The Guitar Channel: NAMM 2010: Day 3

Saturday is always the NAMM show's busiest day, and I have many highlights to report. Early in the day I was able to see Chris Poland and 'Pag' from OHM jamming at the Eminence booth. It's always a treat to see players of this caliber in these small-scale NAMM floor settings. Chris was burning as usual. After Eminence, I hit some other booths and saw lots of big names on the floor - I saw Gene Simmons heading to an appearance with a throng of people following him, Slash made a couple of appearances, I saw Flea walk through, saw George Lynch chatting with Uli Roth, saw Andy Timmons, Paul Gilbert, and Tony MacAlpine signing at the Ibanez booth, and on and on.

One of the highlights of the day for me was meeting Steve Lukather. As you may recall, back in November I posted a video of Luke jamming with Joe Bonamassa that Luke himself commented on. He essentially agreed with an earlier comment that he was overplaying on the song, and that the clip kinda sucked. Out of respect for Luke, I considered taking the post down at that point, but a good discussion was ensuing in the comments so I left it up. When I met Luke yesterday, I sheepishly revealed that the Guitar Channel was my site, and that I was the one who posted that video. Obviously I didn't need to do that, but I wanted to tell him I was sorry if I pissed him off. He absolutely could not have been cooler about the whole thing. He said hey, sometimes you're gonna have a bad night, but the next night you might play great. He said the difference nowadays is with YouTube, everything you play gets posted and viewed by millions of people. His "no-worries" attitude was very genuine, and super cool. What a great cat.

Another highlight of the day was seeing Tony Levin's Stick Men band play in the LOUD Technologies demo room. Their stuff is very rhythmic, and highly progressive. Levin is an absolute maniac on the Chapman Stick.

After the show I headed to San Pedro to see Alex Machacek (guitar), Ric Fierabracci (bass), Tom Brechtlein (drums), and Phil Turcio (keys) at Alva's Showroom. Marco Minnemann was originally slated to play drums, but due to unforseen circumstances, Brechtlein was enlisted to fill in. At the show I met up with Souvik Dutta from Abstract Logix, and guitarist Amit Heri who has been traveling with Souvik during NAMM. What a great hang. Got to talk with Alex before the show and between sets. He's always been one of my favorite players, and is a great guy to boot. His new album with Marco Minnemann sounds like it's going to be killer. I believe he said the title will be "26 Tales;" it was originally part of Minnemann's Normalizer project, but it will be released on it's own through Abstract Logix. Can't wait to hear it. I'd like to give this show it's own write-up, but I'll say this - These guys were some of the best pro's I've seen. Alex told me before the show that he was a bit nervous about the gig, since the setlist had to be changed at the last minute due to Minnemann's absence, and he was not as familiar with the material as he'd like to be. Nevertheless, everybody killed on this gig. They worked off of charts, and it was so cool to see these guys execute on such a professional level. There were a couple of tunes that Brechtlin hadn't even played before, but you would have had no idea. Fantastic playing by everyone involved. Below you'll find one of the videos I shot from this great gig.

I probably won't spend much time at the show today, being that it's the last day which is traditionally light on content. Tonight, however, is going to be huge. I'll be heading back to Alva's to see OHM, and Kofi Baker's Cream tribute featuring Mike Keneally on guitar. I'm sure this will be an awesome show that will pack Alva's to the gills. Stay tuned...

By the way... between the slow internet connection in my hotel, and the God-awful ATT&T coverage at the convention center, my ability to post updates, videos, etc, has been severely hampered. I've got a ton of pics, and some great videos, but most of it won't be uploaded until I get home.

Alex Machacek - "Actual Proof" solo live at Alva's 1/16/10

Comments

Thanks for this video. Alex and friends tearing it up. When I saw him with Marco and Kai last year, he sat on the stage part of the time and read charts. New album should be great. Who is the bass player on it, Ric?

Posted by: Rob Waxman | January 17, 2010 at 01:58 PM