For as much as any musician relies on the craftsmanship and mechanical expertise of others, from instrument-makers to recording engineers, studio technicians, and beyond, it can still be rare to find a performer that walks the line between artist and builder.
But Norman music scene mainstay Kyle Reid seems to fit that bill.
As a jazz guitarist, singer-songwriter, bandleader, and even sometime music teacher, Reid has made a name for himself on the stage, in the studio, and in any number of bars, coffee shops, and weekly jazz nights throughout the Metro.
But he’s recently been trading the stage boards for the circuit board, drawing on his long background in mechanical engineering to focus on his own hand-built boutique guitar amplifiers, offering him a new outlet to explore a very different kind of creativity.
Kyle Reid: You know, I consider myself technically minded and I like to get hands-on, so that started with recording myself, and then you run up against the limitations of what kind of gear you can afford. In pursuing music, you know, you’re always up against the cost.
Brett Fieldcamp: Through the irreverently named Kyle’s Rad Amplification, Reid has been retrofitting everything from decades-old film projectors to mixing consoles and even old photo-development light meters into amplifiers.
Much like the throwback music hall jazz of his albums, Reid has always found himself drawn to that kind of unconventional, vintage technology and machinery, experimenting with how to transform the old, broken tech into something musical.
Kyle Reid: I always kind of liked that problem solving thing, so I got really into the idea of furnishing a home studio with things that had once been broken that I had fixed for myself. I was scratching at that before the pandemic and the shutdown and the end of touring and gigs for, you know, a year or two or however long that was. And that was the time when I really sort of dove into the learning.
Brett Fieldcamp: Being forced to take that time away from the stage was a new experience for Reid, who had been strongly and steadily gigging for years, but during that period, he says, he began to more deeply develop this new way of connecting to both the music scene, and to the music inside himself.
Kyle Reid: Part of me feels good to be able to just sort of take a step away and do something else that interests me that feeds into my ability to make music in the studio or in a live setting. But it gives me access to tools that excite me and make me passionate about making music, and I can step away from sort of the rat race of the music industry for a little while and re-energize myself.
Brett Fieldcamp: That’s where he says that he finds the connection between these two seemingly disparate disciplines, not only energizing his own excitement for songwriting and musical experimentation, but providing a new way to collaborate and communicate with other artists and performers.
Kyle Reid: It does, it allows me a different access into the music community that is really exciting for me. You know, when I’m out there just trying to put my music out there in the world, it’s so nice to come and meet other musicians and other players and people on a level of “we have an appreciation for the tools that we use to do the thing.”
I’ve developed a skill that helps fix people’s stuff, you know, and I’ve been trying to do it more and more. But just the idea for a working musician and their amplifier, you know if it stops working, then it’s a problem. And more and more these days, there aren’t as many who know how to fix that stuff.
Brett Fieldcamp: It’s that potentially disappearing knowledge that Reid hopes to bolster through collaborative builds, custom projects, and even just conversation and education for this decidedly different side of musical artistry.
Kyle Reid: We’re here. We’re by appointment. But, you know, we want to be an integral part of the music community and we want people who are interested in electronics to come by and learn stuff and get inspired themselves.
I know what I know because smart people have been generous with their knowledge. So I try to foster a sense of that kind of community.
Brett Fieldcamp: You can follow the progress of both Reid’s music and his amplifier creations at kylereidmusic.com, and you can hear them in action on this brand new upcoming track, “Grounded,” recorded entirely with guitar amps that Reid built and wired by hand.
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