MOST FAMOUS AMP in Rock History! 300 Watts, McIntosh, Grateful Dead & The Wall of Sound 

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My step dad was the blueprint designer and builder of this McIntosh. He has worked with the biggest most famous bands in history including the Grateful dead before Jerry passed away..he is currently retired now. He retired from Sea Gate electronics..that Amp is a monster for sure. However, he has built more powerful amps than that and used them at home. Couldn't stay in the house when he turned it up. He shattered 3 windows in our house one day all at the same time..nice to see that in your shop..

I got a chance to hear this wall of sound at a Dead concert in Cincinnati in the spring of 74 at a hockey arena. This arena that was notorious for really bad sound. Concrete floors and lots of reflective surfaces etc. The wall of sound was, for every seat in the arena, like going so someone's home listening to their super stereo with some Klipsch horns or some other premium speakers. They used sights on the horn tweeters to make sure every area of the arena was in direct line. Best amplified sound I have ever heard in any large venue.

Think about the roadies that had to setup and breakdown the wall of sound every show. Those guys earned their pay that’s for sure

I like hearing John Curl talk about his time with the band and the wall of sound.

Not a word about Bear?¿?¿...the wall of sound was his grand vision and greatest achievement other than his mastery in chemistry!

A friend who worked at a highend high-fi store in the late 80's bought a recycled Greatful Dead McIintosh MC2300 amp. The story I heard was that a tower of amps tipped over either prior or after a show damaging all of the amps in that stack, these amps were then retired from "performing" with the Dead. I also understand that McIntosh modified the amps for Dead shows, just how I don't know but there was a label on the amp stating the modification. The sad end to this story was he was getting it repaired in the early 2000s, got a divorce, didn't have a phone for a few months and when he went to pick it up the shop had closed, the amp was gone, and the tech didn't leave a forwarding address. It's out there, good luck finding it.

an amazing fact about wall of sound microphones was that on order to cut feedback in microphones in front of the speakers there were 2 microphones wired out of phase to each other so when there was no signal the two microphones cancelled each other out providing a signal only when the active microphone was being used. this was engineered by augustus stanley owsley a man of many talents including probably the most lsd produced by one man......

The major reason the 2300 was selected was not only the ruggedness and sound, but the transformer matching output. This allowed many speakers to be run in parallel, but the main reason is you could not destroy the output by shorting. Crown and Phase Linear, although powerful, had many issues, primarily unsteady and blown transistors. I was the drum tech for Blood, Sweat and Tears in 1974-6 and we cringed everytime a sound company would use them (crown+Phase L) in their PA. Also, the 2300 was not used in Woodstock, since it wasn't available. Only the MC-3500 and MC240/275 tube units were there.

2300 is like no other, I use one in my Jerry rig! That’s awesome you mentioned Anthony he has done so much for our community!

There is no room like headroom,,,we never heard the monitors we built with 12" JBL and a piezo in each til we hooked up an MC 2105. Suddenly there was clarity from all six. Just wow, eh? I also had an MX 110 FM receiver and an MC 240 at home, used it for nearly thirty years. McIntosh used to sponsor clinics where you would take you amps and a MC tech would test and rate the performance of each individual unit to ensure quality sound. They affixed a little sticker with a date, showing you passed. I met Gordon Gow at one clinic. What a gentleman.

I was at the Grateful Dead concert at Roosevelt Stadium in august of 1974 where they played with the Wall of Sound. INCREDIBLE SOUND!! It sounded like a huge Wurlitzer jukebox. Dead played for five hours!!Best concert of my life!! .

Typing from San Francisco - And surrrounded by a ton of Grateful Dead cover bands who play locally. Several still employ the 2300 as Power Amps - not for their PA but for their guitar rig - which was what Garcia did - using the front end of a modified Fender Twin with Outboard Hard-Trucker Cabinets. Jeff Matson of Darkstar Orchestra is a prime emulator of this assemblage.

I was into sound from the time I knew what music was. I built my 35 watt per channel kit hi fi amp early on and also my speakers circa 1959 ish. Wonderful sounding system, especially for the time. I was about 14. Was aware of what the best amps and speakers were at the time but couldn't afford them. But we rock on to 1970. I started playing with a band named Kudzu out of Georgia. I think that was my 3rd serious band. We played mostly in the Southeastern US and we played a lot of southern blues among other things. I had worked in a couple of studios in Atlanta that used 1208 Altecs in the control room and I knew they were monsters. Around '72 we bought one of the first Mc 2300 and a Mc 2100 and biamped 8 1208's with them, 2300 on the bass speakers and 2100 on the horns. We didn't blow the horns because we split the signal to hi's and low's and no bass content was sent to the horns and vice versa. I can't even begin to tell you how good they sounded. The bass was phenomenal. Tight and solid. We could play to a few thousand people when called on to do so. I no longer have but two of the 1208's because when the band broke up we split up the speakers, but I do have both the 2300 and the 2100. Haven't fired them up in years but I bet they still work. To say they sound good is a gross understatement lol! I can't even imagine 40 or 50 of them. Fond memories. At 77 I no longer play live, but I now do music videos on my youtube music channel. When the music is in you, you never want to quit! Oh, and by the way, those Mc watts? They were RMS watts. That was the no BS way to rate wattage. Still is.

This was a big bad amplifier in the 70's and it would give a lot of the new amplifiers today's quality a real run for their money and this one is 50 years old! I love the 70's audio experience to this day! It's the real deal ! Great job Just Audio team

I know with new technology these amplifiers can be as small as the palm of your hand and as efficient as an LED light bulb or more but there is still something that's just magical about having this old school gear.

The calculations for that center, radial horn array, in the Grateful Dead's Wall of Sound were performed by Bear himself, when he was working with John Meyer across the street from me, here in Berkeley, CA. Another factoid: the original conceptive idea for 'the Wall' was born of Bear's synesthetic experience of 'seeing sound', while very high on his own acid, at the 'infamous; Muir Beach Acid test! So, now you know!

The reason it was difficult to move around is due to the removal of the side rails that allow you to stack and tilt on it's back The Dead amps start with 1Y in the serial number

I've heard that there were actually 2 Wall of Sound systems. It would take an entire day to setup, a day for the concert, and a day to tear down. So the two systems would leapfrog each other to be at every other venue. The Grateful Dead with the Wall of Sound did for live music what The Beatles did for recorded music.

Great video; thank you for taking the time to make it!

Awesome episode! I _love_ the Dead.. Hope you do more videos like this. 😎 It was great to see the inside of it especially. What a beast! ✌️

Great video! I've got an MC 2600 for home use.... It's a monster!

Awesome job showing and description!

A friend of mine used one of these with 2 JBL Voice of the Theater cabinets for his home stereo. It was the most kick ass home stereo I've ever heard!

The comments are extremely informing and educating. Thanks.

I was around during the big conversion from massive tube amps to solid state for Rock & Roll. The 2300 was the absolute boat anchor! Beautiful amp! The other Amps of the day were the Phase Liner 400's and 700's (Sometimes known as the "Flame Liner" for their reputation for blow-ups), and of course, the Crown DC300 (a) Which became the standard of the industry for many years. All these seem so small compared to the equipment that is on the road today, but back then, it was massive stuff!

That’s a wild ass story! Definitely before my time, but that wall of sound, as a whole team is crazy dedication

Great video!

I’m from Ireland and on visiting Philly back in the 70’s I saw one of these at a friends house and was awed by it. Thanks for the great video presentation. It was so interesting and enjoyable to watch. Keep up the good work.

Hey man, I really enjoyed this video. I love the fact that you do due diligence in investigating the history of these units you bring in. Thanks!!!

We used them to drive multiple subwoofers back in the 70’s , helped with the low impedance taps, the Sansui BA5000 big daddy :)

Awesome history lesson and fascinating amp!

Man I remember the company Crown made these crate amps that can power any concert speakers you threw at it. There were absolutely huge and heavy amps.

Thanks for this great video. I love vintage audio and have some Marantz, Teac and Nakamichi and also love the passion you take about those famous devices. Great devices, great stories and interesting comments. A big thumbs up from Germany !!!

Great video! When i was playing live our rig had 8 H+H mosfet V-800,s . 4 a side. Rock solid British amps and never let us down. This was for playing 500 to 1000 seat rooms.

Personally I think the most interesting part was when the amp was taken apart and we got a chance to see the insides. I was wondering what kind of capacitance was in the power supply to support the 600 watts.

Another amazing vid as always, keep it up brotha

I had the pleasure of hearing a system centered around the McIntosh MC2300 powering a pair of JBL 4343 speakers. It was insane how good that system sounded.

Thanks for the history lesson which was very interesting. All the Maclntosh components that I remember in my favorite Hi-Fi store back in the 70s was always the top of the line and also very unaffordable for me..lol Problem back then was there wasn't many speakers that could handle all that power

I own one of these and it is a beast. If I want to drive my magnapans and make my ears bleed, I hook up to 2300. Somehow a few years ago something inside of it caught on fire and there was smoke coming out the top. Sent it back to McIntosh and they made it like new again. I have to admit that it is very hard to lift into position. Great video. If you own hard to drive speakers, this is your answer.

