Jim Marshall helped make rock ‘n’ roll loud. The British electrical engineer, musician and owner of Marshall Amplification produced one of the most iconic pieces of equipment in popular music. Marshall died today in England after battling cancer and suffering multiple strokes in recent years. He was 88.
In the 1960s, when guitar players like Pete Townsend and Jimi Hendrix sought to make a louder and more distorted noise than the jazz and country players whose place in pop culture they would soon usurp, they turned to the amplifiers bearing Marshall’s name. Marshall began making the amplifiers from a small shop in West London in the early part of the decade.
Marshall amps became a key part of the rock ‘n’ roll sound. Hendrix grinded his guitar into one before setting it on fire at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967. Lemmy Kilmister, the bassist and singer for the heavy metal band Motorhead, plays in front of a giant wall of them and name-drops the amps in the song “Dr. Rock.” Pete Townsend, known for destroying his instruments, made them a trademark part of his assault.
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