[James] Some, but I mainly use the Chieftain.
The Bad Cat was sort of an experiment and
came out of hanging out with the Bad Cat guys
one afternoon. They were really happy with it,
and it’s one of their favorite amps.
[Jeffrey] One of the things I wanted to mention
about the Sweet 16, that has happened more
than once, is that I’ve had more than one front
of house guy come to me and ask, “What are
you playing? I didn’t have to EQ anything on
your rig. It sounded great, just like it was.”
I think that’s one of the things that’s unique
about that amp. It’s meeting all of the criteria
right out of the gate. James, I think that’s true
of your Chieftain too.
[James] It’s just one of those amps that feels
like home, every time. Again, it’s so important to
have that consistency. When you’ve played the
same amp for twenty years you know exactly
what it’s going to do. That’s not to say that you
don’t experiment with other amps, but you
have something that you know exactly what it’s
going to give you, and then you can manipulate
to be very much in the Line 6 camp, and I love and 12AX7’s. It couldn’t be more opposite of
what they’re doing. But there came to be some a DC30, which is by far the more popular amp
situations where I just couldn’t recreate in the from Matchless. But I prefer the Chieftain, and
digital world what I’m doing live. So, I did some I’ve used this one for probably twenty years. I
research and sent our tour manager eleven play it on just about everything I do, and I take it
or twelve different choices for amps. And he everywhere I can. It’s loud
had enough experience to say, “Okay, if you and clean, and you don’t
use this, it will be similar and it will be readily have to crank it. I don’t
available.” And that’s been the Mesa Boogie play super loud anyway,
Lonestar - it’s killer! but a DC30 or an AC30
it however you want. That’s really important
to me.
[WM] James, I’ve got to ask about Andy
Elliott and that Elliott guitar. Andy is a brilliant
craftsman and makes amazing guitars. Tell us
break up early, which a lot
[WM] The Lonestar! You can make the clean of people love. But I like
channel dirty, the dirty channel, clean… it’s got that it’s a big, fat, clean
both the vintage and Boogie reverbs, and it can sound that you can get as
run Class A or Class AB. What is there not to sparkly as you want, and
love about that amp! James, your go-to amp is it’s really consistent. It’s a
a Matchless Chieftain, correct? very even sounding amp
across all of the frequency
[James] Yeah man! I love that amp!
ranges. It’s really easy to
play through, and it’s my
[Jeffrey] How would you say it compares to
favorite.
an AC30? I’ve seen you use those as well.
[WM] Are you still using
[James] Chieftains are 40 watts, with EL34’s
36
the Bad Cat?
May 2018
WorshipMusician.com