Mesa Boogie

Princeton Boogie

Mesa/Boogie began with a practical joke when Smith was commissioned to secretly convert the 20-watt Fender Princeton of local guitarist Barry Melton of Country Joe & the Fish into a significantly louder 100-watt amp without altering its appearance. He accomplished this by replacing the amplifier section with that of a Fender Bassman and replacing the 10-inch speaker with a 12-inch speaker. To ensure the joke would work, Smith asked Carlos Santana, a customer at Prune Music, to demo the amp. Despite initial skepticism at the sight of the seemingly stock amplifier, Santana played it and exclaimed, "Man, that amp really boogies!" Customers at Prune Music were impressed with what Smith dubbed the "Princeton Boogie" and Smith would ultimately build and sell over 200 of them before the local supply of used Princetons ran out.

At the time, Smith supplemented his amplifier income by building concrete foundations for houses and restoring Mercedes-Benz automobile engines. Smith wanted to purchase amp and engine parts at wholesale prices from European dealers, so he founded Mesa Engineering as an umbrella company with a more serious-sounding name than Boogie. Smith had intended to use the name "Marin Engineering," but it was taken and "Mesa" was chosen off the top of his head.

The 1970s and the first Marks

In the early 1970s, Smith pioneered what became known as "cascading" gain stages: he was building a custom preamp for Lee Michaels and decided to add an extra tube gain stage along with three variable gain controls at different points in the circuit. The amount of distortion this produced surprised both men, and Smith subsequently combined this innovation with what he had learned modding Fender Princeton combos to create the industry's first high-gain amplifier, dubbed simply the "Boogie." Released in 1972, these Boogies proved a great success during Fender's "CBS-era", during which time Fender's tube amps suffered a perceived decline in quality while multiple lines of new transistor-based amps were poorly received. Carlos Santana, George Harrison, Robben Ford, Eric Clapton, and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young all used early Boogies. The Rolling Stones ordered seven Boogies for their March 1977 El Mocambo 1977 club shows, and continued to use them and subsequent iterations as their main amps up until 1994.

As demand for his amps grew, Smith decided to move his workshop out of the Prune Music storefront to get away from the distractions of the store having become a busy local hangout. He relocated to what was formerly a plywood dog kennel, then, eventually, to his home.

Smith produced a number of custom variations of the Boogie through the late 1970s, with options including reverb, a five-band graphic EQ, various speakers (most often Altec or Electro-Voice), koa wood jointed cabinets, and wicker grills. Upon the 1978 release of the Boogie's successor—the "Mark II"—the Boogie was renamed the Mark I. Smith ultimately produced over 3,000 amps out of his home workshop in the 1970s.

The 1980s and the Mark IIC+

As Mesa/Boogie continued to grow, Smith moved the company to Petaluma in 1980 and continued to improve his amp designs to meet players' requests. Revisions to the Mark II resulted in amplifier milestones such as channel switching (Mark IIA) and the first effects loop (Mark IIB). The IIC was introduced in 1983 to fix a noticeable "pop" when switching channels, while subsequent improvements to the effects loop resulted in a handwritten "+" designation on the rear of each amplifier's chassis. Notably, this new IIC+ variant also featured an altered preamp to create a more aggressive sound, with a strong midrange focus and tight low end. Combined with its graphic EQ, the amp excelled at "soaring lead sounds and huge crunch chords." Early adopters included heavy metal guitarists like Metallica's Kirk Hammett and James Hetfield. The amp was also a favorite of top session musicians at the time like Steve Lukather. As the Mark III was already deep in development, fewer than 3,000 IIC+ amps were made during its short production run between January 1984 and March 1985. With the Mark III, Mesa/Boogie added a second rhythm mode—or "crunch" sound—while the Mark IV expanded the amp's format to three fully independent channels with more controls and options than any other amp of the time.

Throughout the decade, Mesa/Boogie continued to expanded its product lineup, with power amplifiers like the M180/190 and Strategy series and preamps such as the Quad and Studio. Other amp models developed in the 1980s include the Son of Boogie and the Studio.22.

The 1990s and the Rectifiers

As the 1980s came to a close, the complicated features and boutique styling of the Mark series began losing popularity in favor of simpler designs by Marshall, Bogner, and Soldano. Particularly inspired by the Soldano SLO-100—itself derived from the Mark series circuits—Mesa introduced the Dual Rectifier in 1991. With a "raw, aggressive bass-heavy sound" and sporting a characteristic steel, diamond faceplate, the Rectifier was Mesa's take on a "big, monster-metal head" and intended to look threatening compared to the Mark amps.