SOUND CITY

The roots of Sound City date back to 1875. The parent company of Sound City was formed then as John E. Dallas and Sons, Ltd. (JED). JED grew in the musical instrument area, and circa early 1960s, they entered into consumer electronics. This division was called Dallas Musical Ltd. In 1965, Dallas bought Arbiter Electronics, and the new partnership was called Dallas Arbiter, Ltd. Arbiter owned three music shops before Dallas acquired them. They decided to start producing sound reinforcement equipment and it was first built in one of those three music shops that was named Sound City. This is how the amp acquired the name. All products produced by Arbiter featured the Sound City name or some close variation of it.
Sound City amps have a reputation of being HIWATT copies. There is some truth to this as it was reported that Sound City and HIWATT were produced in the same location for a short period. Dave Reeves actually designed some of Sound City's first amplifiers. Pete Townshend of The Who played through Sound City amplifiers as well. Information courtesy: Unofficial Sound City website.