The idea for the design of the “Rush Pepbox” came to me when I was
working in my factory in Soho, London, building Bass and Public
Address equipment for some of the biggest groups in the middle 60’s. In
about 1965 a guitarist from one of the big groups came in and said he
had heard an American Record with a distorted sounding guitar and it
sounded great.
I thought about it and a couple of days later came up with the design for
what was to become the “Rush Pepbox”. I built a prototype using
germanium transistors and tried it through one of the amps we were
building and it sounded distorted, just what I had been working so hard
to design out of our amplifiers. I sold quite a few. The Beatles, The
Shadows and various other big groups of the time had them and they
were used on a number of recordings. There is a picture of John Lennon
with one at Abbey Road Studios
A few years ago I discovered that people were talking about the ‘Rush
Pepbox’, and some firms were making inaccurate versions of them using
silicon transistors. It seemed they were getting popular and I got a
message from blogger Simon Murphy who published the interview.
I have attempted to make these reproductions as accurate as possible to
the originals. I’ve even managed to track down “new old stock”
transistors of the same type as originally used (these transistors are no
longer made). These transistors have obviously aged and as a result
every Pepbox has a unique tonal response, an unexpected side effect.
Rather than trying to modify them I decided to remain true to the original
design. However this means your new Pepbox is like no other!
I hope you enjoy your new Pepbox.
Regards,
Pepe.
“Rush Pepbox is a registered trademark of Pepe Rush
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