AS FOUNDER OF ELECTRO- Harmonix, Mike Matthews certainly deserves his 2012 Guitar Player Hall of Fame Award for Manufacturing Legend. But the man is also a force of nature. He’s someone I’d bet would laugh during a zombie apocalypse with unlit cigar in hand and a master plan for continued existence in tow—well, as long as the fish were still biting. His company has survived union thugs, bankruptcy, strong-arm tactics in its Russian tube factory, and five decades of competing in the roller-coaster-in-flames wild ride of the guitar industry.
Matthews is also one of the last icons of the spontaneous, innovative, and well educated hippie entrepreneurial clan that challenged and changed the music industry—even if that spirit caused a few problems here and there.
“Back in the ’70s, I stupidly smoked too much pot, drank too much liquor, and I jumped on every good idea I had,” explains Matthews. “Eventually, I had too many problems at once, so Electro-Harmonix collapsed in the early ’80s. That was painful. But I got the business back, and when I did, I was more conservative. I waited patiently until it was really the best time to produce a product. Because of that, we’re now financially strong, and we can move on anything that’s hot. Patience is important.”
As EHX moves into its 50th year, it will continue to develop a balanced mix of inventive and traditional products. Matthews wouldn’t offer any tantalizing peaks at groovy new pedals— sigh—but he did reveal that the company plans to branch out into amps, such as a revamped Sovtek MIG-50 head (now under the Electro-Harmonix label) and a reissue of the Dirt Road Special solid-state combo.
My very first guitar effect was an LPB-1.
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