In one word, awesome. In two words, awesomely awesome!

Share My Guitar Show!

Last Saturday, 8/07/2010, I made a trip down to the Santa Monica Civic Center to check out the 4 Amigos Guitar Show which I had heard about from another article on SMG, and I’m glad I did. There was a reasonably sized auditorium full of headstocks; a sight that could make any fretted instrument enthusiast go wild.

Before I headed out to the show, I knew that you can buy, sell and trade equipment (aside from the oogling), so I grabbed two pedals and took them with me just in case anything sparked the “I CANNOT GO ON WITHOUT THIS!” kind of feeling, thinking that I would be able to bargain. I brought a Line 6 DL4 Delay Modeler knowing that I could get about $175 in a pinch but was reluctant to release it from my arsenal. I also took my Digitech Death Metal pedal which I have not used in about 2 years, so I figured I could probably trade it for a less expensive octave pedal around $40 – $50.

I Must Be Dreaming

The first thing I noticed when I walked into that auditorium was the sheer amount of rare and vintage gear up for grabs. Then I noticed some of the pricing on said gear and I was overwhelmed. One booth easily had over $200,000 worth of guitars, with each guitar commanding about $12,000! Oh but the guitars were definitely of quality, I even managed to find numerous incarnations of my next dream guitar, a Gibson ES-175. A Florentine cutaway never looked so sexy.

Parts!

I quickly realized this was as serious as a lighthearted guitar convention could get.

This place also had all sorts of parts for new or old guitars like: replacement necks, switches, pots, bodies, and pickups… anything and everything to restore or modify your guitar!

Well, I Never!

I also came across a few booths that had nice pedal collections and I saw things that I never knew existed before, like this Foxx Turtle Tone Machine.

This beast is a Volume/Fuzz/Octave/Wah all in one!

While browsing through pedals I came across something that caught my eye, a cheap octave pedal, to be more specific an old DOD Octoplus.

I tried it out on a Strat copy at the booth. I wasn’t too impressed and the man working the booth, although kind enough, really wasn’t into my trade (I don’t really blame him). But, man were there pedals….

Here are some of the other cool finds I found!

Sheet Music Guitar

Myself at the Roland station where they were promoting the MicroCube amp.

1966 Gretsch, Beautiful.

Time To Go

Although I didn’t want to leave, I felt that if I had stayed any longer, I wouldn’t be able to pay next months rent. This was time well spent, close up and personal with fine instruments from yesteryear. Not many chances come by when you can see a magnificent sight like this, as well as talk to fellow guitarists about one of their greatest loves!

If there is a guitar show like this coming to your area, I would highly recommend you report there ASAP to simply ingest the guitar knowledge floating through the air, and maybe you might just pickup something when your girlfriend turns around… just kidding.

* * * * *

Mike Kolbenson is a staff writer at SMG. Mike is a recent graduate from Purchase College, SUNY and absolutely in love with all things guitar. Email: mikekolbenson@sharemyguitar.com

Like this post? Then you won’t want to miss the other awesome posts we have planned. Subscribe to Share My Guitar and get new posts delivered daily…for FREE!

The latest edition of Taylor Guitars Wood & Steel is now out (Volume 63 Spring 2010) and we were very pleased to see that Taylor published an excerpt from our review of the Taylor 414ce!

The latest edition of Wood&Steel features Dave Matthews, Backstage with Tommy Kessler and more!

The Five-Star 414ce

ShareMyGuitar.com

Excerpt From Wood&Steel (page 16):

When our friends at Share MyGuitar, an online social network for guitar enthusiasts, asked to do a review of a mid-priced Taylor acoustic/electric, the 414ce ended up a big winner. Reviewer Nick Arrietta takes the guitar through some pretty strenuous playing, and with each different style, the guitar rose to the occasion. “The guitar is the perfect acoustic for any style of music, whether fingerstyle, folk, voice accompaniment, rock, jazz, and beyond,” Arrietta says. “The resonating tone that comes through this guitar is unlike any other acoustic I have played to date.” Arrietta concludes that “this amazing guitar is at the top of my
list, with its warm, full-sounding mids and bold lows,” and gives the guitar a five-star rating (out of five). With its “electric feel” and “smooth and easy to grip” neck, it’s “just what the guitar doctor ordered.”

Wood&Steel began as a desire of Taylor co-founders Bob Taylor and Kurt Listug to create an informative communication channel between the company and the people who buy our guitars.

Alright fine, I admit it. I play guitar and yet… I have purchased multiple versions of the popular video games “Guitar Hero” and “Rock Band” from local big box retailers.

The Video Game Controller Consists of an Actual Guitar!

It’s true that whilst playing these games, I’ve rocked out to some of my favorite songs along-side an animated Slash or the Beatles and I even had a rock-off against the devil himself. All and all, I kept this one quiet, as to not raise any annoyed eyebrows from  my “real” guitar playing buddies, until now.

News recently broke about a company called Seven45 Studios unleashing a new video game on the likes of Guitar Hero or Rock Band, but this one, “Power Gig: Rise of the SixString” uses a REAL GUITAR as the gaming controller. Yes, that’s right, with actual strings and everything!

Now, although Power Gig: Rise of the Six String will be equipped with an actual guitar, the game does not require that players be a shredmeister-extraordinaire. Think of the game as the next step in an evolution of guitar gaming. A hybrid if you will of the Guitar Hero style games, combined with player modes that have you press down on the correct string or shape basic chords for extra points. It may not make every gamer a great guitar player, but it’s likely to fuel interest in guitar to countless boys, girls, men and woman who might not have ever held an actual guitar in their hands or even touched an actual guitar string.

I can only guess that this game will help to spawn other more realistic type guitar games in the future. And that will be a cool thing for those interested in expanding their guitar gaming, jamming along to their favorite songs, or just wanting to waste time playing video games and listening to killer tunes!

The game is slated to be released in the Fall of 2010.

While at Winter NAMM 2010, I spent some time with my bands bass player and his old band mates from the 60’s. They kept telling me I needed to go to the Guitar Geek Festival that was happening down the street from the Convention Center. I sat on the fence and almost didn’t go. I was tired, my feet hurt and seen enough for one day. Well, at the last minute I went. My friends had saved me a seat which was a coveted prize they had to fight for to hold for me. It turned out to be the most entertainment I had, including all my interviews with famous icons of the guitar world. Not because it was the hip place to be. It was because everyone there just loved guitars of any kind.

Deke Dickerson performing live at the 7th Annual Guitar Geek Festival

Deke Dickerson was the host of the show, or party, if you will. He emceed and played a variety of instruments throughout the night. Very well I might add. At one point “Deke” who had been dressed as a formal cowboy all evening, came out and did a Ramones tribute with his impromptu band which included Tom Kenny-the voice of Spongebob Squarepants as the lead singer. They were all in costume including the correct wigs.

I thought to myself, “this must be what NAMM would be like if you were on acid.” You see, not only were the mega stars of guitar at NAMM, but every poser on the planet was there too. I’m talking sunglasses and capes, mohawks and zoot suits. You name it. There were freaks covering ever possible mix of genre attire. The interesting thing was that they were not trying to be funny. Deke and his crew were. That is a big difference.

Another segment of the show was the “Electric 12 String Nightmare.” Anyone who brought an electric 12 string could join in on stage to play a song together. There were 17 takers. Have you ever heard seventeen 12 string electric guitars going at once? Me neither. It was worth the price of admission alone.

HoneyBoy Edwards was there and did a set with Joel Paterson, a guitarists guitarist. HoneyBoy is 94 years old and still gigging. Amazingly he had to leave because he had to get to another gig in L.A. Billed as the last living bluesman to play with Robert Johnson, he was worth the price of admission as well. Joel brought up his own band from Chicago and blew everyone away. Now I am an official “Joel Paterson and the Modern Sounds” fan. They were beyond “tight”.

At one point during the History of Lap Steel Guitars segment of the show, Chas Smith loosened some of my fillings with his 28 lbs of titanium fury monster slide guitar. Pushing the envelope with this instrument also was worth the ticket in.

Lots of other amazing stuff went down that night including dueling double neck guitars with Brian Longbeck and Elaine Frizzell and it was all headlined by Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Duane Eddy. He played a bunch of his stuff with Deke and Joel and never dropped a single note. And it wasn’t  just Duane who played to utter perfection, it was all of them. They are all Hall of Famers in my book. Yes, that includes you too, Crazy Joe. You did Enon, Ohio proud.

