One Of The RAREST & Most SOUGHT AFTER Amps | Watkins Joker

Transcription:

Why is it called the copycat? Because it copies itself and it's made out of cats yeah.

Hi folks Nathaniel here at Chicago Music Exchange I'm joined by Dan Lump, one of our Vintage buying team how's it going mate. Doing all right, how are you? I'm doing very well. I must say shoes. Thank you looking sharp Facebook advertising you said Yeah the one time I got it right they targeted you specifically that's never happen you like these yeah.

Right so we are here today to talk about the Watkins Joker amps now me being so naive or whatever or ignorant I'd never heard of these it's a very rare amp um Watkins I think doesn't get the recognition they deserve for the people who know them they really love them but it's not like a household name the same way that Fender and Marshall is even though they were there right in the beginning. They were one of the first amp manufacturers, the first production amp came out in 57, their most famous amp the Dominator uh came out in 1960 and that was built for a couple decades a few different iterations that's the one with the V front. We had one a while ago. I think we had one yeah yeah yeah yeah very cool amp. It's a 2x10, the speaker kind of Point outward. Then in ' 62 they came out with these and they consider it their greatest design and it really is wild.

There's so many features packed into it. You have tremolo There's an actual tape Echo built into the amp. Crazy Design there's a mic stand just all all every every feature and bob and whistle so you can put in an amp there that's pretty cool isn't it yeah I'm not sure exactly how it works but I like it is it going to drop oh there we go.

So these are both extremely rare uh as you were saying now this one actually used to belong to Richard Fortus pretty cool and this one actually used to belong to Josh Klinghoffer and the case as well uh so it seems like you know top players really like these amps yeah exactly it speaks a lot to the Quality these things that the two we have both belong to verified Mega Stars.

Yeah, have you ever seen one of these in per before I have not so yeah the fact that we have two at the same time is pretty crazy yeah. Now I mean is there many of these kind of surviving in the worlds these days or they not really one of the the downfalls of them even back in the' 60s um was there's so much going on uh these have 11 tubes in them cuz it's tube driven tremolo it's a tube tape tube preamp tube Power Amp so there's just tubes all over the place there's so many things I can break tape echo goes you know it's a moving part so there's things to break in there yeah there is a lot going on there look at the tape that is cool to see the tape that about say yeah so this back here is the famous Watkins copycat they were one of the first people to make uh a portable tape Echo machine um in the mid-50s and for this amp they decided to build it into the amp um which is pretty crazy I don't know of any other amp I was going to say they were they will they were the first believe so and yeah um other fun fact this to my knowledge is the first amp to have a master volume. Oh really uhhuh lot of people think it was uh Dave Reeves in the later 60s but this is' 62 oh wow well I didn't know.

So yeah I mean there's an awful lot going on tremolo, Echo I can't see with the light more Echo yeah I mean it's got all the echo you could ever need Echo control Reverb well what does that say Halo repeats uh yep there there's an awful lot going on touch the tape though right no that's not me trying to be funny like I mean how delicate would you have to be with that um it's not so much it's going to break but if you get oil on the tape it's going to affect the the quality the repeats and it's going to dirty up the heads but I was going to say what about dust in the air like will dust not gather on that yeah to a degree um these typically came with spare uh tape tape Loops that were built into this cover here yeah um I don't think we have any with this but you can still find them oh you can yeah they just is a tape Loop which is more convenient than a cartridge like you would find on like um an Echoplex or something now I mean when we plug this in I don't know you're probably not going to be able to see for the angle but that's like a little kind of light that comes on I don't know if you've seen it yet yeah which is kind of cool yeah very cool that's like an indicator for the uh the delay for the delay which which is cool to see.

Now obviously we got the Watkins here what are the WEM Speakers cuz next for so for a lot of people they're probably more familiar with this name um I've seen them made famous by so many artists uh David Gilmore being a big one he used the cabs so WEM and Watkins are the same company they rebranded in 1964 okay but just Watkins Electric Music oh yeah but uh we got these in recently it's the uh the famous kind of uh starfinder Grill cloth yeah um they were also a huge name in the PA world and these are a couple of PA columns that we got in recently and these are ours right these are for sale I believe correct yeah yeah these they just look too cool to yeah we got have them it's nice.

So here seeing me in the videos we're actually going to try a new little segment called the more you knowledge. Very original idea from you I believe it was your complete original idea sure I'll take credit for it uh so here we go.

In 1949 Watkins and his brother reg opened Watkins electric music a record shop in Tooting Market London two years later the brothers relocated to the shop in Balham and began selling accordions and guitars in 1967 he approached Marquee club owner and Windsor Jazz and Blues Festival organizer Harold Pendleton with an offer to design and build a 1000 watt system far more powerful than any PA system at that time uh now this would make it possible for the famous Festival to expand its audience size significantly Pendleton accepted and Watkins delivered the 1,000 watt system in time for the event however the PA system was so loud that local residents complain to the authorities who leveled charges against Watkins and attempted to regulate the volume of the festival Watkins was later defended in court by the right honorable Quinton hog where the case was dismissed... the more you knowledge

So two very rare amps uh owned by reputable players Josh Klinghofer uh Richard Fortus very cool so we may never see one of these again right it's unlikely it's unlikely so that makes it kind of extra special extra cool I'm looking forward to playing them I'm looking forward to hearing you playing them any closing comments on our Watkins before we say goodbye to them see you next time perfect.