by Twangaway » 16 Apr 2010, 17:25
Looks like that site of TV3 has it nailed on all matters relating to echo units used by Hank. Fair to say that there is no evidence whatseover of The Shadows using Watkins Copycat for recording, but there is evidence there ( not more than hearsay I would say ) of someone spotting Hank , with the outfit Marvin,Welch and Farrar ( not the Shadows ) using the Watkins Shadow unit, not exactly a copycat at Sheffield Bailey's Club.
For all we know it may have been a standby unit as backup for any failure of his regular unit. I suppose in the early days when his Meazzi proved problemmatic he may have had a Watkins Copycat for backup simply due to wide availability, spares and cost but that would be guesswork. Maybe Bruce could throw some light on these questions ? To answer the original question, of Copycat use in the 60's I think not as the split lid valve version of the copycat didn't come close to the Meazzi in sound, with few heads, wrong echoe patterns, and noisy sound.
Thanks for the link to that excellent site where I also discovered other echo units I didn't know Hank used.