Rolling Stone WHAT IT IS: These custom-built guitar amplifiers are made from vintage toasters, fitted with a six-inch Jensen speaker and custom-painted by a hot-rod detailer. Powered by a 9-volt battery, Hotties are the coolest practice amps around and can be hooked up to an external cabinet for even more volume. WHY YOU WANT IT: Hottie Inc. founder Jean-Claude Escudie, also a VP at Breedlove Guitars, can barely build enough of the custom toaster amps to keep up with the demand from those coveting his product, a group that includes big rock stars and legendary guitarists.

Premier Guitar HOTTIE 454 ELECTRIC GUITAR REVIEW: Hottie Inc. joins the guitar game with muscle-car-inspired retro rocker. In this modern age we live in, everything we buy is all about function and portability. We’re all concerned about acquiring the latest and greatest technology and fashion, but there are a few exceptions to the rule, and I’m glad to say that the guitar-playing community goes against the grain. We might be modern in our lifestyles, but we’re classic in our tastes when it comes to guitars. The hottest trends in guitars right now are custom-made, vintage- style instruments and relics, and only a guitar player would pay more for a guitar that looks like it’s been through a war. CRAZY LIKE A FOX? The vintage-styled guitars we grew up with are as much a part of our being as the classic cars we fantasize about, and some new guitar manufacturers are figuring this out. But how do you sell a new guitar when so many of us want to play what we know and are comfortable with? How do you make it look and feel like an old friend without being a direct rip-off? Hottie Guitars, a company already well know for Hottie amps and pickups, is taking inspiration from the classic muscle cars of the early ’70s to come up with a guitar that is fresh but familiar, classic and retro: the Hottie 454. When you first lay your eyes on this guitar, you’re instantly taken back to an era when muscle cars roared down the streets and you spent Friday nights cruising the strip looking cool and feeling badass. This guitar has instant sex appeal, and it’s designed to be played with lots of attitude. When you first pick up this guitar, you can feel right away that this is a quality instrument made from top-shelf custom parts and materials. The one-piece Honduran mahogany body and neck have girth, and the whole weighs in around the same as a vintage Les Paul. Mahogany comes in many different grades, and they’re priced accordingly. I can tell you the 454’s mahogany is the best grade you can buy. They also offer alder and ash body options. The carve top is comfortable and made from Eastern hard rock maple. Hottie offers two types of neck shapes: a soft-V and a ’59-C. The review model came with the soft-V, and it felt very comfortable right out of the gate. A “V”-shaped neck can take a while to get used to, but this one is probably one of the best I’ve played in a long time. The ebony fretboard came with medium/jumbo frets, and the setup and fret job were perfect right out of the case. I would have preferred bigger frets, because the .010 gauge strings felt like .009s on the 24.625" scale and 12" fretboard radius. String bending was a breeze, with lots of volume and sustain. The Bigsby tremolo system was a nice addition to the flexibility and swagger of this guitar. The vintage tuners held their tune perfectly and the bone nut was cut to perfection. VROOM! Don’t be fooled by the simple sleek look of the 454; it has tone for days and is quite flexible for being a single humbucker guitar. The Hottie bridge pickup is another quality addition, and is made from the best materials available. This pickup gives you the impression that it’s the offspring of the classic PAF design, but it has way more personality and attitude. This little Hottie pickup comes stock with fancy flames on the nickel cover and is housed in a custom-made pickup ring. This custom-wound, U.S.-made 8.5k bridge pickup compresses really nicely and has a little more “Pow!” in the lower register. I had no problem dialing in a very nice Gibbons-style tone, and the pinch harmonics rang out with ease and delight. The pickup also cleaned up great when backing off the volume a bit. The 500k pots are a nice audio taper that gives you more control. It’s not one of those “it’s on or off” types of volume pots, and the sweep is very dynamic and usable. The Tone knob is a push/pull that allows you to split the humbucker from series to parallel. This feature shows off the quality of the materials, because most humbuckers don’t sound this good split. When you’re in split mode, you get very good Esquire-type tone, and the Tone knob also shares the same dynamic range that the Volume does. These guitars are designed and built by Jean-Claude Escudie (Hottie owner) and master luthier Saul Koll (Koll Guitars). Their love of classic hot rods and their knowledge of guitar construction and design makes a noticeable difference. The nitrocellulose lacquer finish was flawless; it’s this step in the guitar building process that takes lots of time and skill. You can always tell if the lacquer was applied and finished properly by looking across the finish in the light. You should not see little waves, cloudiness, or unevenness in certain spots. If you do, the manufacturer may have rushed the finishing process, or used cheap lacquer. The finish should look like a thin layer of clear glass. The metallic red sparkle on this Hottie is beautiful. It’ll make anyone do a double take when lit under stage lights. This guitar will get you noticed! THE FINAL MOJO As I said at the beginning, there are no short cuts on this guitar—even the case it came in was quality and looked like a piece of furniture. The guitar is priced like a classic car— and I know not everyone can justify that kind of outlay—but those who demand style and quality will feel that this guitar is a bargain. I can tell you from my own experience that it’s not too often you play a guitar that you can’t really find anything wrong with. The only thing I can pick on Hottie for is that a guitar in this price range should come with strap locks. We get so used to buying guitars that are close to our expectations and then spending additional time and money upgrading them to our exact standards and preferences. You won’t need to do this with the Hottie 454. It’s as close to a mint-condition 1972 Corvette as you can get, and it will turn as many heads and get you the attention you deserve. And isn’t that why we play guitars like this and drive 1972 Corvettes in the first place? It sure is!  (Tony Pasko)