We had that very same amp in a 19" rack in the control room of KROK in Shreveport Louisiana. It was a Monster! Truly a Beast! It was connected to a pair of Marantz high-end control room speakers. The only problem was the newsroom next door. The Chief station engineer had the console monitor output cranked way way down. I was lucky. He and I were pals and I did a lot of weekend shifts. He showed me the tiny pot to adjust the board output. This setup would make Bonnie Tyler's Total Eclipse of the heart shake the building. Not to mention Jacksons' Thriller. FF over 20 years. I'm now Chief engineer. The caps had been dying over the last year of service. The output pots were noisy as hell. I replaced it with a cheapass Broadcast works 2 channel 50 watt amp. This thing weighed about the same as a small block chevy engine. It made its way to my workbench. There it sat for over a year. The original parts were hard to find so I had to makeshift caps and pots. It now sits in my storage room. I may drag it out, dust it off and reemploy sometime soon. Thanks for the memories. Cheers from Louisiana.

Awesome! Thanks for this!

Absolutely love the dead! Thanks for the knowledge drop! Best believe im truckin to the first show with that full scale wall of sound

That's a beautiful beast.

this video was amazingggggggggggggggggg!!!!!!! thanks for this!!!!!!!!!! upvoted!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Great work

I’m 66 years old and still have my MC2300. It’s the same power output at any impedance. The McIntosh Output Autoformer, a giant transformer on the output. This allows any speaker impedance to be hooked to the amp. This delivers the same power no matter what’s hooked to it…. You just need to know the correct taps on the buss strip to hook the speaker to.

Awesome......thanks for the all the info on this amp...i have been wanting to know more about this amp and its relationship with the Grateful Dead.

Thank you for this bit of Dead history.

Excellent video.

I see them all the time back here in service, McIntosh is a cool thing for sure. Love seeing peoples views on the Amps.

When I tested those amplifiers at McIntosh Labs at 2 Chambers Street in 1973, they each had two A/C cords rated 120V@14A.

Love it.... loved the info the presentation the history and all. Big thanks

Awesome video guys!! Loved the bonus footage, nice to see inside that monster.

Sounds great!

Dang! What a beast. So glad you took the covers off -- did not expect a bottom view. Very naughty, very sweet.

These are the best videos from you guys amazing video and history

Fantastic history of Rock !

Very cool vid! Saw/heard the Wall of Sound at my first Dead show at the Providence Civic Center in RI in 74. They played Boston the next night so the road crew must have had several WTF moments. Woodstock was amped by the McIntosh 3500’s by Hanley Sound (Boston based I think). The site museum has original amps (and speakers) on display as well as the recently departed Michael Lang’s iconic BSA motorcycle and other great stuff. Worth a visit. Keep em coming my friends, enjoyed it!

Thank You Bear.

Wow!! Very Kool Job Man!!! I want one Bad!!! Lolo

Thank You Tapers 🙏 ♥️ ⚡ 💙 ☠️ 🌹

Wow, massive caps😲👍👍👍

They had 2 walls of sound. One for the show that night and one on the road to the next venue being set up because it took up so much time to transfer and setup and tear down

Summer Jam. I was there. To much fun was had. I probably saw about 10 shows with The Wall of Sound.

Great job on this video. I'm a Deadhead but never heard the wall of sound. My boss had this amp for his home stereo in the mid 70's. With JBL speakers. Same idea...

Lol I've heard Korn live 15 years ago and my heads still ringing😎

Owlsley " Bear" Stanley was the Dead's sound guru who designed and built that system. As I understand it, the height of the bass speakers equaled the height of a full standing bass wave. If you know the iconic Grateful Dead dancing bears, The Bear was Owlsley. Also, he was the manufacturer of high quality LED that was pervasive in San Francisco and beyond, as told in Steely Dan's Kid Charlemagne. His LSD rig was also sold at auction last year.

Wow, I'm just speechless!

I use a McIntosh c32 going into the 2300 for my vintage home stereo set-up. It sounds great with a bass sound I've never heard from anything else.

Great show

Great Video, I actually have a McIntosh 2300 and a gear box from the Dead in my Collection. I'm a huge Dead fan , I have a little over 45 shows stubs that I was at and missing quite a few. Your RU-vid vids are legit, keep them coming.

Heard and Saw the Wall of Sound in Oakland. Even though it was incredibly loud, it was so clear that the volume was not unreasonably uncomfortable. There was one fan who climbed up on the stage and was sitting *inside* a woofer during the concert.