Bruce Jacob armed with one of his killer Coil Guitars at 2010 NAMM

We were lucky enough to catch up with the founder of Coil Guitars on the 3rd day of NAMM. Coil makes awesome guitars and their electronics are developed by guitar-playing engineering professors, so you know they’re amazing. Their electronics are insanely versatile, and are now available to anyone to put in any guitar. Check out this video demonstration we shot at NAMM…

Coil Guitars was started when Bruce became frustrated while searching for a guitar with must-have features, like multi-tone circuits, neck-through construction, and an ebony fretboard with real abalone inlays. He had no problem finding guitars with those specs, the problem was that they all cost more than 2 grand. Out of Bruce’s frustration, came Coil Guitars. In addition to making the electronics that Bruce talked about in the video, they also make a pretty awesome lineup of guitars, like the classy Ronin double cutaway ($999) and the asymmetrical double cutaway Hammer ($999), which is bad ass. They’re definitely a boutique guitar company worth checking out.

Photo and video © 2010 by Dan Coplan

Oops!

The post you looking for is no longer available. Check out lots of awesome guitar articles at our Blog, or…

Join the SMG Social Network!

Share My Guitar has an awesome social network for guitar enthusiasts. SMG is a place where people can come together to talk about guitars, pass around information, and build a community where everyone shares their passion for guitars, no matter who they are or what style of music they’re into. Join up today!

Riffin’ on Gretsch live at 2010 NAMM

Dan Coplan and Oscar Jordan caught up with Fred Gretsch of Gretsch guitars at the NAMM show on Saturday. He is one cool dude. They discussed guitars, rock n roll and the Gretsch Eddie Cochran tribute guitar.  The only thing that could get them to stop talking guitar was the blaring distortion, screeching from punk band Rancid, who began their set, a short distance away.

For almost 130 years Gretsch has been fine tuning what has become known as “That Great Gretsch Sound.” Gretsch was founded by Friedrich Gretsch in 1883. Only 12 years later Friedrich died, leaving the fledgling company in the hands of his teenage son Fred. Fred built Gretsch into a leader in musical instruments, and eventually handed the company over to his sons, Fred Jr. and Bill in 1927. That’s Fred Jr. in the photo and in the following video…

Photo and video © 2010 by Dan Coplan

Another highlight for us at this years 2010 NAMM show was the Taylor Guitars exhibit. They have a TON of killer guitars and not just your standard 6-string acoustic guitar. Nope. Amongst the vast herd of beautiful guitars on display in the room were a few special models that captivated our attention, the Taylor Solidbody Series and The Taylor Baritone 8-string. We spoke with Taylor’s PR Manager Chalise Zolezzi who gave us a personal tour of the latest and greatest from this years Taylor factory. Later we sat down and rapped with one of Taylor Guitar’s very knowledgeable guitar guru’s,  Product Specialist Corey Witt, for a little one on one about the new “Hot Swappable” Taylor Solidbody guitars.

Check out the video below from 2010 NAMM of sharemyguitar.com’s Oscar Jordan testing out a couple sweet Taylor guitar’s and speaking with a few interesting cats along the way:

We spent a lot more time than we had planned in the Taylor booth. It was just slammed with cool people, killer axes and friendly Taylor representatives. I guess they can afford to be a bit more relaxed than your average exhibitor since they are based in Southern California. Not a major trek for them to get to the Anaheim Convention Center. Plus they’re on eof the cool kids of the class. It’s easy to be chill when everyone wants to hang out with you. On top of all this, what was particularly nice was that everything was meant to be touched, scrutinized and PLAYED! We had a blast checking out various acoustic models and at nearly every moment you could hear random jam sessions breaking out all across the room.  I think it’s safe to say that SMG will be checking back with Taylor Guitar’s at next years NAMM show. And we’re also looking forward to posting reviews and info about the guitars we previewed at this years NAMM. Stay tuned.

Oops!

The post you looking for is no longer available. Check out lots of awesome guitar articles at our Blog, or…

Join the SMG Social Network!

Share My Guitar has an awesome social network for guitar enthusiasts. SMG is a place where people can come together to talk about guitars, pass around information, and build a community where everyone shares their passion for guitars, no matter who they are or what style of music they’re into. Join up today!

New social network for guitarist to launch soon

ShareMyGuitar.com is set to launch a new social network for guitarist. The social network will allow registered users the ability to create a user page, network with other musicians and reach a global market.

Features include options to upload original songs, youtube videos pics and more. Make friends with other guitarist, join guitar groups and forums or peruse the classified section. Create your own blog and share your bio, band links and more with others. It’s absolutely free to join. The social network is set to launch in a matter of days so please stay tuned and we”ll keep you posted!