Last month, I got to do something I have never done before—I got to experience Winter NAMM. For those of you that don’t know what NAMM is, it stands for Nat’l Assoc. of Music Merchants, and it’s the world’s biggest trade show for the musical instrument industry, and there are two NAMM events each year. The big one is in Anaheim, where I was in the photo above. Summer NAMM, which is about 20% the size and scale of the winter show, is held here in Music City.
As mentioned in the post about The Four Seasons Guitars, I was there to check out the results of our design and illustration work in person, thinking that this may be my only shot to ever see them up close. I flew in to Anaheim the night before the show opened, and was shuttled to my tiny box of a hotel room about a mile away from the Anaheim Convention Center. You’ll see shots of my room in the photos at the link below, should you want to see them. The show goes on for 4 days, and I was only there for the first 2 days, so I sat in my room and planned out where I was going to go when each day, so I had an efficient plan given my limited time there. That place is so gigantic, there is no way—NO WAY—to see all of it in 4 days, and not be doing it OJ Simpson style, running the whole time.
Thursday morning I started out at the McPherson Guitars booth, and met our contact there for the first time in person, as well as the other McPherson employees there. Then I was shown our guitars, and was thrilled to see and hold them in person. The photo above has me holding the “fall” guitar, which of the 4, is our favorite. After hanging there the first hour or so of the show, I popped by a few other booths to see their stuff, one of which is Tom Anderson, whose guitars I really like even though I do not own any.
Next up was going to see my friends at Taylor Guitars, one of my favorite guitar makers, because the man himself, Bob Taylor, was signing copies of his brand new book, Guitar Lessons, and I wanted to get a signed copy for me and my friend Paul Bogart, being a Taylor Guitars player. I have met and had my picture taken with Bob Taylor on two other occasions, here in Nashville at Summer NAMM, and the guy could not be nicer and more pleasant to talk to. He has also answered two questions of mine in his Q&A column in their in-house magazine, Wood&Steel—one of which was asking about if they would ever make a double cutaway guitar. Guess what their big electric news was at the show. Yep, double cutaway electrics. I‘m taking an ounce of credit on that to get the ball rollling, even though it was 2 years ago. I’m just sayin’.
While at the Taylor room, I caught up with Sr. Art Director Cory Sheehan who I have known for a few years now, and saw my friends/salesmen Barney Hill and Aaron Dablow for a very brief hello. After hanging there for a while taking shots and catching part of the set from Plain White Ts, I mosied (sp?) on, checking out other companies’ booths that I wanted to see, like Paul Reed Smith Guitars, another favorite of mine, as well as others like Vox, Tascam, Orange, Warwick, Markbass, VooDoo Labs, Dunlop, Fender and Hartke, where I saw one of my all time favorite bass players, Billy Sheehan doing a demo clinic on a new amp.
Later on in the day I went to the PRS Studio room, where I saw some performances of some PRS artists, and see part of a clinic on recording like I saw back in September at Experience PRS 2010. I ended Thursday back in the Taylor room to catch Doyle Dykes play, who I have never seen live. He is a godly and talented man, and did an amazing job of playing, but also putting the gospel out there for anyone and everyone to hear. He had his daughter Haley with him and David Pack, formerly of Ambrosia who came out to do some tunes with Doyle. It was a great and uplifting way to end day one.
Day two found me starting the day at the Breedlove booth, then heading back to McPherson to play some guitars, and I stayed there an hour or so, just hanging and playing guitars, one of which is their new 12-string, which was one of the nicest sounding and playing 12-strings I have ever heard or played in my entire life, and I have played several. Even owned 4 over time, so I am a fan of 12-strings. There were others I played as well with exotic woods and incredible appointments on them, and I had to get some more photos of The Four Seasons guitars before saying goodbye to the McPherson team, and thanking them again for hiring us for that project. Lord willing, we will get more work from them in the future.
Other highlights of Friday were the hour long press conference at the PRS booth, where I saw tons of artists gathered for the 2011 product announcement. Just some of the artists I saw were Ricky Skaggs, Cody Kilby, Tony McManus, Brad Whitford from Aerosmith, Dweezil Zappa, Miles Kennedy of Alter Bridge, David Grissom, Warren Haynes, Howard Leese and Davy Knowles. That was a treat to be a part of—being feet away from that epic of a group of guitar players was pretty cool. I also checked out some other companies’ booths that I like and have gear from, like Boss, Elixir, Levy’s, Fishman, Digitech and I went back for a 2nd visit to a few that I was rushed in the day before.
After hitting the PRS studio again for more performances, including a killer jam with David Grissom and Davy Knowles, I ended day two in the same place I ended day one—Taylor Guitars. This time it was to see a band I have liked for more than 20 years—Night Ranger. They were such a blast to see, and ROCKED the Taylor room in a big, big way. After they were done, and the crowd emptied out of the packed room, I hung out for a bit with Barney and Cory and played a few guitars, and then poured myself into a booth at a local restaurant to sit and unwind.
Stay tuned . . .
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