A great amp and the Dead used a ton of those along with them at the Woodstock concert so can't diss any of that but as a very frequent concert attendee in those days I mostly saw those early Crown amps. The ones with the DC300 on the front of a little panel that hid the fuses. Also some oddly modified Phase Linears that had big multiconductor cables to a box mounted below housing their power transformers.

My local record shop has this exact amplifier, the shop first opened in the early 70's

A new Subscriber Bro! Thanku for the Share "Back in Time" That is an Awesome Power House! And I'd simply luv to get my hands on one! Too Cool!!!👍 Rock On Bruh!!! ✌

I need one!

Never forget listening to Starship Trooper on my dad's MaCintosh spelling? receiver and Klipsch speakers in the early 80s on reel to reel. Mind blowing experience.

The Ampeg SVT Bass Amp is/was 300 watts and I played my guitar through. You could feel the sound waves run through your body as well as things in the room would rattle and fall off the shelves !!! It was AWESOME !!!

Good job !

Great Amp nice history lesson 👏 👌 👍

Ive got an mc2500 (500 WPC) And an mc2600 (600 WPC) LOVE LOVE THEM!!!!

Excellent

One of the more amazing aspects of the wall of sound was the fact that the PA was behind the band and it served as their monitors as well - they plugged into the PA and did not have traditional amps that were mic'd or had a direct output. Same w/vocals but they had no feedback. This was the first application of noise canceling technology I have heard of. If you look at photos you see the vocal mics had 2 mics lined up vertically, one they sang into and one was wired to be reversed polarity to cancel feedback. As we all know put a PA speaker behind a mic and feedback loops ensue. Really advanced design but I heard it got really loud as the show went on since the musicians controlled the output to the audience.

WOW>>>>>

You had me at the Greateful Dead! While I was not born until 77, My early teenage years were lived deadhead style!!!

Now i want one !!!

yehhh, my dat had one of these, I wanted to be like my dad, so I bought one in my late teens. they were popular with sound systems when i was a kid in jamaica. and thats how i fell in love with hifi and especially mc intosh. i was a mc intosh freak at 8 years old. then when i first met my dad in ny, he had a full Mcintosh set: mc 2300 pa and mcintosh preamp. cant recall which model. wow, youve motivated me to get back into hifi.

😲Wow! what a Beast!💥💪🏼😁👽✌🏼

This just illustrates how amazing McIntosh amplifiers are!!!!!!! To be able to be used for the Grateful Dead concerts requires serious power, current, and heat dissipation to last during the shows. McIntosh amps, probably the most robust, well-designed, and well-built on the planet, are legendary for a reason!

My dad still has his 2500. Its blown several sets of really good speakers over the years that i can remember. Thing is an absolute monster.

the reason for the quarter ohm stability is to allow for multiple speakers to be driven simultaneously as seen on stage where you can see the amps. Each of those cabinets are likely 8 ohm, and when you wire 4 of those to one channel, the final load will be 2 ohms and the math just continues as you add drivers

Hey guys, Great channel. Brings back memories. In Germany with the USAF back in 77.Sansui, and Kenwood were the preferred monster receivers for us back then. Of course Macintosh was bad to the bone. Got out of the service and had to sell off my good Teac reel to reel, Kenwood 9600 and JBL speakers to keep the lights on and baby milk and such on the table. FF to the mid -80's. Was able to go big. Yamaha MX 1000U Hyperbolic Amp with matching pre-amp and equalizer. Just curios as to your thoughts on these items. The MX 1000U was rated at 1000W per channel at 8 ohms if I remember correctly. Thanks again for a great channel!

Amazing 😲👍👍

I think they even used them for pa system on ships. I have three of them in use . Love them.

My dream system McIntosh I settled on Marantz. My cousin had a complete McIntosh system with all the bells and whistles. It and 1500 pristine vinyl pressings went up in smoke.

I heard the original McIntosh 2275 tube power amp a long time ago. One of the best sounds I heard from a Jubal JBL speaker set. The amp was $3,600, I believe, but at least I coud dream.

That's a real rocker I seen those back in the day in the stores set them up with four 901s you got a party

An amp with a rock and roll history is the Bryston 4B. Just about every studio had one!

I just made a 3D version of the Wall of Sound in Blender and used it to make a music video of "Stella Blue." I heard the real Wall of Sound at the Philadelphia Civic Center on August 5th, 1974. There was nothing like it. The sound was crystal clear with zero distortion. Thanks for this video. I always thought the McIntosh 2300 was a tube amp. Now I know it was solid state.