"Rock...man" - Sting
At the tail end of the 1960s, young Ohioan Tom Scholz started attending classes at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Following his graduation with undergraduate and master's degrees in mechanical engineering from the school, Scholz began a career with the Polaroid Corporation where he worked in product development. Scholz, a lifelong tinkerer and now part-time musician, spent his nights theorizing and working toward the realization of musical perfection.
Perfection, to Scholz, manifested in goals of "the perfect rock band" and "the perfect song". This preoccupation with theoretical musical perfection brought Scholz to invest his own money to build his own recording studio near Boston, Massachusetts where he would tirelessly write, record, and re-record demos to eventually pitch to record companies.
By the late 1970s, Scholz had a platinum record and a world-famous band. Boston, his band's self-titled debut, would go onto become a standby of classic rock radio with songs to define an era of arena-ready pop rock. During the span between Boston's 1978 release Don't Look Back and 1986's Third Stage, Scholz returned to the creative space that predated his rockstardom.
Scholz Research & Development was founded in 1980 as an outlet for Scholz's lasting passions for engineering and design. From a much more modest position, Scholz set out to make his mark on music through the development of early consumer-grade musical electronics. The company would go on to develop lines of attenuators, rackmounts, and headphone amplifiers, among them, the Rockman series.
But what is this, Behind the Music? How It's Made? Modern Marvels?
We're here today to talk about a thrilling revival of one of the world's earliest attempts at capturing "the sound" for the consumer market. The sound in question was Tom Scholz's very own. As a time capsule of '70s arena rock as well as the workings that made such a sound possible, we have the MXR Rockman X100 Analog Signal Processor. Let's dig in.
Just Another Band Out of Boston
Introducing the MXR Rockman X100
The MXR Rockman X100 is a multi-effect pedal designed to recreate the sounds of the original Rockman X100 headphone amplifier developed by Tom Scholz back in the early '80s. There are definitely some differences between the consumer electronics market of the early 1980s and today. To address such differences, MXR took the liberty of lovingly designing an unconventional interface and vintage-inspired art with the Rockman X100. If you're seeking out an authentic tribute to Scholz's original analog designs, you've found it.
A Little HistoryNaturally, the original '80s Rockman X100s were fashioned with very little precedent established for its kind of consumer-grade electronics. Because of this, the '80s Rockman X100s were bulky black boxes with a selection of sliding switches and a built-in belt clip. Original X100s operated on external batteries and could be played through headphones or then-commonplace home FM stereo receivers. These twentieth century technological hangups have either been consolidated or completely replaced to fit into an easily operated stompbox form.
Today's Rockman X100 works using two push switches, two sliding faders, and a single footswitch. Streamlined, touch-responsive, and expressive, the MXR's Rockman X100 is made to hearken to the arena rock sounds that would be later called the "Boston Tone" as well as inspire nostalgia for early rock guitar-oriented electronics. If you're a fan of those commanding Boston guitar tones or just an aficionado of early musical consumer electronics, there's definitely something here to win you over. Let's get into some tones and controls.
Hitch a Ride
MXR Rockman X100 Effects and Controls
Inspired by the original Rockman X100 headphone amp's design, the MXR Rockman X100 features two push buttons to control its effects and two sliding faders to control its volume and input.
The two effects onboard the Rockman replicate the original headphone amp's. On one button, you have a tone control with four modes. On the other, you have a chorus. The tone control on the Rockman has four modes that range from clean to distorted, and they shake out a little something like this:
- CLN2: This is the Rockman's default tone setting, designated by its blue light. At this setting, the Rockman will play with a crystal-clear tone perfect for starting out and hearing that '80s brand of cleanliness.
- CLN1: Here's your next step up. From this point, the EQ curve of the Rockman adjusts with a more mids-focused scope to result in a dynamic, tight, and punchy clean.
- EDGE: This is your point of no return, your borderline, so to say. The Rockman on this setting introduces a moderate clipping that tacks on that added but of crunch – not too little, not too much.
