John Petrucci

"So when we went to in-ear monitors they got rid of the monitor wedges and John didn't have anything to put his feet up on anymore. So I had these boxes made for him made of diamond-plated stainless steel. Two years ago we were in South America and he was out front and he put his foot on a front monitor from the PA and he goes, 'I can feel my guitar! How can we get that on my footrest?' So I ended up taking a bunch of ButtKicker drivers that like drummers would use on the bottom of their drum throne and I put one in each box. You just feed a little bit of the mic's signal into that channel and you can feel the guitar shake. So that was a great idea. Then earlier this year we were in the studio and he said, 'I want to be able to feel like back by my cabinets on stage.' So I got Boogie to make me some 2-12 cabinets and I put a pair of ButtKickers in each one of those. So anywhere he goes in his little area his guitar is shaking. And just to clarify to the public, none of these cabinets are plugged in on top. The heads are empty. The 2x12s have the kickers and the rest is kind of just for show," says John Petrucci's guitar tech.