GGE NAMM 07 Review

WINTER NAMM 2007

Another Winter NAMM at the Anaheim Convention Center proved to be as popular as ever. This year in particular seemed to be more crowded than the previous year. I spent Thursday on the floor all day and a little more time on Saturday. The best part of NAMM for me is catching up with friends, business associates and meeting musicians and gear enthusiasts alike. Also, you can’t beat some of the “improv” jam sessions on the floor. There were some great players this year including talented guitarists like Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Ben Lacy and Johnny Hyland letting loose in any given booth. It’s pretty amazing to see them up close and personal.

On a personal note, I believe that we are currently experiencing one of the best times in history for guitar gear today. Although, I feel that the market is a bit over saturated. When you can buy a guitar, socks and carrots at Wall Mart, there is something wrong. For me, it presents a challenge. If you can sift through the enormous amount of options and discover brilliant designers and equipment builders producing some of the finest equipment ever made, then you win. This is why I lean toward the boutique builders. Seeing them succeed in the vast sea of gear says something about their designs. There are so many talented designers out there creating their expression in guitars, amps and effects. This equipment is not just good, it is sometimes GREAT!

For those of you who missed the show last January, I’ve provided my personal take on the latest and greatest gear at the show. Below are pics of some of the highlights for me. I hope you enjoy!

Chris.

FAVORITE FINDS

Guitars

WINTER NAMM 2007

Misc. Pictures from the Show Floor

Amps

Pedals, Accessories & Misc. Stuff

Players & Booth Babes

Burriss Amplification - The Shadow

I had an opportunity to play a lot of guitar amps at the show and this little surprise was the best new

guitar amp I found (in my opinion). It’s a relatively small company out of Lexington, Kentucky. Bob Burris is the designer and brain child behind this small line of guitar amps. This particular model, The Shadow, is a single channel amp and it blew me away! It is designed with classic 6L6 tubes achieving 28w of supreme power with a dual phase inverter allowing you to switch between two styles of “American Clean”. Bottom line....it just sounds and feels FANTASTIC! A real player’s amp! I describe the sound as a beautiful “pillowy” clean sound with a warm breakup upon attack. It is single channel and light weigh with a very unique style. I went back

on Saturday because I just had to play it again.

The amplifier line also includes a clever tilt panel that is built into the amplifier. This is a new twist on the age old problem of pointing your amp up and away from the front row. The other two amps in his line up are called “The db Special” and “The Switchmaster”. Both are decent sounding amps but The Shadow stole the show for me.

Burriss also makes a small boost pedal called “The Boostiest II” which is a clean preamp pedal. Check out Burriss Amplifiers at their website listed below. Great job Bob!

Website: www.burrissamps.com

Contact: Bob Burriss

RJM Music - RG16 Audio Loop & Function Switcher

One of my main goals at NAMM this year was to look at loop-based switching systems for my guitar rig. I am going to make a change in how my rig is wired and I’ve decide to go with a loop-based switching system. Of all the contenders in this market, only a few were actually exhibiting at the show which

was a bit disappointing. I must say that I have done a lot of research on the web and I’ve made quite a few calls and talked to several companies about their switching systems. After meeting RJM Music who were set up at the Diamond Amplification booth and seeing their switching solution in action, I am thoroughly impressed with their take on controlling effects and amplifiers.

Ron Menelli, electronics designer, guitar player and business owner is passionate about guitars, effects and amplifiers and how to control them. His new product release at NAMM, the RG-16, is a combined audio loop switcher and function switcher. The RG-16 is very well thought out allowing the user to easily select the switching combination on the front panel. It provides 8 audio loops, 8 function switches and a high quality audio buffer in a single rack space. The RG-16 interfaces with any midi controller and seems to be built like a tank. Although I have not done an audio listening test, I can’t imagine that Ron would allow anything less then the finest audio components for the cleanest signal routing and switching. The product is schedule for official release this spring.

