Well, I just got back last night from LA and what a trip.
First of all, the weather was fantastic!!!! We landed on Tuesday evening to 70F!!
Took the shuttle from LAX to Anaheim and got checked into the hotel. That night we hooked up with Scott (vwall) and Doug West after having dinner at Mimi's cafe (great place) and went over to the Portifino to meet with Marty, Dave, and Lea from Graphtech. Well, after a few drinks we had a few more, Marty passed out on the balcony in his chair, Dave went back to his room, and we decided to head back to our hotel.
Wednesday morning we headed up to the convention center, got our badges, walked around a bit and thats when my feet started hurting, (our hotel was just over a mile from the convention center and we walked) The day was gorgeous though (85F) so we decided to walk back. Well, we got back to the hotel, had a couple drinks again, and then left with Scott and Doug and went into Beverly Hills to a garlic place called "the stinking rose"
The food was good, not sure my filet was worth $50 but it was good. Scott made mention that he just wanted to go there since it was in Beverly Hills and that the food could have tasted like Ass for all he cared, I suggested we should have gone to "the stinking ass" instead, their steaks probably would have been cheaper
Thursday morning arrived and so did we, after walking to NAMM again my feet were killing me but hey, that's what it's all about right :P Got into the show, started checking things out. DAMN!!! this place is HUGE. I met Rich Harris at guess where, yup, the Ibanez booth, shocking huh? We looked at and discussed the new Jem and JS, neither are very impressive, especially for the $$$. Well, we chatted for probably about an hour, then he had to get back to his 36 hours of hell :P
I continued to wander, met with Steve Wark from All parts, met Dave Ellefson at Peavey, Ed Degenaro from THD.
Rob Balducci, even ran into
John Petrucci in the Ernie Ball booth.
Later on we went into the Hilton to meet Mikey (Mesker) and had a few drinks with him, his father, and their friend Kim from Denver. This was one of the highlights of NAMM for me, Mikey is simply one of the coolest guys I know and I'm very pleased to be friends with him.
Afterwards we went to the Grove to see Eric Johnson, (big thanks to Vwall for scoring the tickets). The concert was dissappointing to say the least. EJ's playing was very bad, very choppy and nothing flowed, he was also off time a lot, I was quite dissappointed. He looked stiff like he hadn't played in years, he also needs to look at something besides his shoes LOL!!!!.
Anyway, after that Mikey took us back to the hotel. Also had a couple other VERY cool treats but I've been sworn to secrecy, needless to say, you'll all be amazed
Friday was a great day, got back to NAMM, wandered some more, then at 2pm we went and saw the Mark Wood rock violin orchestra. MIND BLOWING!!!!!! I saw Mark Wood on TV about 14 years ago and was blown away, seeing him live was for me like seeing Vai live for the first time is to most of you. The show was completely amazing. Then at 3pm I stayed and was wowed once again by Rob Balducci.
After the show I was wandering and saw Mark Wood in his booth, stopped and talked to him about doing some paint and inlay work on his violins, he was interested but I could tell he had that "just another guy at NAMM" feeling. So that evening I did some design sketches for him (more on that later) He told me if I wanted to do work on his vipers, I had to "blow his mind".
Later I was up in the Fender booth and bumped into Yngwie, he turned around and looked at me and said "do you want an autograph?" I looked at him and straight faced said "not really" his jaw dropped, it was like he was thinking "but I'm Yngwie!" oh well, you can almost see the flashing sign above him that says "EGO" LOL still cool to see him I guess though.
Anyway, that night we went into Downtown Disney and ate at the Rainforest Cafe, that was cool, had a great meal and a few Mai Tai's
Back again on Saturday, busy like crazy!!!! Wandering around I made my way back to Mark Wood's booth. I showed him the sketches and he was very impressed, then I brought the Leviathan over to him and he said "you've blown my mind, I'm very excited about working with you" so I was happy
Sadly I missed meeting with Vai because I was busy with Mark but that's ok, there will be other days.
The rest of NAMM was spent mostly wandering, meeting a few other people, talking about the Leviathan with people, had some pretty wicked players checking it out, met with Trevor from Jemsite here. Talked more with Rob Balducci, just pretty much enjoyed everything.
Had dinner at the House of Blues that night. Went back to the hotel, had a couple beers and called it a night.
Sunday we saw a couple of cool shows including the finals for the worlds fastest drummer competition, Mike Mangini put on a demo which was awesome as well. 1200 beats per minute with his hands (no sick jokes here guys)
Talked with Rob again for a while and went back to the hotel, ate dinner at the Jazz Kitchen that night and that's about it.
Monday morning on a shuttle back to LAX, on a plane to Calgary, and back home to the land of snow, it's nice here, about 45, but after 90, that sucks
Here's a bunch of pics I took, sorry, a lot suck, they're blurry, but hey, it's what I have
Jeremy
http://pics.lgmguitars.com/pics/NAMM%20show/
