Mike Clark of Final Gravity was not fooling around when he was asked to tell us the details about his Mesa Boogie TriAxis Preamp. He really wasn’t.

So tell me about the Mesa/Boogie TriAxis Preamp?

The TriAxis preamp was released in the nineties and is Mesa/Boogie’s first and only midi guitar preamp. As far as I know, less than 10,000 have been manufactured and I have one of the early ones: number 1329. The goal behind the TriAxis was to combine simple, intuitive programmability and midi control with some of the very best Boogie sounds ever created.

Rhythm mode produces tones on the clean end of the TriAxis spectrum. Rhythm Green ("Vintage Fat Rhythm") emulates the sound of the early Boogie Mark I Black-face model. This mode is great for rhythm tones that break up when you push them hard, low gain blues leads, and other vintage sounds with lower amounts of overdrive. Rhythm Yellow (“Modern Hyper-Clean Rhythm”) emulates the Mark IV and I use this mode often for compressed, chorused, ultra-clean tones.

Lead 1 Green and Yellow Modes emulate higher gain modes from the Mark I: “Vintage Lead” and “Gain Boost”, respectively. I don’t use these modes often with Final Gravity, but I do use them on our song “Go On Home”, which has a much bluesier sound than a lot of our other material. I’ve played in a couple of cover bands in the past where I used these modes for songs from the sixties and seventies and they worked out very well.

Lead 1 Red is a strange beast. In my version 1 TriAxis, this mode is called “British Shred”. It produces something akin to a Marshall Plexi tone on steroids that is then run through a variac. I used it in cover bands for heavier alternative songs, but I haven’t used it much in Final Gravity as the mode can become harsh and prone to some pretty serious feedback.

The lead 2 modes are where I spend most my time. Lead 2 Green is called “Medium Gain Boogie Lead”. It’s a good mode for lower gain leads with a more modern sound than the Lead 1 modes. Many of my heavier lead and rhythm tones are produced by the Lead 2 Yellow (“Classic Boogie Lead (Mark IIC+/Mark IV)”). Lead 2 Red (“Searing Boogie Lead”) is great for really intense lead parts.

The TriAxis is powered by five 12AX7 tubes, used in differing combinations depending on the selected mode. There is a lot of solid-state circuitry in the TriAxis for control and programmability, but aside from two op-amps used for the recording output and the Dynamic Voice setting, the signal path is all-tube.

Programming the TriAxis is very intuitive. There are no menus, just 11 primary settings on the front panel with six additional control buttons. There are 128 programs available in the unit and each can be easily mapped to a midi program change command directly from the front panel. The unit also offers an effect loop and four control switches which can be set and stored individually per program.

The TriAxis offers a lot of flexibility within its tones and this is one of the few areas where the unit becomes more complex. The various controls influence each other a lot in shaping the final sound in ways that are often more complex than you might think. I strongly suggest reading the TriAxis manual to get familiar with the various settings and their effect on the overall sound.

I guess the last thing I should mention is a great resource for TriAxis sounds and utilities: Tony McKenzie’s TriAxis page at http://www.tonymckenzie.com/triaxis.htm If you click on the “TriAxis Downloads” link toward the bottom of the page he offers a TriAxis patch editor and a few TriAxis program dumps which I used as the starting points for some of the tones on the Final Gravity CD.

Why do you use it? What does it do for your sound?

I enjoy many styles of music and try to incorporate a number of different influences into the sound of Final Gravity. The TriAxis performs beautifully for my basic clean, crunch, dirty, and lead tones, but it’s also great for our songs like “Go On Home”, where I’m going for more a warm, clipped vintage tube sound and “Be Not Afraid”, where I used the TriAxis with a ZVex Fuzz Factory pedal to get a much nastier tone.

I am also a huge fan of progressive rock, particularly bands such as Rush and Dream Theater. John Petrucci from Dream Theater used a TriAxis on the album “Images and Words” and that was a big factor in influencing me to buy the preamp. Dream Theater’s sound covers a broad range of sonic territory and the TriAxis has allowed me to do the same in my work with Final Gravity.

Why this and not other similar preamps on the market? What made this one jump out at you?

I’ve had this preamp for quite a while and when I bought it, I felt it was the best preamp to meet my needs, hands down. First, I love the fact that there are no menus to deal with. Editing a program is incredibly simple and midi program change mapping is far simpler than any other product I’ve ever used. I hope to one day find a midi multi-effect unit this easy to program.

Second, the TriAxis is designed to work closely with the Mesa/Boogie 2:90 stereo power amp, which I also use. The 2:90 has three special modes (Deep, Half-Drive, and Modern) which are controlled via function switch controls on the back of the TriAxis and can be set individually set within each TriAxis program.

Last, but certainly not least is tone. When I get into a great sounding room and can really crank up the volume on my rig, the TriAxis just sings. To be honest, I haven’t looked at any alternative preamps because I’ve been so happy with the TriAxis for so long.

What is the best single feature of this preamp?

Lead 2 Yellow Mode. This mode emulates the sound of the classic Boogie Mark IIC+ and Mark IV amps. Most of my heavy rhythms and leads utilize this mode and it sounds amazing at a number of different settings. One of my favorite things to do when jamming in this mode is to use a fairly high gain setting with some delay and shape the sound using my volume pedal and dynamics from my guitar. At really low levels, Lead 2 Yellow has a bluesy, jazz-fusion sort of sound and dynamics on the guitar really carry through. As the volume pedal moves up to full, the sound becomes saturated and has sustain for days. There are lots of great nuances between the two extremes.

If there is anything you could change about or add to the preamp what would it be?

I would add a convincing Dual Rectifier bank. After the TriAxis, Mesa moved in a more aggressive tonal direction, but they never adequately revised the TriAxis to include those sounds. In version 2 units, Lead 1 Red mode used a separate Rectifier circuit board but the sound was not universally acclaimed. After that, Mesa/Boogie offered a “Fat Mod” to improve the tone, but it appears they gave up and for version 3 they describe the mode as “Classic Boogie Lead”. If Mesa would develop a new version of the TriAxis with a bank of authentic-sounding Rectifier tones, I’d buy it in a heartbeat.

Clark’s main work recently have all been about gearing up for the release of the band’s first CD on November 17th. Months of recording, mastering and manufacturing are behind them and now they are ready for some shows. They are already working on new material for a second CD in 2010.

“We’re moving in a more aggressive direction with some of our new material, so I’m working with Lead Red 1 to see if I can tame the beast,” he says. “Of course, if Mesa/Boogie decides to add a Rectifier bank to the TriAxis, I’ll be the first in line to buy it.”