Throughout my career, I’ve done corporate gigs for
large companies like Microsoft.
For these kinds of shows, I
typically have to learn about
40 cover songs by artists ranging from Michael Jackson to
Bryan Adams, Jay-Z, Maroon
5, Journey, and U2. These
artists are very different, so I
have to be able to pull up the
correct sounds for each song as
fast as possible. Having a large
pedalboard with different output options allows me to have
a vast palette of tones available
at the stomp of a switch. In
this month’s Tone Tips, I’ll
give you an overview of what I
call my Monster Board.
I have pedalboards of
various sizes, and they all serve
different functions. If I need
a board that’s easy to modify,
I build it on one of several
Pedaltrain models. For a board
that needs to stay hardwired,
I call James “Rooster” Olson
at Trailer Trash Pedalboards.
Most of my knowledge about
signal flow and how to build
a large board has come from
working with James. When
building a large board, one of
the first pieces of gear you’ll
want to purchase is a buffer.
Buffers send a nice, strong
signal to the front of your
amp. My favorite buffer is
the Axess Electronics BS- 2,
because it has a split output
and an isolated output. I use
the split out to go straight to
my tuner. That way, I don’t
have to have my tuner be first
in line in the signal chain.
The buffer works in conjunc-
tion with my Loop-Master
5-Loop Effect Switcher, so I
can always have my tuner on.
This way, I have the option
to tune while I’m playing or
tune silently. I mainly use the
BS- 2’s isolated out when I do
sessions. This signal goes to a
jack I had installed on the side
of my board. From that jack, I
can go into a DI box and send
the engineer a completely dry
and unprocessed sound. Later,
I can use this for reamping
tracks with my ReAmp box.
My Trailer Trash Glow-Top pedalboard sports a combination of digital and
analog effects for maximum flexibility. Top row: Line 6 DL4, Line 6 MM4,
and ReAmp box. Middle row: Line 6 Verbzilla, Boss OC- 2, Z.Vex Ringtone,
Keeley Compressor, Planet Waves tuner, and Z.Vex Box of Rock. Bottom
row: HomeBrew Electronics Power Screamer, Loop-Master 5-Loop Effect
Switcher, Digi Tech Whammy, and Snarling Dogs Whine-O Wah. Side:
Rocktron Banshee Talkbox and Z.Vex Tremolo Probe.
The underside of my Glow-Top pedalboard reveals a highly organized matrix of cables and electronics designed to ensure great tone
and optimum reliability.
instrument. To get around
this, I’ll run an overdrive pedal
into an octave pedal before I
hit the talk box. Octave pedals
send several layers of harmonic
information to the talk box
and fill out the sound before
it comes out of the tube and
goes into the microphone.
Okay, back to pedalboards.
Enlisting the help of an expe-
rienced tech like James Olsen
is always a good call when
building a complex board.
Paying someone to make sure
your pedalboard is ready to
be knocked around by airlines
and shaken in trailers is money
well spent. If you’re going
to build your own Monster
Board, make sure you have
pedals with quality parts and
well-built cables connecting
everything. In my experi-
ence, when a rig stops making
sound, nine times out of 10
the issue lies somewhere in the
pedalboard. Take the time to
make sure everything is prop-
erly and securely hooked up.
Once you have the peace of
mind that everything is settled
on the technical side, be sure
to give your creative legs a
stretch by experimenting with
different sounds.
PAUL “TFO” ALLEN
is a multi-instrumentalist
who has worked with Big
& Rich, Adele, Sebastian
Bach, 112, Jake Owen,
Larry the Cable Guy, and
many others. He also
has his own project called Ten Finger
Orchestra, and can be reached at tenfin-
gerorchestra@yahoo.com.