Guitar World TOAST OF THE TONE: Hottie Amp.  Circuit benders love to transform ordinary household devices into electronic noisemakers.  When Jean-Claude Escudie spied a stack of broken vintage chrome toasters at his local thrift shop he knew they'd make perfect amp cabinets.  And so the Hottie Amp was born.  While on the outside the Hottie Amp may look like a normal Sunbeam or GE toaster (our favorite a Roto Broil toaster oven), lurking inside are a six-inch Jensen speaker and a nine-volt battery-powered solid state amp.        Escudie recently started offering the Hottie Custom Amp, which features candy, pearl, and metalflake finishes like those on custom hot rods.  My test example came with awesome red and yellow pearl flames on a black candy base, but Escudie also offers the solid color GT model with wheels (?!), as well as two-tone flame models.        The Hottie Amp is as simple as it gets.  Its feature sets consist of a single input and an output that lets you connect the amp to an external cabinet - there are no volume ot tone controls to contend with other than those on your guitar.  As you might expect, the Hottie Amp's tone is warm, and when overdriven produces a satisfying crunch.  (Chris Gill)

Willamette Week PLAY WITH YOUR FOOD:  What to get the gent or lady who's got a Santoku in one hand and a Fender in the other?  The unholy union of a '50s-era General Electric toaster and a 9-volt battery powered amplifier.  Portland mech-whiz Jean-Claude Escudie crafts his Hottie Amps (hottieamps.com) outta vintage toasters - and even toaster ovens - and then decorates his Monster Garage-style creations with sleek, sexy, auto paint jobs.  This takes the whole "kitchen as stage" idea to a new, louder level.  (Kelly Clarke)

Music Trades JEAN-CLAUDE ESCUDIE has always liked building things, and over the years tried his hand at making guitars, amps, effects pedals, "and a lot of odd gadgets," he says. However, at the Dallas Vintage Guitar show in 2005, he had a stroke of inspiration that led to the founding of Hottie Amps. Looking at old guitar amps made from vintage tube radios, he thought, "Why not build a portable amp out of a '60s-era transistor radio." He began searching for old radios but was quickly discouraged because all the models he came across at flea markets, pawn shops, and junk stores were either ridiculously expensive or destroyed. However, in the process, he kept coming across old toasters. "The thought popped into my head, I could turn one of these toasters into an amp," he recalls. Hottie Inc. was born soon after that. Hottie has since cranked out 350 amps from toasters built between 1930 and 1960, what Escudie calls "the golden days of American manufacturing." He prefers models from the mid-20th century because "they combined design elements from wartime manufacturing, art deco styling, the auto industry, and the space age craze." And, not all toasters pass the grade. He relates, "Modern toasters, for example, don't utilize a strong enough metal gauge to support a speaker. Many older toasters simply fall apart when we remove the inner machinery so they can't be used. The toaster must be large enough to house our 6" speakers." In the manufacturing process, a small team of builders remove the toaster machinery, give the chassis an industrial wash, and then install electronics that are powered by a 9-volt battery, and the speaker. Dialing back the volume on your guitar will clean up your sound considerably. In the name of simplicity, they have an input jack and an output jack, and volume and tone are adjusted via the guitar. Dialing back your guitar's tone knob will warm up your sound providing a fat bluesy tone. Escudie adds, "Sound from the speaker bounces around inside the toaster and creates a natural reverberation before exiting through the bread slots. Hottie Amps have a very organic tone with lots of feedback and natural harmonics. Each type of toaster has its own unique sonic qualities." And the toaster amps are just the beginning for Hottie Inc., which will soon introduce Hottie Guitars, a line of high-end, U.S.-made electric guitars. "I'm waiting for someone to ask us to build a Hottie Amp from a full-size oven or a refrigerator with rows of 12" speakers," says Escudie. "Shipping might make it expensive, but if someone wants one, we're up to the task."