What happened at the Brighton Guitar Show and Effects Expo Part 1: Fidelity Guitars and Hamstead Soundworks
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| Matt Oram from Fidelity Guitars. |
The very first Brighton Guitar Show and Expo took place at Brighton Racecourse on the 15th July 2023 and what a show it was.
It was an interesting show in that it separated guitar and amp manufacturers from effects manufacturers and as a result brought about two areas of activity that had a different feel that worked well in terms of being able to find exactly what guitarists was looking for. It genuinely made the focus on products more enjoyable. In a separate area workshops were taking place being led by the wonderful chaps from Guitar Nerds Podcast.
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| The Fidelity Guitars Double Standard Lite II |
In this article I would like to share the highlights for me from my experience of attending The Brighton Guitar Show and Effects Expo.
Fidelity Guitars and Hamstead Soundworks.
It’s always nice to meet up with Matt Oram (owner) of Fidelity Guitars and try out his guitars. He was sharing the booth with Peter Hamstead and Brian Love of Hamstead Soundworks and together their products truly complemented each other with Hamstead’s amps and cabs, effect pedals and Fidelity’s finely crafted guitars.
For me, I got a chance to play one of the Stellarosa Deluxes in Sonic Blue (which is a favourite guitar and colour of mine) but I also got to play with the Double Standard Lite II which I found to be very comfortable and tonally very engaging especially through the Hamstead amps that were on the stand. I used to think that Fidelity’s guitar necks were too chunky for my liking but I think I was being narrow minded, they are great and with the compound radius that Matt applies they seem to be getting more and more comfortable. Indeed is bore out as the Stellarosa that I tried at the show was three years older than the Double Standard and clearly Matt has made great strides in developing his neck profiles. Matt acknowledges that over time he has refined the shape of his necks always improving as he goes along. This is truly evident as the Double Standard was excellent to play.
A quick word about the Hamstead amplifiers and effects.
The collaboration between Fidelity and Hamstead is a smart move. Geographically they are based in the same area (not far from where I am based) and they work a lot together. As I tried the Fidelity guitars, the tones cames through the Hamstead amps and effects. Matt was adjusting some of the effects as I played and at one point I was playing in stereo across two amps with the effects sweeping from amp to amp. Literally I was in the middle of a huge sonic bubble that absolutely inspired me to play more experimentally. It pushed me to do something different to my usual three chord Blues repetoire. In terms of the tones, the amps had such a clarity and they were remarkable in that they didn’t have the usual hum that comes from overdriven channels. Whilst these amps are boutique amps and with boutique costs to boot, they are clearly amps that professionals should be using not just live but definitely in the studio.
Chatting to founder, Peter Hamstead, an electronics engineer with extensive experience and interestingly doesn’t play guitar, it was evident that Peter is fixing challenges with amplification with his innovative take on how amps should sound. On that point, some of the pioneers in amplification over the years weren’t guitar players at all e.g Leo Fender and Jim Marshall, could Peter Hamstead be continuing on a trail of doing something different that perhaps some guitar players won’t because it is too much to move away from the norm?
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| The Stellarosa Deluxe from Fidelity Guitars |
I am looking forward to taking a closer look at Hamstead Soundworks as they have invited me to visit their factory and have a play. Watch this space…
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