Ron was using the Voodoo Labs Ground Control midi remote controller at the show which interfaced nicely

with the RG-16. Although Ron doesn’t offer a remote control solution yet, he hinted at developing his own version of a remote foot controller with a few unique twists. I’m looking forward to that! Also, Ron’s wife, Sheri, was there to help generate excitement for the new product. Very enthusiastic! Great job Sheri!

The RG-16 compliments RJM’s current line of amp controllers, loop switchers and other unique product offerings including the Loop Gizmo and the Amp Gizmo. Visit the RJM Music website for a full review of this product line.

Website: http://www.rjmmusic.com/

Contact: Ron Menelli

Paul Reed Smith - Guitar Amp (Made by Dumble?)

Well, I know absolutely nothing about this “limited addition” guitar amp that was in the Paul Reed Smith booth except that it sound awesome! PRS is mainly known for its beautifully finished and fine made guitars. I don’t think that they have plans to release guitar amplifier products but they had this beautifully designed guitar amp in their booth which was used by the guest guitarists including Johnny Hyland and Pat Travers. The sound of this amp was amazingly sweet and warm and just filled the PRS booth with wonderful guitar tones.

Although I have not been able to confirm this, I believe this amplifier is a rare, hand-made amplifier built by an Ex-Fender amplifier designer. I believe the price tag for this puppy is about $30,000. Needless to say, I was unable to place my order...

By the way, if any of you can confirm or deny this, please let me know. Or, if you have any further information about this amp, I’d love to hear from you.

Some of you may have heard of the PRS HG-70 Harmonic Generator. In the early 90s, PRS set out to design a top-fight guitar amp using transistor technology, and the PRS HG-70 Harmonic Generator was the result, without doubt one of the sweetest, warmest solid-state guitar amps ever made.

The Harmonic Generator's circuitry was designed primarily by Eric Pritchard, currently of Pritchard Amps, and was innovative in two key ways. First was the use of a harmonic generator (surprise!) that was used to add additional harmonics to the amp's basic tone to create a lively, more tube-like sound and response to playing touch. Secondly, the PRS HG-70 was one of the very few transformer output-coupled transistor amps ever designed. In essence, it actually utilized an output transformer, much like a tube amp. However, after PRS dropped the amplifier project, Pritchard remained convinced that a solid state amplifier could sound like the classic amplifiers. With this conviction, Deja Vu Audio was born which later developed into Pritchard Amps.

Website: http://www.prsguitars.com/

Webiste: http://www.pritchardamps.com/pritchardamps.cfm

Gary Kramer Guitars - Delta Wing Tomcat

These unique looking guitars really caught my attention. Come to find out, this is Gary Kramer’s next adventure. Gary Kramer is the man behind the original Aluminum Travis Bean Guitars as well as the

infamous Kramer Guitars that set a standard for heavy metal guitars in the 80s and 90s. In his latest line of guitars, Gary has rethought the ergonomics of the traditional guitar and has made some radical and innovative improvements to some of the age-old guitar designs. I was truly impressed with the workmanship of these guitars as well as some of the unique fabrication techniques.

For instances, look at the straight headstock and how he insets the tuning machines to keep the strings as straight as possible. Also, the unique leg rest at the bottom of the guitar is clever and very usable. The weight and balance is very nice. I played one on the show floor and I was pleasantly surprised on how easy the neck was to play and the body felt comfortable to hold.

I’m not a big fan of wild shapes but I think this guitar could be very popular. It’s got all the right specs including a 1pc neck, ebony fretboar, 25” scale, jumbo frets with a 12” radius, bone nut, Sperzel tuners and a one piece mahogany body...the works! These guitars are fitted with Dimarzio pickups and an exclusive variable coil-splitting feature as well as an on-board passive EQ. Great job and good luck Gary!

