Up to eleven

The volume knobs of Tufnel's Marshall amplifier went up to eleven

"Up to eleven" or "these go to eleven" is an idiom from popular culture, coined in the movie This Is Spinal Tap, which has come to refer to anything being exploited to its utmost abilities, or apparently exceeding them, such as a sound volume control. Similarly, the expression "turning it up to eleven" refers to the act of taking something to an extreme. In 2002 the phrase entered the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary with the definition "up to maximum volume".

Original scene from This Is Spinal Tap

The phrase was coined in a scene from the 1984 mockumentary/rockumentary This Is Spinal Tap by the character Nigel Tufnel, played by Christopher Guest. In this scene Nigel gives the rockumentary's director, Marty DiBergi, played by Rob Reiner, a tour of his stage equipment. While Nigel is showing Marty his Marshall guitar amplifiers, he points out one in particular whose control knobs all have the highest setting of eleven, unlike standard amplifiers, whose volume settings are typically numbered from 0 to 10, believing that this numbering actually increases the volume of the amp ("It's one louder"). When Marty asks why the ten setting is not simply set to be louder, Nigel pauses, clearly confused, before responding, "These go to eleven".

Real life

Prior examples

C&O's #500 began going up to 11 in 1947.

The use of "11" as a maximum predates This Is Spinal Tap by almost forty years. In 1947 the Baldwin Locomotive Works and the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway introduced the Chesapeake and Ohio class M1 steam turbine locomotive. The locomotive's throttle included eleven settings, ranging from one (idling) to eleven (full speed). The locomotive's cruising speed was 70 miles per hour (110 km/h), at which point the throttle was on "seven." During a trial run with a reporter from Popular Mechanics aboard, a C&O engineer expressed his dissatisfaction with a local speed limit of 75 miles per hour (121 km/h), noting that he would "Sure like to be able to pull it back to eleven!."

Cultural influence

As a consequence of the film, real bands and musicians started buying equipment whose knobs went up to 11, or even higher, with Eddie Van Halen reputedly being the first to do so. Marshall, the company that provided amplifiers for the film that the custom marked knobs were applied to, now sells amplifiers such as its JCM900 (first sold in 1990) whose knobs are marked from 0 to 20.

Soldano amplifiers have controls that go to 11.

In 1994 Australian radio network Triple J released a compilation of heavy metal music called Eleven: A Triple J Very Loud Compliation featuring a cover with amps which go up to eleven.

A 2010 teaser for the Lenovo ThinkPad W701 features a picture of a TrackPoint mouse designed to look like the volume knob on an amp. The knob's controls go to 11. The ad states, "NEW THINKPAD MOBILE WORKSTATIONS. TURN IT UP TO 11."

The BBC iPlayer and other media on the BBC website has a volume control that goes up to 11.

The top of the Virgin Electronics' Boom Tube speaker line (Boom Tube EX) had a volume control that goes up to 11.

The Tesla Model S automobile's music volume controls go up to 11^{[citation needed]}.

The tachometer on a Singer-modified Porsche 911 goes up to 11 (for 11,000 RPM).

On the This is Spinal Tap IMDb page the film's star rating is out of 11, rather than the normal 10.

QSC 3500 and 3800 amplifiers made for the pro sound company Sound Image in the 1990s went to 11.

In the 1999 John Lasseter animation feature Toy Story 2, as the villain Zurg prepares to shoot the hero Buzz Lightyear, he selects his weapon's highest setting, eleven.

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See also

• Loudest band in the world
• Loudness war
• Spinal Tap