Randall Smith fired from Mesa?

[Vince]

Idk various extreme settings on Mesa amps yield excellent results like... a lot of the time.....thinking nothing should be too far away from noon on the knobs is the epitome of dialing in with your eyes rather than your ears imo

Truth. Turning the treble off on a Recto yields a completely different and awesome sound, while cranking the treble and fully cutting the mids and bass (knobs, not GEQ) makes a Mark crushing.

 

[prlgmnr]

Don’t you tell me what to do, old man. I paid for the full knob and Imma get my money’s worth.

View attachment 148592

why so much 750?

 

[spawnofthesith]

Truth. Turning the treble off on a Recto yields a completely different and awesome sound, while cranking the treble and fully cutting the mids and bass (knobs, not GEQ) makes a Mark crushing.

On the mark V, channel 2 mk 1 mode, everything dimed except for bass all the way off (volume to taste) is a pretty sweet and unique lead sound. GEQ in the classic V works for the leads like this, but chugs/rhythm dont. Drop the 80 to flat and 240 all the way out and you're in chug city though

 

[Sermo Lupi]

Nope nothing, just a post from a drama-driven youtuber (since deleted) and a bunch of rumor from people that wouldn't actually know anything beyond "Randall Smith is no longer here".

There's another video going around by a YT channel I've never encountered before (Barry Johns Studio Talk). In the comments under the video, Johns claims that Randall Smith still had a year left on his contract with Gibson when he was 'fired'. I came here to look for further discussion...seems like details are sparse, though.

 

[ramses]

Back when he sold Mesa to Gibson, I understood that move as the first step into retirement. I'm actually surprised that he did not leave after just 18 months.

In any case, as "Lupi" above states, "details are sparse."

 

[technomancer]

Saw this on another forum, and it seems like a pretty likely story. I'd tend to believe this over the random youtubers trying to generate views.

I live in the area where Mesa Boogie has been since 1980. I have owned many Mesa amps and been friends with some folks that work there for many years. I've always been a very big fan of the company and purchased their stuff exclusively for a long time because I knew I could get things repaired quickly and easily. That being said, I decided to find out some detail about Randy's exit. Here's what I know from the mouth of a LONG time employee who knows Randy in a work capacity pretty darn well.

This may not be what people want to believe, but Randy wanted to retire. He's 78 and was ready to stop. He's actually been gone now for a month btw. Prior to that his presence at the factory was fairly intermittent. HR had a company meeting to explain he decided to retire (let your speculation go crazy for 20 more pages if you like to believe or not believe this) and there will be a private retirement party in the near future with a lot of long time employees.

Mesa's Future:

Again from my friend that works there currently and has for many years, production as a whole is pretty slow so there are less folks working in the factory daily as a result (this is more about inflation really if you ask me, which you didn't). There are only a few long time employees responsible for design of new products, but Mesa has contracted folks to come in and help design amps over the years long before Gibson purchased the company. The latest bass amp they have was actually designed by a contractor. You can check the bass forums at another site where this contractor routinely posts to confirm this. Certainly, Mesa had final say on things, but the nuts and bolts and design was done by a contractor.

The "Badlander" is a recent example of current employee designers who had the larger hand in designing instead of Randy. That doesn't mean Randy didn't have anything to do with it, but there is an actual team of people doing the work not just Randy.

Moving forward, these existing designers at Mesa (from the original Mesa crew over the years) are the only folks at the moment involved in design so far as my friend knows. However, people are getting old and approaching retirement and when shifts like this happen at a place of work (i.e. new ownership) it doesn't take much for someone to decide they would like to exit. There have been a few long timer folks that have left as a result of the company being sold, but that was back when it was made public the sale was happening.

Incidentally, most of the amps and things that have been very successful like Lone Star series, don't get produced anymore because the parts are just not available any longer. In the Lone Star case it's my understanding the transformers for that line aren't able to be produced. However, many parts go out of production over the years from factory's that produce them and the normal sort of flow of amp production life was around 5-15 years (that fluctuates based on success or lack there of for a particular amp).

Anyways, this is what I know from someone in the building and knows Randy personally, so take this for what it's worth.

At the end of the day, Randy was an icon in the amp business for many products, so I wish him well and hope he enjoys his retirement. He certainly deserves it for all the beautiful sounds that I've made and listened to over the years from Mesa Boogie.

 

[HeHasTheJazzHands]

Well that's boring. I can't make a 45 minute YouTube rant around that

 

[technomancer]

It's sort of funny as all the fauxrage going around ignores he sold the company because he wanted to retire and insure continuity of the business when he decided to hang it up. He had also been shopping it for a while before the Gibson deal.

It's also been 3 years since the sale, which is a long stay for a founder. That stuff is usually 18 months.

 

[Screamingdaisy]

Saw this on another forum, and it seems like a pretty likely story. I'd tend to believe this over the random youtubers trying to generate views.

A lot of that jives with what I know of them as a company.

Randy's time at the factory was limited before he sold it and he didn't run the day-to-day operations. Basically only "worked" when an idea popped into his head. I'm not sure how deep into the design he went... so far as I know, he would take it so far and then hand it off. You can tell the transition as Randy hand drew his traces, so if a PCB looks like it was designed in CAD then it was put in there by someone else (Tim Waugh, I think).

The Electra Dyne was another employee design, based on prior Randy designs. Not sure who actually designed the Triple Crown, but it's clearly based off the Electra Dyne. The Subway and Rosetta amps/cabs are/were Andy Fields, and based on the questions he periodically asks they're working on new designs. Mario Marino has been doing all the buffer and midi stuff. I'm not sure who's been doing the pedals.

I believe the sale to Gibson gave Mesa access to Gibson's sales and distribution network. No one really talks about it, but Mesa was hurt by tariffs on Chinese parts as it drove up their prices, so they had to find ways to reduce their operating costs (no more 5 year transferable warranty). I believe one of the reasons they sold to Gibson was because Gibson could provide them with certain efficiencies (like not running their own sales or distribution network).

Take what I say with a grain of salt. I've talked to a bunch of Mesa people over the years and tend to remember things, but I don't work there.

 

[Jon Pearson]

These posts highlight part of product design in general - amps with all these modern features many of us enjoy pretty much requires input from multiple designers of different specialties. As a matter of fact, I think Mesa could likely benefit from a few MORE folks involved. Somebody to optimize their layouts would be good, with the help of some quality CAD tools. Someone to work out better switching schemes.