Alex Lifeson and Mojotone CEO Michael McWhorter on how Lerxst is more than just another signature brand
Across his time in Rush, Alex Lifeson’s guitar sounds were as meticulous and purposeful as the music itself. Throughout the band’s varied discography, his virtuosic playing is presented through clear, bright and obviously considered tones – his care for the sound clearly exemplified by his constant experimentation with different effects, amps and guitars.
And so even though it’s a range of gear bearing his name (well, his nickname at least), calling any given Lerxst product an “Alex Lifeson signature” feels a bit redundant – the brand’s amplifiers, cabinets, pedals and loaded pickguards are something else entirely. Lerxst is instead a new brand in its own right – but one that’s totally dedicated to that library of sounds the Rush guitarist spent the better part of 50 years establishing.
READ MORE: Lerxst By-Tor review – far more than an Alex Lifeson signature overdrive pedal
While it was late last year that it began to ramp up the new products, the Lerxst brand first started over a decade ago, back when Rush were touring the Clockwork Angels album. The band was already collaborating with amp and pickup maker Mojotone for some staging aspects of the tour, and so when Lifeson had the idea of building his own amplifier, the solution was obvious – Mojotone, as well as being a brand in its own right, is also an OEM. Collaboration is its bread and butter.
And so in 2012, the Lerxst Omega was born. The limited-edition run of 50-watt amplifier heads was based on the Marshall Silver Jubilee Alex used for the Clockwork Angels album and tour. However, the tweaks that were made to the circuit represented the tonal preferences he had developed over his career playing with Rush.
“I used a lot of amps over that 50 year period. I knew what I liked and I knew what I didn’t,” Alex tells us. “My sound developed a lot, and certainly in the last 10 or 15 years, it settled into what it was at the end of Rush’s touring career.” The Omega amplifier evidently succeeded in capturing what Lifeson did like – even with the refresh of the brand last year, its circuitry has remained unchanged since that first limited run in 2012.
Alex Lifeson with Lerxst amplifiers. Image: Press
Approaching design
When it came to actually capturing the things Alex liked, Mojotone CEO Michael McWhorter tells us that a healthy appreciation of Rush across the business helped get things going on the right tracks: “I’m a huge Rush fan, and have been forever. And all of our designers here are too. So having that knowledge of the discography, of how Alex’s tone has changed over the years, and of the different equipment that he’s used – that foundation gave us an idea of where to start from.”
Michael also paints a picture of the actual amp design process as pretty seamless and enjoyable. “Sending an amp to Alex, and getting his feedback after he played it for a few weeks, seeing if he wanted it to change more or if he was happy – that was really an exciting time, a really fun process,”
Alex echoes this sentiment. “Mojotone has always been amazing to work with. We have a very good, friendly relationship. It’s not just a business thing – we’ve done some work together, person to person, the staff came up for shows and so on.”
“I remember that they were always very open to anything that I wanted changed, or anything that I was looking for. They were really encouraging me, saying ‘tell us what you want’ as we went back and forth. So we did do a couple of prototypes that way, but really I was happy right from the start – it was just minor tweaking that it needed.”
Mojotone CEO Michael McWhorter with Lerxst amplifiers. Image: Press
A new look, and a new amplifier
The new look for the amps, launched last year, takes some cues from some classic Rush imagery, as Michael explains. “It was the 40th anniversary of Moving Pictures, so we took our cues from that with, especially with the red, and the way we refreshed the Starman logo. Alex is a car guy, too, so we kind of brought in some of those aesthetics, and mixed them in with the Moving Pictures look.”
Alex adds that it’s a “good, handsome amplifier” – but out of the Lerxst range, the most visually imposing product has to be the Omega 4×12 cabinet. It almost has the proportions of a 6×12, with an extra-tall design. “I think it just looks fantastic,” Alex says. “If I was to go out on the road again, I think I would like to have about 15 of them across the stage, that would look brilliant. Maybe even stack those!”
However, with the addition of the Chi (pronounced “kai”) combo amplifier to the Lersxt lineup, comes some acknowledgement that, for the average gig you or I might play, an extra-tall 4×12 cab might be a bit much. “The combo is great because you can carry it yourself,” Alex says. You don’t need to have your tech, if you have one, carry it around. You can take it yourself, which is what I do, and set it up and go. It’s great.”
But other than its heft, what separates the Chi from the Omega? “The biggest difference is that we use 6L6s instead of EL34s,” Michael explains. “The amp is still in the same vein, it still has the same sort of flavour as the Omega, but the Chi has got a little more headroom. It’s a little more clear, maybe a little more articulate. If you hit that famous ‘Alex Lifeson chord’, with all six strings, you can really hear all six strings.
“So the Chi is definitely in the same family, but it’s different enough. We also wanted to put it into a smaller package – not everybody needs a 4×12 and a 50-watt head. It’s a grab-and-go package that you could use in your bedroom or take onto a stage.”
But it’s far from second fiddle in the lineup – Alex tells us that both amps get a good amount of use by him. “I use the Omega everyday for my recordings here at home. But when I play live, I take the Chi combo with me. It’s a perfect amp for that sort of gig. It’s nice and lightweight, it sounds awesome, it looks awesome – everybody loves it.”
