Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

[Jeff_H]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

No, Bruce was contracted as part of the design team. Word around is Avi owns the Friedman branding now, and Boutique Amp dist is the company that is contracted to build them. Dave is still involved but not solely.

I wonder how that came to be. None of our business I know, but I like it when the little guys develop great products and then reap the rewards when things go well.

 

[Ayrton]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

No, Bruce was contracted as part of the design team. Word around is Avi owns the Friedman branding now, and Boutique Amp dist is the company that is contracted to build them. Dave is still involved but not solely.

I don't know the breakdown of Friedman Amplification, but Rob Navarrette (Tone Merchants) and Dave own the Friedman name (trademark.)

Bruce was (is) a mentor to Dave, and they go way back. Bruce has always been involved with the amps in one way or the other.

Boutique Amp is a builder and distributor of many brands. That is what they do.

 

[B2D]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

Bruce, Dave, and Rob Navarette I know of... Met the latter two gentlemen personally a few times. I've never met or heard of Avi Elkiss. What's he like? Looks like he runs the Boutique Amp Dist. company?

 

[Chuck_Norris]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

But does it Djent?

 

[Joey Voltage]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

I wonder how that came to be. None of our business I know, but I like it when the little guys develop great products and then reap the rewards when things go well.

Sure, everybody likes the Rocky storyline, but It’s not really unlike any other business that’s trying to grow out of being a basement operation. It starts becoming a huge undertaking both financially and time wise. I know people like the idea of one man tediously and carefully building each amp to order, and calling all the shots, but even very small companies seldom operate that way.

 

[Red_Label]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

Sure, everybody likes the Rocky storyline, but It’s not really unlike any other business that’s trying to grow out of being a basement operation. It starts becoming a huge undertaking both financially and time wise. I know people like the idea of one man tediously and carefully building each amp to order, and calling all the shots, but even very small companies seldom operate that way.

I was just watching the 2016 NAMM video with Dave and Greg Koch and Dave pretty much says that very thing. Dave says that running a factory takes a lot of work and it's pretty clear that he'd rather just work on designs, mods, and work with artists. I don't blame him.

 

[Red_Label]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

whats the diff tween a Wildwood Pink Taco vs the regular Friedman one??

The regular Taco sounds comparatively small. The Wildwood Taco has two switches that give it much more bottom end, like the Mini Dirty Shirley. My first Friedman was a regular Taco, several years ago. It had a great tone (pretty much that ONE tone). But it was all mids and highs. ZERO bottom end or headroom. Sold it to my buddy (who has the BE50) the next day. I dunno why Friedman doesn`t put more thump in the regular Taco, like the Mini Shirley has. Anyways... I've had three more Friedman's since then and all were great. I also demoed a Mini Shirley for a week or two and it's awesome. The Wildwood Taco has the thump of the Mini Shirley, with the tight, smooth tone of the BE. It's exactly what I've been wanting to backup my BE100 and use for home practice.

P.S. Though I love the tone of the Dirty Shirleys... they're too old school loose and soft for my tastes. I like the tight, smooth BE sound. It's my sound. It's the tone I've been looking for and hearing in my head since 1984. I've had a lot of awesome amps, but nothing that speaks to me even close to what the BE does. There was always something missing before the BE came into my life.

Yesterday I was playing a bunch of tunes from Savatage "Hall of the Mountain King" and "Gutter Ballet", Saxon "Innocence Is No Excuse", and other iconic 80s metal tones. Had an ear-to-ear grin for the whole 2.5 hours. That amp is just so F'ing inspirational to play. I seriously love it. The Wildwood Taco is supposed to be a 20-watt version of the BE100. Fingers crossed-

 

[B2D]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

I was just watching the 2016 NAMM video with Dave and Greg Koch and Dave pretty much says that very thing. Dave says that running a factory takes a lot of work and it's pretty clear that he'd rather just work on designs, mods, and work with artists. I don't blame him.

That's kinda typical with companies like that. The person that's the founder/name/artist has someone running the management/logistics while they work on the gear. It seems they prefer to remain the heart and soul of the company rather than the business detail. I get it, it makes sense.

 

[RACKSYSTEMS]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

a couple of things that people tend to overlook is that Friedman as a company isn’t owned by Dave, apparently dave is just an employee these days. He also doesn’t have free reign over design changes. Word around the camp fire is that Bruce Egnator was brought onboard, and is the one behind a lot of the design revisions, and indeed from what I have seen regarding the new design, this looks suspiciously true. The new design follows the typical egnator input stage design, and as a whole, the preamp resembles the one that was in the Randall rm100si “the nuts” module.

Sorry this fake news. company is owned by myself David Friedman, Rob Navarette and John Shanks... Boutique amps are our manufacturing and sales partners.. Bruce has nothing to do with Friedman designs at all. He is involved with Synergy and Egnater though. As for the RANDALL I worked with Scott Ian on that and 2 others for his signature amp. Thanks

 

[Red_Label]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

Sorry this fake news. company is owned by myself David Friedman, Rob Navarette and John Shanks... Boutique amps are our manufacturing and sales partners.. Bruce has nothing to do with Friedman designs at all. He is involved with Synergy and Egnater though. As for the RANDALL I worked with Scott Ian on that and 2 others for his signature amp. Thanks

Nice, quick, informative response Dave. Awesome.

Keep on cranking out the holy grail amps. I'll be adding a Wildwood Taco to my BE100 any day now, and hope to add a Phil X shortly. I love the tight punch of my BE, so I'm thinking that the thump of the Phil X is up my alley. Can I get my 2015 BE modded to have the glassy cleans of the BE50 Deluxe?

 

[RACKSYSTEMS]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

Yes it could be sure.

 

[Red_Label]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

Yes it could be sure.

Thanks Dave. I'll be contacting you about it after you're done with the busy NAMM season. I love my 100's clean channel, but the 50's glassy cleans really get my attention. Just stunning.

 

[B2D]

Re: Played a friend's new Friedman BE50 yesterday... WHOAH!!!!

Sorry this fake news. company is owned by myself David Friedman, Rob Navarette and John Shanks... Boutique amps are our manufacturing and sales partners.. Bruce has nothing to do with Friedman designs at all. He is involved with Synergy and Egnater though. As for the RANDALL I worked with Scott Ian on that and 2 others for his signature amp. Thanks

Theres the man himself!!

Thanks for speaking up, Dave. That's good information to hear. Glad to hear it. Welcome to the forum!