Big Joe Stomp Box Co.

Back in the early 80’s, brothers; Paul and David Christian developed and released a simple yet game-changing musical product; the Pocket Rockit. The Pocket Rockit emulated the wonderfully juicy, warm, pure analog tones of a classic tube guitar amplifier and provided them in an inexpensive, simple-to-use headphone practice system. At about the same time, the brothers met Peter Amft who was working for Guitar for the Practicing Musician magazine. In the late sixties/early seventies Peter worked as a freelance photographer and over the years came in contact with virtually every relevant player of that era: Jimi Hendrix, The Rolling Stones, Muddy Waters, Chuck Berry, BB King, Mike Bloomfield and countless others. He provided photos for all of the early Alligator records album covers as well and in his later years was a close personal friend of Big Joe Williams. Paul, David and Peter have been friends ever since. About a year ago, while reminiscing about how long they had known Peter, the Christian Brothers realized that their thirty year portfolio of analog circuit designs mirrored the photo history that Mr. Amft had documented.

It was decided to merge the two bodies of work into a line of stomp boxes that captured the tonal history of blues/rock guitar: From the early electric days of Freddie King and Muddy Waters to the era of The Rolling Stones and Aerosmith through today’s D-tuned over the top overdriven sound, they set forth to faithfully recreate and honor the legacy of these great artists’ tone.

A lot of hard work and a little magic…

Creating a great sounding analog product is all about trial and error; whether you are hot rodding a tube amplifier or developing a great sounding analog circuit, the process involves building, modifying and rebuilding until you arrive at just the right combination and configuration of components. More than just by engineering, great tone is achieved by this painstaking process. To build products that endure through the ages, there needs to be a focus on the integrity of your craft. With no short cuts or compromises, you work on your design until it takes on a life of its own: Simple and pure legendary analog tone.

Today analog designers are a dying breed, it is not even taught in college anymore! Paul and David Christian are formally trained analog electrical engineers. They started out in high school modifying tube amps for their friends and progressed into the development of original products and circuits. With over 25 years of OEM analog designs to their credit the brothers have worked to enhance the products of such companies as Fender, Gibson, Steinberger, Sonny Boy and many others. Many of today’s boutique designers have “stood on the shoulders” of the Christian brothers’ mechanical and electrical designs.

Like Big Joe - the man, the founders have influenced a new generation of craftsmen. It would not be a stretch to say that there is no one in the industry today who has more experience than the Big Joe Stomp Box Company design team. Like Big Joe himself, they are the ultimate tinkerers!