Famous Westone Players - Name and (no) shame them!

Westones were a staple of many Indie bands of the early 1980s

Bogshed used both a Thunder Jet Bass and a Thunder 1A

Keith from the Wedding Present used a Thunder bass.

Don't get me started on all the world music bands at that time, who touted Westones, Westburys, Arias and other Matsumoku etc.

Check out old vids on YouTube;- Thomas Mapfumo, Bhundus and more.

Paul Court - The Primitives

just spotted these old photos on their Facebook/Twitter pages.    

May 1987.

Is it a Westone Thunder 3?

on the westone website there is a guitar listed as unknown #4 . along with it, there is a picture of a magazine cover. the guitar player shown is Mark White of ABC. he is holding a guitar similar but not the same as the unknown #4.

in this official video, you can see him playing the same guitar as he is holding in the picture on the magazine cover.


Poison Arrow by ABC

Looks a lot cooler on stage than in the flesh methinks.
But those single coils likely sound good.

This is the Nova Twins playing Glastonbury 2023.

Yep, Georgia South loves her Thunder too!

You can read more about the Twins on a previous post HERE

90s-era indie noise band Cranes, with a Spectrum SX in use:



Also, I do recall seeing a video of the band Red Lorry Yellow in which the bass player had a black Spectrum DX. Not been able to hunt it down thus far.

Varg Vikernes (1973-present), guitarist of Kalashnikov/Uruk-Hai during 1987-1990 (thrash metal), guitarist of Old Funeral during 1990-1991 (death metal) guitarist of Satanel during 1991 (black metal) guitarist/vocalist/bassist/drummer/synth of Burzum 1991-2009 (black metal) his solo project, bassist of Mayhem from 1992-1993 (black metal) lyricist for Darkthrone (in 1993 or 1994 (black metal)) and his own post-Burzum solo project from 2009-2020.

He played a white pantera x300 that he bought in 1987 as his first guitar, but it was stolen when he was in prison from 1994-2009.



These photos are both from 1991 during Old Funeral as well as the video...



Varg during the early years was more infamous than famous. The single best musician ever in my opinion.

Increase the dreadful phobia!

Oh my Lord!

If I banged my head like that, my vertigo would drop me to the floor like a hot potato!

But I'd be sure that the Genesis was on top of me!

Ian Masters, of Pale Saints, with what looks like a Thunder Jet:

Terry Sadler, bassist of Slaughter (Canada), 80s death metal.

This is him playing a red Westone Dynasty bass (1985) live in Toronto with Slaughter July 6th 1986.


Increase the dreadful phobia!

Maybe not exactly "famous", but I've got to mention Henry Thomas.
He was the Bass player on the BBC programme Rockschool back in the 80s.
And he must have given a lot of people BAS for Westone since he used a gorgeous Thunder III on Rockschool.

I guessed he probably became a session player, and having just looked him up, he did.
He's played for many bands/artists and has probably played on a huge amount of records.
Page 2 of this thread gives a long list of artists he's worked with - https://www.basschat.co.uk/topic/8808-henry-king-thumb-thomas/

The others I remember have already been mentioned - Quo and The Cardiacs.

I'd forgotten all about Rockschool! Looks like he had a fretless Westone there too.

Roman Jugg with a Raider 1, when The Damned appeared on an episode of The Young Ones in 1984:

Hawkwind in 1986 with a Spectrum FX (?) on show: