My first day at NAMM was packed with testing, viewing, chatting and just absorbing. There's so much to see, it's ridiculous.
I started by hooking up with a friend from an online guitar forum, and I really enjoyed getting to know a person behind a forum nickname. He builds guitars too, and they are very interesting.
I did a lot of walking around and talking to lot of people. I saw a very interesting pedal power supply by Molloon, and a wicked swirly pedal by Jack Deville. This one impressed me immensely.
I hooked up with Armor Gold Cables, and I bought some of their cables, which I will demo later. I also checked out the always amazing Reverend Guitars.
I tried the Gibson Firebird X, but I honestly could not figure out how this thing works. I might go back tomorrow and ask questions - it looks kind of interesting but it was far from intuitive.
The Fender booth didn't have a lot of new things for me, but I did try the Mustang amp, which I have read about. I used it with headphones only, and I was not that impressed. However, the guy demoing it did a good job and got great tones out of the amp.
Next was a demonstration of the latest Line 6 gear - the HD500, DT50 and the TylerVariax. I already know the HD500 is a killer unit, and I will make more demos of it soon. Combining the TylerVariax with the HD500 and DT50 is an incredible dream rig. This set up provides pretty much any and every tone you could ever dream of.
Gig FX has some cool pedals, and I enjoyed checking them out. I also had fun playing a tiny travel guitar designed by a Norwegian - G Sharp Instruments - very nice sounding tiny guitar.
Jammit is a very interesting app for Apple devices. You have to check it out if you want to learn songs. It really impressed me a lot.
Sanyo PedalJuice had a great demo of their battery solution for equipment - I really like what they are doing. I will demo this too soon.
I spent some time testing Diamond pedals, and boy these pedals are killer. Great, great tones to be had, and the digital and analog delays they make are spectacular.
Lastly, I finished the day by going to a jam with Mark Wein at the Juke Joint, where Paul Bigat was playing - awesome player. After that show, we jammed some blues, and I used Mark's nice Suhr Classic. Perfect way to end the day!
I didn't try that many guitars today, so that will be my focus tomorrow. Now it's bedtime. :)
By Robert Renman - www.dolphinstreet.com
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