- DIST: Here's your showstopper. This setting denotes itself with its red light, if that's any hint as to what you're getting yourself into. On this mode, you have a high-energy overdrive that definitely lends itself to Boston's big chords and screaming solos.
Across these four tone modes, the Rockman expressively breathes life into your tone – clean, dirty, or distorted. The sound of the Rockman is notably (and perhaps unsurprisingly) pop rock focused, where you'll hear more flavors of Boston's tight, late '70s and early '80s guitar tones than anything too mangled or unrecognizable. As a pedal, the Rockman X100 carries that same '80s sheen its originator did.
Alright, but how about these sliders, huh? Yes, the Rockman takes the leap to utilize dedicated volume and input gain sliders over your usual knobs. Let's talk about these two for a second.
- Volume: No surprises, here. Slide this fader up, you get more volume from the pedal. Slide it down, less. A totally intuitive process. However, things shake up a little bit when you get into its neighbor.
- Input Gain: Now, notably, input gain is not a setting you see as frequently on effect pedals these days. To give a little context, the input gain control will set the level of the signal entering the pedal. Adjusting this slider will interact with your playing dynamics as you pick and strum harder or softer. On higher settings, you'll get a more compressed and sensitive sound which is particularly responsive to the Rockman's Edge mode.
Between these two level controls, you have a highly interactive and customizable interface for the Rockman. Use these sliders in tandem to cook up some interesting intersections of volume and gain for a touch more customization for your Bostonian effect mixes.
To top this all off, the Rockman comes built with that ever-important secret '80s sauce. Matching the original Rockman, this MXR creation comes loaded with a bucket brigade chorus effect. This effect is swapped on and off by a two-way switch. Reducing much of the tinkering and twiddling behind modulation, this on-or-off effect experience makes for quite an easy set-and-forget kind of feature. Literally drop in the chorus and let that mandatory '80s flourish twist around your clean or dirty signal.
Shipping Up to Boston
MXR Rockman X100 Further Functions
Let's get into a few of the nuts and bolts of the Rockman X100. For starters, the Rockman features a ¼" expression control jack. This control jack allows for external controller pedals to remotely swap between the Rockman's four tone modes. Hook up an external tap footswitch controller and play with the various tonal modes more freely. The added playability function built in is sure to inspire some real hands-free interaction and exploration of the Rockman's different drive levels.
In addition to its external functionality, the Rockman features added internal functionality for fans who like to get involved with their pedals. An internal switch, accessible by opening the pedal itself, will enable the Rockman to be run in stereo, should you switch it and have a TRS splitter cable on hand. This stereo effect will be noticeably present through the Rockman's chorus as it extends to left and right channels with different frequencies.
The Rockman operates using your usual nine-volt DC center negative power supply, so working it into your pedalboard is quick and easy. Drop it in, hook it up, let it rock.
MXR Rockman X100 Analog Tone Processor Final Thoughts
The MXR Rockman X100 is a special sort of pedal. Hearkening to a quieter moment in gear history, the Rockman X100 celebrates not one of the most famous or boastful pieces of gear across time, but one of the more humble and understated.
Maybe this is a bit hard to explain, but the MXR Rockman is a pedal that wants to be played. It's a pedal that certainly has a sound of its time and alludes to an era of rock where what you got out of your gear was what you put in. There's always been that type of pedal does a lot of the heavy lifting for you, but the Rockman X100 is a pedal that gives what you put into it. To that degree, it’s a very workmanlike piece of gear, and that's worth mentioning.
If the pop rock and power pop guitar tones of the late '70s and early '80s are your thing, then the Rockman X100 will not let you down. The swirling, gritty, commanding, stadium-minded guitar tones of that era are ready to go with the Rockman.
There's a certain poetry to Tom Scholz's career. Is it any wonder that a mechanical engineer would find the concept of a "perfect" song so alluring? How a guitarist with a brain clearly versed in mathematics would end up in pursuit of a maximized and optimized sound? That the creator of a world-dominating rock sound would aim to capture such a feeling in a box of physical components?
Maybe it's more than a feeling.
