[Harp-L] Butter's rig.....Butter thread.....



Around 1965-66 Fender began to sponsor bands, including those of Butterfield, The Electric Flag and at some point not long after Cotton.  The bands were provided with amps, PA and mics, all from Shure.  I have dozens of pictures of the band (including their Fender shot) and a lot of video, and in almost every thing I have from the era of PBBB through to Better Days Paul is playing either silver or black face Twins, Supers or Deluxes.  Madcat's comment on a Princeton was revealing, but it also exposed one of Butter's early tricks--running amps in line to get a huge sound that could play with his guitarists, horn players, etc.  The first time I saw him play, in 1968 with the first big band and Elvin still on guitar (sitting RIGHT in front of him at the Miami Pop Festival) he was playing through two Supers.  Massive sound. Monster band--Elvin and Paul were both firing at a high level that night.

Prior to that time I have photo proof of him playing through a tweed Bandmaster.  At Newport it looks like he's using a Magnatone that I can't ID.  

The last shots of Butter playing, from the live video he did with Ronnie Barron just weeks before death, he's playing what appears to be a Randall--the combo tube/solid state version that Mussel used for a time.

Mics were a 54PE, three pin, from the mid-sixties.  This was not part of the Fender deal, but probaby a result of him switching in late 64/early 65 when Walter was using one and just about everyone in Chicago went the same way.  I've held his 54PE (his second wife has it and his kit) and in his kit when he died were a collection of MBands and two Meisterklasse's, both of which looked completely unused.  There's also no doubt that he had played MBands about exclusively;  recently a huge cache' of MBands that Hohner had shipped to him years before he died surfaced as further proof.

The comments about his "sideman" abilities are interesting, especially when compared with his playing as a leader.  As most players know, it's a LOT easier to show up and play that to have to front the band, control the egos, write some of the songs or pick the material, and balance out all the great players in a band like any version of the PBBB.  But I agree the playing on Mike Peloquin's list is really good.  "Rain Down Tears" on the RCO stuff is a monster, and the live version is super heavy if you can find it!



This archive was generated by a fusion of Pipermail 0.09 (Mailman edition) and MHonArc 2.6.8.