Website: http://www.garykramerguitar.com/

Xotic Pedals - AC Plus & BB Plus

It looks like Prosound Communications is up to something cool again. You all know that I am a huge Xotic pedal fan. In fact, I have all three pedals in my rig. Check out my Xotic Pedal Review HERE. At

NAMM this year, they unveiled two new pedals riding on the success of their AC Booster and BB Preamp. They are the “AC Plus” and the “BB Plus” which are essentially a two-channel version of each pedal. Although I did not have a chance to play the prototypes at the show, there appears to be a gain and volume for each channel and an overall EQ. The idea here is for each pedal to offer two distinct voicing modes. This is consistent with many distortion pedals on the market offering two channels in one package.

Another cool feature included on the new AC and BB Plus pedals is that you can activate both channels at once and/or rearrange the channel

stack (series or parallel). At least, I think that is how it will work. I was unable to hear it at the show due to the noise and congestion. But, I’m sure both pedals will be sonic beauties!

I believe these pedals are scheduled for release this summer. If they are anything like the original trio, they will be a huge hit in the guitarist community. I’m looking forward to trying them myself.

Website: http://www.prosoundcommunications.com/english/

Taylor Guitars

Each time I come into contact with Taylor guitars I become fascinated with the acoustic guitar. These guitars make me “want” to buy one. I’ll say up front that I do not play acoustic guitar regularly and it really is not my expertise. However, I don’t get this feeling when I walk through the pretentious Martin booth with their ridiculously overpriced guitars. In fact, I can’t even get a Martin sales rep to look at me in

their booth probably because I haven’t had a hit record lately. (OK…enough of that…)

Anyway, the Taylor booth was enormously impressive. The variety of guitar models was impressive. The Koa guitars were stunning! The workmanship on some of the guitars was awesome and the guitars just sounded wonderful.

The Taylor folks are friendly to talk to and were genuinely interested in my inquiry. They all seem very proud of their product and they should be. These guitars are works of art and I can see why they are so popular.

I suppose, some day, when I am ready for my “acoustic adventure”, I’ll probably buy a Taylor. Whenever I play one, it just feels right!

Website: http://www.taylorguitars.com/

Pro 7 Doc HumFree - Guitar Hum-Ellinator

I ran across this nifty invention on the NAMM floor. Got noise? You don’t have to suffer anymore. I think we found another solution for the age-old “inherent” problem of single coil Strat pickups. Some of you may have heard of

the Suhr BPSSC Noise Canceling System. This is an awesome noise canceling solution and it really works. I have one installed in my Strat. However, it can be expensive.

Pro 7 has released a new way to cancel noise on any Strat using their patented Guitar Hum-Eliminator circuit board. It integrates perfectly into any standard Strocaster pick guard and replaces the volume, tone and switch as part of the circuit. From what I heard in their booth, it eliminates 90% of the noise without affecting the guitar tone.

Renato Giordano, a guitar-playing engineering from Italy,

invented this device. The theory behind this devices is that it uses add-on filtering and signal conditioning circuitry to enhance signal strength and clarity towards noise levels, thereby boosting mid range and treble sections.

There are currently three PRO 7® models: PRO7® Passive, PRO7® Basic and PRO7® Enhanced. I heard this thing for myself and it absolutely works! There is not tonal change to the guitar sound either. Very very impressive! Check them out a their website.

Website http://www.dochumfree.com/benefits.html

SkyWire - Foot Loose Wireless Switching System

In my search for rig switching systems, I was surprised to see a wireless option. I’m always suspicious of anything wireless…starting with my cell phone. But the FootLoose products seemed to work well.

SkyWyre Wireless Technologies is the company behind this product. Inventor Thomas Gouge (shown below) is the brains behind this design. I was impressed with their line of products and flexibility. They not only offer a wireless foot controller but they also make a nice little clip on button controller for your guitar strap as well as an optional wireless annunciation panel.

Foot Loose was designed to take control of your amplifier's built in effects, such as reverb and chorus, as well as channel switching. The remote control foot and strap controllers can operate anywhere on stage within 75 to 150 feet.

Although this is not the right product for my personal new set up, I think this is a clever product and I’m sure it will be very popular. By the way, they are very very affordable!

Website: http://www.gofootloose.com/