Sound manipulation
Late last year Lerxst launched its first foray into effects, with two pedals named after the pair of canine antagonists in the Fly By Night song By-Tor And The Snow Dog – the former, a drive, the latter, a fuzz. “I’ve been into effects since I first started playing guitar with my first Fuzz Face that I plugged into my parents’ TV,” Alex says. “And over the years I progressed from stomp boxes to high-end rack-mounted units. But I’ve always been interested in that sound-shaping aspect of guitar.”
“I love the idea of creating different sounds that don’t really sound like a guitar at all. That’s one of the things I love about the Envy Of None project – 70 or 80 per cent of the guitars on those records don’t sound anything like a guitar. That’s really a lot of fun for me. And of course, you need to be able to manipulate those typical, straight-ahead guitar sounds with all these great effects.”
The two pedals offer something quite different – the By-Tor is an amp-in-a-box-style drive based on the Omega, with the addition of a boost. “I find that I use it all the time,” Alex says. “It’s not just a distortion pedal, and it’s not just a boost pedal – that tone sweep is really effective, the distortion is just really saturated and warm. It sounds like a really nice amp that’s been overdriven, rather than a typical stompbox with a very linear kind of distortion.”
The Snow Dog, on the other hand, is an aggressive octave fuzz, which was inspired by Lifeson’s tone on the solo of The Weapon. “I used an MXR octave divider pedal for that song, and brought it on tour whenever we played it. But I didn’t use it a lot other than that one track,” Alex explains. “But when we came up with this idea for the Snow Dog, I thought it was really cool to go back and reprise that whole character of that sound. It’s a really wild, fun pedal that you can use to create a lot of cool sounds that are really off the wall.”
Alex says that the two offerings work well together – “we have the combination of one really straight-ahead pedal that you can use for anything when you want a nice, creamy sound that’s controlled, and something that’s totally uncontrolled. It’s almost Yin and Yang with the Lerxst pedals.”
Michael also notes that their interlocking design is nicely illustrated by the Rush canon their names draw from: “In the battle between By-Tor and the Snow Dog, it wouldn’t have made sense for the Snow Dog to have been, say, a chorus pedal. It had to be something that was equally powerful.”
An all-analogue approach
Although he keeps schtum about the specifics, Alex teases that the brand has “a couple of other effects ideas coming along”, in the relatively near future – effects that will “test the parameters of what you can do with sound manipulation on a guitar.” So as Lerxst looks forward, and to some degree onto the floor where your pedalboard goes, I’m curious as to how Alex and Michael see the brand’s relationship to digital gear. It’s an undeniable part of the modern guitar landscape, but is it something Lerxst would want to embrace? The answer is a resounding “no”.
“You know, buy whatever amp you want,” Alex says. “But the one that we make sounds really good, and it’s based on a more traditional lineage. Digital is becoming a much better platform within itself. But when you’re using a plugin compared to an amp that’s mic’d, the difference is so noticeable – I hear depth in the amp that’s mic’d, I hear internal dynamics, I hear so much that I don’t hear in the digital plugin, which seems almost pasted onto the screen.”
Other than tonal quality and consistency, Alex explains that he and Michael are happy with Lerxst’s scope – it’s not about being the biggest amp company in the world. “We just do what we do,” he says, “and we like to believe in it. We don’t make something that we think is going to be a huge seller because we want to make a bunch of money. We do it because we’re having fun with it.”
The future
Alex Lifeson has, of course, already gone down the more traditional “signature gear” route – most recently with his Gibson and Epiphone Axcess Les Pauls – but it’s clear that what he’s doing with Lerxst has a very different motivation. “I was always involved in the design and the release of those guitars. But with Lerxst, it’s different – having a good relationship with Mojotone, for a long time, and with an idea of where we’re going – that’s good. For one thing, it’s fun. I’m not a business guy. I am just an artist, and I hear things the way I hear them, and I thought it’d be cool to have some gear that reflected my experience, and things that I would play.
“I use all the guitars that I’ve been involved with. I definitely wasn’t just slapping my name on it. But forward, we have some other plans for some other pedals and we’ll see where all of that takes us. But it’s definitely fun to have your own thing, and work together in a small group to make it happen.”
The environment is clearly a productive one – the Lerxst lineup now also includes, on top of the amps, cabinets and effects – a guitar, made in collaboration with Godin, and based on Lifeson’s Hentor Sportscaster. It incorporates a set of electronics that’s also available as a loaded pickguard, meaning if you have a compatible S-type, you can instantly Sportscaster-ify it.
Alex praises Godin’s work on the instrument as a whole, but is particularly effusive about Mojotone’s electronics work: “I’ve been using the Lerxst guitar primarily for them because they have such a shiny, clear quality that I think is really unique. I don’t hear it in a lot of guitars. And the humbucker is nice and smooth, without being overpowering. So it’s a really balanced combination.”
So while Lerxst doesn’t want to take over the world, it could feasibly take over your signal chain – from guitar to speaker, and everything in between. So what’s next? “I think our motto going forward is this: to build something that’s very useful as a creative tool, something that people will really respond to, and grow to love,” says Alex. “Nothing flashy, just something really solid that really works well.”
“Alex hit the nail on the head,” Michael adds. “We’re not necessarily trying to compete with Fender, Gibson or Marshall– we’re just just having fun and trying to put out cool equipment that’s well made, that a lot of musicians can find a use for and be creative with.”
You can find out more at lerxstamps.com.
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