Pro Tone Pedals, a boutique manufacturer of pedals for guitar and bass, started up in 2004 in Crossroads, Texas - a suburb just north of Dallas.

"I had been building and modifying pedals for years, so it was a pretty natural progression to make a go of it." says Dennis Mollan, owner of Pro Tone. "Currently, the Pro Tone staff consists of my wife, Jenn, who handles most of the customer service, and keeps our books. Felix LaFlamme does much of our artwork and I do everything else. When we have special events or large orders we will bring in some extra hands to help with the enclosure drilling and powder-coating."

The company currently manufacture 19 pedals with a core of 12 and seven or eight units that are rotated in and out. The second best selling pedal is the Lithium chorus which is a modernized and modified version of the Small Clone. The Body Rot II is currently the best seller from Pro Tone.

"It’s an extremely high gain Dual Rectifier emulation with a robust tone stack- VERY heavy metal." says Mollan.

And that is sort of Pro Tone's Modus Operandi--straight up rock.

"We’re not trying to give you Hendrix’s fuzz, or SRVs tone- we know modern rock and metal- that’s what I grew up on, that’s what I listen to in the car, its what I play in my bands," says Mollan. "It’s what I know. I build pedals that I want to play."

A full list of musicians who use Pro Tone pedals are on the company website Mollan is happy to drop a few names.

"Matt Sorum has a bundle of Pro Tone units in his studio, they used them while writing the upcoming Velvet Revolver album," he says. "Other bands include Camp Freddy, Ministry, Fear Factory,Overkill, Toxic Twist and Prong. Obviously we have a pretty big base of rock & metal players. But beyond metal we have bands like Flickerstick from VH1’s Bands On The Run, a power-pop outfit from Detroit called The Fags, Jeremy Goldsmith a blues player from New York , we’re working with goth/punk pioneers Kommunity FK out of L.A. -our users really run the gamut. The bottom line is- cool gear and great tone are universal."

The components Mollan uses are "standard boutique parts"--True by-pass switches, powder-coated die cast aluminum enclosures, Alpha pots etc.

"The whole is much greater than the sum of the parts. It’s the design; it’s the thought we put into the usability of each model; it’s the care that goes into every pedal we build." says Mollan.

Pro Tone Pedals are built with an aluminum enclosure and a foot switch that is rated to handle no less than 30,000 stomps. While a few of the pedals are inspired by vintage designs modernized by Mollan most are his own, original creations.

One of the new pedals is the Raven Dirty Chorus ( a complete article on this pedal is on the way), which combines a chorus effect followed by a fuzz circuit. When asked about other possible signature models Mollan says; "Its probable."