John Petrucci has been using Mesa amplification for over 30 years, and Mesa amplifiers have been featured on nearly every Dream Theater album made. During a Tone Summit on November 14, 2016, John joined Mesa R & D Director, Doug West at the Guitar Sanctuary Performance Hall in McKinney, Texas for a night of discussion about tone, John’s Mesa signature amp – the JP-2C – and the amps behind the tones of various Dream Theater songs over the years.
John and Doug discuss approaches to dialing in sounds and some of the history behind the JP2C signature project, while John shares tracks from his library of Dream Theater sounds and then plays those riffs through his JP-2C rig for comparison.
It was a great night of stories, helpful hints, and Tone. Our thanks to John and his tech Maddi Schieferstein for taking the time for this event. Also, big thanks to Clint Franzen and George Fuller from the Guitar Sanctuary for hosting.
The guitar for this event was recorded with John Petrucci’s Signature Ernie Ball Music Man JP 16 six and seven string guitars into stereo JP2C heads and two Rectifier 4x12 Traditional cabinets. Mic’d with a Sennheiser 421 and a Beyer Dynamic 160 on one side and a AER AR22 and an SM57 on the other cab with a stereo pair of Earthworks QTC-50 Room mics blended in at 10% of the final mix.
For more information on the JP-2C:
http://www.mesaboogie.com/amplifiers/electric/mark-series/jp2c/index.html
And the Limited Production JP-2C:
http://www.mesaboogie.com/amplifiers/electric/mark-series/JP-2C-limited/index.html
www.dreamtheater.com
www.johnpetrucci.com
www.mesaboogie.com