Hamstead Soundworks

A pair of unsuspecting Cambridgeshire-based industrial units play host to a rising force in British hand-built guitar amplification – Guitarist pops into Hamstead HQ for a cuppa…

- David Mead

Like many great ideas, the beginnings of Hamstead guitar amplification, just four years ago, can be put down to pure chance. Peter Hamstead had made his first amplifier as a project back in the 1960s when he was an apprentice, but went on to have a career in avionics, specialising in electronic design and development for the aircraft industry. After striking out on his own, a new neighbour by the name of Jim Bird moved into the unit next door to him, noticed some electronic test gear in his workshop and asked Peter if he could repair a guitar amplifier. “I said, ‘We can make them if you want.’ That’s really the beginning of it,” says Peter, as we settle down for a chat in his workshop. “Then, as a part-time thing, just a few hours a week between us, we developed our first amplifier. We got to the stage where I stopped doing everything else and started just manufacturing guitar amps.”

With Peter’s career in a different side of the electronics industry, we wondered if the transition to the world of rock ’n’ roll was an easy one. “Because I’d been doing design and development work, not just avionics, it gave me a good grounding, really, for guitar amplifiers. Jim just said what he wanted and I worked out how to do it. Then we just did some voicing. He would come in for an hour or so every week and we would change things. During the first few years doing it part-time, I learned a lot about guitar amps… and guitarists.”

DRAWING ON EXPERIENCE