Tom Scholz

Tom Scholz is the founding guitarist of the hard rock band Boston, the writer behind hits like "More Than A Feeling," "Don't Look Back" and "Amanda," and, away from the band, a design engineer with more than 30 patents to his name¹². He is as well known among gear builders as among players: in 1982 he designed and released the Rockman X100 headphone amp through his own electronics company, Scholz Research & Development (SR&D), a device that changed how guitarists could practice and record³.

His motivation was practical. In a 2020 Facebook post, quoted by Guitar Player, he explained that in 1982 there was no way to practice high-power rock guitar quietly, and that is what drove him to build the Rockman⁴.

The Boston guitar sound

Boston's first two albums were made with what one history describes as "the cumbersome collection of Marshall stacks, custom electronic boxes and mechanical inventions that had been Boston's daily environment for the two first albums"⁵. Scholz built and modified his own equipment rather than buying off the shelf. When no commercial EQ met his requirements, SR&D tried modifying existing units, gave up, and designed their own so they would have what they needed, as Scholz told Guitar World⁶.

His approach to overdrive was unconventional for the time. Speaking to Guitar World, Scholz said he does not use tubes or transistors as overdrive elements, he uses LEDs, and that it does not matter which device it is if you do the right thing with it⁷. That view carried into the records. On Third Stage, he said he started off using tube amps for several of the songs, then went back later and changed some of the parts so that some songs had pieces of tubes and Rockman, adding that nobody can tell which is which⁷.

His gear from the period includes:

• Custom electronic boxes of his own design, used on Boston's first two albums⁵
• A custom SR&D EQ, built after commercial units proved unsuitable⁶
• LED-based overdrive circuits in place of tube or transistor clipping stages⁷
• The Seamoon Fresh Fuzz, a pedal JHS Pedals notes was used extensively by artists including Scholz and Eric Johnson⁸

The Rockman and SR&D

Scholz founded Scholz Research & Development Inc. to market his inventions, which included the Rockman headphone guitar amplifier, designed to simulate the roar of his old Marshall heads at much quieter levels¹. The original Rockman was hailed for its unique sonic character, with crystal cleans, harmonics, nuanced modulation and gritty crunch tones, and it revolutionized the process of recording guitars directly into a mixing board⁹⁴. Scholz claimed it could replace $10,000 worth of studio gear and fit in the palm of your hand². After the original's release he kept developing the product, spawning a whole line¹⁰. One notable validation came early: he received a Rockman warranty card in the mail from Jeff Beck².

Dunlop now makes an MXR Rockman X100 pedal inspired by Scholz's original design, bringing the 1982 headphone amp's character to a stompbox format¹¹³.

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