Joel Richardson
Getting to know Blackstar Director of Marketing Joel Richardson
Employee Spotlight
What is the Sound in YOUR head?
I remember Ian Robinson and Bruce Keir (Blackstar founders) showing me a HT Pedal proto-type back in 2006. It was a metal box with a bunch of wires at the time and Ian demonstrated the ISF control and it blew my mind. I knew this was the biggest innovation for guitarists since the master volume.
The best tone I’ve ever heard is Jared James Nichols, playing any of our amps. He’s just a monster player! Also, doing a demo with Dan P. Carter through an Artisan 100 head and cab with a HT-Dual on the 2nd channel front ended. If you want to hear the best high gain tone ever, try it!
What are you most proud of, professionally?
Helping to take the Blackstar brand from unknown to established brand in the guitar market in such a short space of time. Successfully launching hundreds (literally) of products into the global market.
Working with such talented artists like Jared James Nichols, Gus G., Toby Lee, Carmen Vandenberg and all our Blackstar artists. Supporting our fantastic Blackstar dealers with training, incentives and giving the brand as much visibility as possible.
What are your 3 desert island albums?
Blur | Modern life is rubbish – When I was 14 I would listen to this album on my Walkman while doing my paper round. To this day I still love it and know every word. Also the reason, I like stripey t-shirts, adidas Sambas and brown cords… I can’t really pull off the look now though.
Radiohead | The Bends – My brother bought the music book for the The Bends and I studied it religiously. With 3 guitar parts in most of the songs there was always one I could kind of play. My favourite song on the album? Black star! Of course!
The Slow Readers Club | Build a Tower – unashamedly a huge fan. This is a beautifully constructed album as all Reeeeaders! albums are. Hooks for days!!!
Tell us something that we might not know about you…
We have a Blackstar band. We play purely to test Blackstar products and for fun. All band members are Blackstar employees and I sing. If you want to check us out (laugh at us) our Instagram is jabberwocky_band – be kind!!
