Kristopher Roe, frontman with pop-punk band The Ataris, told us about his Orange love.
Kristopher Roe: Hi! My piece of gear that I can’t live without is my 1979 Orange OR80m.
I am a huge vintage gear nerd. I still record all of our albums on analog tape on a Neve console using old guitars, tube amps and ribbon microphones.
I just love the realness, warmth, and human quality of records that were made mic’ing actual amplifiers, before autotune and every note being meticulously quantized, taking the heart and soul out of the songs.
That’s just not for me.
This amp and my Fender Telecaster are a big part of my sound. In the studio my other main amp sound is a 1964 Fender Bassman, but that amp has no master volume so in a live setting it would just need to be turned up way too loud in order to get it to break up.
I came across my Orange amp at a used music store when we had a show in Virginia in 2007. I played the amp for five minutes and immediately knew it was mine. I bought it without even thinking twice and never looked back.
It’s been my main live sound ever since. I use a lot of old delays, echoes and reverb pedals on my two pedal boards but my main sound is my guitar with the amp gain. I don’t use any distortion pedals or anything that changes the sound of the amp.
I use one pick up booster that will allow me to run the amp, a little hotter and Boost chorus and lead parts of songs without changing the sound of the amp gain. But beyond that what you hear is the sound of the amp distortion.
My Telecaster has not been modded in any way. I use the stock pickups that came with the guitar when I bought it in the early 2000’s. It’s a 1952 Fender Telecaster “NoCaster” U.S. reissue.
The Ataris' "Car Song" single is out now, with an album on the way.
