MESA/BOOGIE, Recent History

MESA/BOOGIE, Recent History


Well this review will approaching you guys about one of my fave amps that i used it, I'm pretty stuck up with this amps...Rectifying my sound what a nice collaboration with my active ESP/LTD/Washburn guitar plus Ibanez TS808, NS2 and another Reverb that will give a strong sound, hard noise from bass gain and boosting tha tube...


MESA / BOOGIE, Introduced in 1970, the Boogies proved to be absolute giant killers (in more ways than one) and began to re-define forever what a guitar amp could be and do. A small company working closely with leading players and fiercely dedicated to innovation and quality made a successful end-run around the sleeping giants of the industry


Mr. Randall Smith, the creator of Mesa/Boogie, began his career at Prune Music, a Chinese grocery store turned music shop. Working as a repair tech while his business partner and friend, David Kessner, ran the front, Smith quickly gained a reputation with the local San Francisco Bay Area musicians. This reputation brought him business from bands including the Grateful Dead, Big Brother and the Holding Company, and Carlos Santana.


In 1969, Smith, as a joke, modified Barry Melton's Fender Princeton amplifier. He removed the standard 10 inch speaker and modified the chassis to fit the larger transformers that were needed by the 4-10 tweed Fender Bassman, the circuit that he had added into the tiny 12 watt Princeton. Finally, Mounting a 12 inch JBL D-120, a popular speaker of the time, Smith had created what would be the first Boogie.


Randall Smith, needing to test his creation, took the "hot-rodded" Princeton into the front store, where Carlos Santana was present. Santana "wailed through that little amp until people were blocking the sidewalk". Impressed, Santana exclaimed to Smith, "Man, that little thing really boogies!" It was this statement that brought the Boogie name to fruition.


The MESA name came about through Smith's other job, rebuilding Mercedes engines and repairing houses. He needed an 'official' sounding name through which to buy Mercedes parts and building supplies, and chose MESA Engineering. It was originally spelled with all capital letters but has been written as Mesa in recent years.


In 1971, Bassist Patrick Burke approached Randall with a proposal for a custom Bass amp. Smith was persuaded and constructed the Snakeskin Mesa 450 - Smith's first bass amplifier and the first official Mesa/Boogie product.


The real breakthrough came when Smith began building a preamp project for Lee Michaels to drive his new Crown DC-300 power amplifiers. Not knowing what signal was required to drive the power amps, Smith added an extra tube gain stage to the preamp, with 3 variable gain controls at different points in the circuit. In adding this extra gain stage, Smith had created the first high gain amplifier. He set about designing a guitar amplifier around the new principle, and in 1972 the Mark I was released.


He produced a number of custom variations on the Mark I through the late 1970s, with options including reverb, EQ, various speakers (most often Altec or ElectroVoice), koa wood jointed cabinets, and wicker grill. The Mark II was released in 1978.


In the 1980s, Mesa continued to produce combo and head amplifiers, and began production of rack power and pre-amps, developing power amplifiers such as the M180/190 and Strategy series, as well as pre-amps such as the Quad and Studio. Other models developed in the 1980s included the Mark III, the Son of Boogie, and the Studio. In the '90s, Mesa launched the smaller Dual Caliber series and the more powerful Rectifier series. Production of new models has continued into the 2000s, with models such as the Road King II, the Lone Star and Lone Star Special, and the Stiletto and Express lines.


Well, above all else, any MESA/Boogie you purchase will be an investment of lasting value. Ask yourself how much you've spent on lesser amplifiers? How much did you lose in performance, and musical satisfaction? How much did you lose when selling or trading in? With MESA/Boogie you get more than just our fanatical devotion to performance and quality, You get Us, our resources and our 25 years of expertise. No one else stands behind their products like we do, guaranteeing lasting satisfaction and seeing that each customer is treated as we ourselves would like to be. We understand you because we are musicians ourselves. And we are committed to making your MESA/Boogie one of the most rewarding purchases of your life.