John Britt Daniel

Britt used this guitar quite heavily from 2007 through 2010. It's his main electric in practically all of Spoon's live videos during that time. YouTube contains several videos of in-store performances, concerts, and in-studio/on-air performances that give good views of this guitar.

In this picture, Britt's amp rig is seen with his "mystery head" sitting atop his AC30, which he has used as his primary amp when playing with Spoon.

In the 2018 Vintage Guitar interview, Britt Daniel briefly discusses the amplifier and the "mystery head".

My main amp is a small head built by Matt Gilchrist that I plug into the speakers of an AC30. The idea is that if I fly somewhere, I can plug it into any AC30 speakers. On tour, we have a few AC30s with us and I just plug into those. But the Gilchrist head is like an AC30, but made exactly the way I want it. Whenever I rent an AC30, they’re always way too hot-sounding, without detail and finesse; I just want to get a full sound that’s not distorted and crunchy. I was finding that rentals went straight from “off” to way distorted. The Gilchrist is a little mellower and provides more detail and options. I’ve also got a really nice old tweed Princeton from the ’50s.

John Britt Daniel can be seen with a candy red Fender Telecaster in this photo.

In 1961 a British engineer would start a company from a spare room in his England home that would permanently change the history of the Pro Audio industry. This company set a trajectory for musical tones that spanned across genres and impacted every generation that followed. We are talking about the famous piece of gear known as the Neve* recording console. From "Love Me Do" by The Beatles to the famous sounds of Led Zeppelin, U2, Spoon, Pink Floyd, Motown, Quincy Jones, Nirvana, Steely Dan, Neil Young, Tears For Fears, and Tom Petty (the list is endless), The Colour Box is our tribute to the legend and application of how a piece of gear can change music.

Britt is credited by JHS as using a Colour Box, but he is rarely seen using it in a live setting. This pedal was mentioned by Daniel in the 2018 Vintage Guitar interview.

It appears to be common knowledge in recollections of live performances that Britt plays this Ventura Barney Kessel. The Ventura can be seen in this video, with a quick view of the front of the guitar at 01:37.

At 1:07 in this KEXP performance by Divine Fits, Daniel can be seen playing a Fender Telecaster Thinline.

Vintage Guitar Interview, 2018

Onstage, Fender Thinline Telecasters are all I play. They have the scrape-y Fender sound I like, and I’m mostly a rhythm player, so that works. It’s lighter than a 335, so I can toss it around, and that f hole is such a cool detail. I’ve bought a lot of guitars based on looks.

In this photo, which shows Britt Daniel with his partially shown pedalboard, one pedal that can be seen is the Klon Centaur.

Daniel received the last JHS Klone ever made, as stated by Josh Scott in this August 27, 2021 livestream at 5:40.

The last one I ever made was for Britt of Spoon.

"Spoon's Britt Daniel, live at SXSW 2008, singing through a Deluxe Memory Man feeding through The Holy Grail Plus."

At 4:53 of this video, you can see the Ampeg SVT-610HLF Bass Cabinet

In this photo, which shows Britt Daniel with his partially shown pedalboard, one pedal that can be seen is the EHX Holy Grail reverb pedal.

There’s effects all over everything on this last record, [especially] a Klon Centaur. We use a Boss CE-1, and I’ve never heard any vibrato that sounds anywhere near as good; it just sort of twists everything up.

The Lightfoot Labs Goatkeeper is an amazing tremolo that can give all these different wave forms, but the cool thing is it will generate a tremolo according to the speed of the signal. That’s really handy if you want to do something that’s right on, although sometimes you want to drift a little.

John Britt Daniels can be seen playing a white Precision Bass in this photo.

Here's Britt Daniel playing a Martin D-35 backstage in London in 2007. From the very start of the video you can spot him with the guitar.

In this photo, which shows Britt Daniel with his partially shown pedalboard, one pedal that can be seen is the Boss TR-2. This pedal was also mentioned by Daniel in the 2018 Vintage Guitar interview.

At 1:26 in this KEXP performance by Divine Fits, Daniel can be seen playing a Fender Bass VI.

"Spoon's Britt Daniel, live at SXSW 2008, singing through a Deluxe Memory Man feeding through The Holy Grail Plus."

At 2:56 and 4:31 of this video, you can see the Ampeg SVT (MTI-Era) Bass Amplifier Head (distinguishable due to the white toggle switches along the top, and the black faceplate)

Saw while wondering what made the tone in a specific song. See 1:29 into the song.

Shure SM58 is used in Spoon's KEXP performance in 2014

In this live video of Spoon playing "I Turn My Camera On" in 2005, Britt can be seen playing a 1966 Gibson ES-330TD.

This guitar was later sold on Spoon's reverb shop.

In this interview for Premier Guitar, Britt Daniel mentioned using a Benson Vinny during recordings for the 2022 album Lucifer on the Sofa. He said:

"We use a lot of [Electro-Harmonix] Memory Man. We also used the JHS Colour Box pedal – it’s like they’re imitating a Neve board, basically; it’s pretty extreme. We used another little amp, this Benson Vinny 1-Watt guitar amp. It’s kind of like the Vox Pathfinder in a way, because it’s so small, but it has a different tone to it."

In an interview for Premier Guitar, Daniel claimed most of his guitar sounds from the 2022 Spoon album "Lucifer on the Sofa" were done with a Vox Pathfinder, which he normally used as a portable amp for radio station performances. He said of the amp:

"When I was working on the songs at home I would usually be playing through the Vox. [When] we were recording, I would have to separate it; we’d put it in a different room because it’s not as loud as the other amps. There was that hump to get over, but it’s got a great sound. You would never know that it’s coming from that tiny little amp."

Britt Daniel's signature Fender guitar, used extensively on Spoon's records and tour since release