Rigged – KAMELOT

I must admit that on the topic of Kamelot, I was ignorant for far longer than I should have. It might have been my desire for the screaming speed and blazing chops of their other power metal kin that made me overlook the superior songsmiths for what they were, and I’m glad that I finally got on board. I once was blind, but now I see – Kamelot fucking rules! They know how to write songs that cut to the core of me, and although they can all play, they use their talents to enhance the songs and not to show off.

We spent some time with the band at their soundcheck for the Anaheim stop of their tour with DragonForce to get a look at the gear they use for their live shows:

Some unusual pieces of gear showing up here. Guitarist Thomas Youngblood favors the Ampeg VH140C, an amp that made the very top of our Ubiquitous Mediocre Amps of the 90’s list, but as I’ve said before – you can get a great sound out of anything, and Thomas makes that thing scream! They also have a Kemper to model the Ampeg as a backup – an interesting choice to model a $350 amp with a $2000 modeler – but a signature sound is a signature sound.

Also of note, drummer Casey Grillo’s heads are ones his company DrumStatic makes, as they do for artists as diverse as Madonna, Rihanna, Korn, and Kiss. The ones on his drums have LEDs to light up his heads from the inside. It looked pretty great from the crowd.