Marshall and his team had ever considered building. With it, Townsend asked for a cabinet with eight 12-inch speakers. Marshall said such a cabinet would be too heavy to move and offered to construct two four-speaker cabinets instead. Townsend insisted on the larger model. That was what roadies were for, he told Marshall. The Who's roadies, however, were anything but pleased with the monstrously heavy piece of equipment. Just weeks after he took delivery, Marshall recalled, Townsend returned the cabinet, asking if it could be cut in half. "'I told him look, Pete, I can't do that because the bloody things will fall apart.' So I ended up doing what I wanted to do in the first place, which was the straight fronted cab with the angled one sitting on top." It was the birth of the stack, two 4 × 12 speaker cabinets, one on top of the other. It may be Marshall's most famous contribution to rock.
If Townsend and Clapton were the driving forces behind Marshall's innovations in amplifier technology, it was another icon—Jim Marshall's namesake—who put the Marshall name on the map in the United States and the rest of the world. Around 1966, Mitch Mitchell, another of Marshall's drum students, brought a young guitarist named James Marshall Hendrix—Jimi Hendrix—to the shop. Although he was still unknown at the time, Hendrix told Marshall that one day he would be the greatest name in the music world. Marshall thought it was a con. "I thought 'Cor, another Yank who wants something for nothing,'" Marshall told The Australian. In fact, Hendrix wanted to pay full list price for all his Marshall amps. What he insisted on was service whenever he needed it, wherever he was. Marshall responded by giving Hendrix's road crew a course in amp maintenance and repair at the Marshall factory. Throughout Hendrix's too-brief career, his roadies were able to deal with any problem with his amps. Hendrix was so committed to Marshall that he bought full rigs for North America, Europe, and Asia, so he would not have to transport a sound system overseas when he toured. Hendrix's use of Marshall equipment would soon make the brand legendary around the world.
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