MI Pro

Hey, this is blog is for the unfortunate people that were unable to be at the NAMM show in LA last week. Yes, the weather was great, but we didn’t get to see too much of that as we spent most of our time in the convention centre – ROCKING OUT!

The show opened before the convention doors did, with the inaugural Marshall and Korg breakfast. (For those reading this that don’t know, Korg is the Marshall distributor in North America.) Some 250 people were the lucky ones with invites to the only breakfast to be at when attending NAMM. As soon as people were getting their morning cups of coffee and saying hello to each other, you could feel the buzz around the room rise. What was Marshall launching? Who was going to be helping with the launch? Everyone knows that when Marshall launches a product, it tends to have an artist playing.

We didn’t disappoint. The show opened with Joe Castronovo, the president of Korg USA, welcoming the distributors, dealers and press to the launch. Then a few words from joint Marshall MDs, Jon Ellery and Graham Young, before the coffee was trembling in the cups and the last of the tired eyes were wide awake as Kerry King was shredding through some Slayer tracks.

The amp in question was the new Marshall MG100 HFX, part of the new MG4 range. I cannot begin to explain how unbelievable this was. Kerry King laying down some awesome, neck breaking metal riffs – at 9 o’clock in the morning. Kerry himself said he couldn’t remember the last time he had seen that time in the morning – let alone playing killer riffs at that unearthly hour. As for the sound, the tone, the power, you would not have known this was a transistor amp.

Kerry said a few words, asked for requests and seemed quite happy to stay up there playing all morning… But – we had another friend who wanted to get up and play: Doug Aldrich. Doug, who was enjoying some time off after touring with Whitesnake, took to the stage and eased some great rock tones from the MG 100. He spoke about how good he found the amp and showed the rock-hungry audience a different style and tone, from the same model as Kerry had been using.

Just to make sure the message had got across the eager audience, Marshall’s international demonstrator, Chris George and Korg’s Marshall brand manager, Ryan Rhoads, went through more of the range, covering just some of the possibilities with the new MG in slightly more detail.

After the breakfast it was over to the stand for the four days of NAMM and the artist presence didn’t stop at the breakfast, as we soon saw John 5 signing on the new look Marshall stand. Regular visitors to NAMM approached the Marshall stand with anticipation. It looked so different from past NAMM shows. Gone was the straight wall of product to be replaced with the curving wall of Artist imagery, spaced products, and the new MG4 range. Flanked by a pair of MG 100-Watt stacks, the full range was very impressive, standing proudly between the two pillars.

Doug Aldrich went through the MG4 again on the stage, so those who had not received invites to the launch were able to hear him play magnificently through the MG100FX, demonstrating its tonal capabilities and its Marshall growl.

The stage was really utilised the first day for the MG4 as Chris George also went through the amps, using the 50-Watt combo, explaining how you can create almost any tone from this amazing new amplifier. Chris did, in fact, get in trouble from the sound police – even though he only had the volume set on three.

After such a powerful start to NAMM with the proceedings of the first day, you would have been forgiven if you thought the second day was going to be an anti-climax. But you would have been so wrong.

Normally playing in front of as many Marshall stacks as he can get on the stage, Yngwie Malmsteen took to the small stage on the stand to show the awesome tones of the Vintage Modern with his faster-than-a-hare-on-speed guitar playing. There was no room to get past the stand on that side, as the aisle was totally blocked with fans trying to get a look at Yngwie ripping it up on the stage. Fortunately, I don’t think the noise police could get near either. Prior to going on stage, Yngwie signed autographs for an hour and even took a few minutes out to try the MG15fx in the sound booth. He compared it to the MG3, which he currently has, and was more than impressed with the fat sweet tones that he could get easily from the new model.

No sooner had Yngwie finished playing than a queue was forming. Some people getting there especially early as they didn’t want to miss out on this one. Dave Mustaine came to the stand at 4 o’clock and was kept busy for over an hour signing autographs. He would have been there all night had we not stopped the queue when we did. We had a visit from Trey, a founder member of Morbid Angel, who wanted to talk amps and maybe try out the JVM 4, as that might be able to give him the gain he gets from his favourite amp the 4100.

The icing on the cake for the second day was the arrival of Jason Hook. Jason has been playing the JVM4 head and was more than happy to come to the stand and demo the amplifier. Normally sharing a stage with Snakes, Murder and the theatrically talented Alice Cooper, Jason took to the stage to play some of his solo work with aplomb. It went down very well with the NAMM audience and was a fitting end to the second day of the show.

The third day was obviously going to have trouble keeping up with the first two days, right?  Wrong. Paul Gilbert was the first artist on the stand, signing autographs for an hour. Paul was excited about the gig he was playing that night, The Racer X gig. he was going to be performing with his band using the Vintage Modern and with Mike Sutzer on the VBA 400, then with Racer X Paul told me he was using a pair of Randy Rhoads stacks.

Just after Paul had finished signing, Frank Hanon came onto the stand. If you haven’t seen Frank demo the JVM410H then you need to see it. If you own a JVM410H then watch Frank play and just watch the lights on the head. Frank uses all four channels and in his demo he goes through the simple set-up procedure for the amp and how he gets his tones. It really is worth seeing.

While Frank was on the stage, we were joined in the sound booth by Tom and Kerry from Slayer. They commandeered our sound room – and let’s face it, who was going to argue with them? When they finished in there, Kerry signed for over an hour and we had to cut the queue otherwise he would not have been able to perform on the stage. Kerry was as awesome as usual. Getting fans up from the audience and showing them how to play the riffs, playing some killer riffs himself and all through the 2203KK. I bet the noise police didn’t have the nerve to tell KFK to turn it down. While Kerry was performing we were pleased to welcome onto the stand Joe Bonamassa, who was just popping over to say ‘hi’. Joe, you may be aware, sold out the Albert Hall last year – within 6 days. Way to go, Joe!

The queue for the next signing, though, superceded everything before it – it was amazing. It started two hours before the person was even expected to be there. This showed total respect and admiration for the man from Mötley Crüe, Mick Mars. He signed for over two hours. The doors had shut and security was trying to throw us out of the building, but credit to the man, he didn’t want to leave until everyone had his signature!

This day was definitely the busiest. Frank tried out the new MG4 amps and I have to say they sounded killer. Uli Jon Roth came into the sound booth and was playing the JVM and a 59. We had a visit from Corey Taylor, who is working on a few bits and wants to get his hands on some Marshalls. Not only was this a really busy, but a very exciting day and in the evening we went along to watch Paul Gilbert perform.

Sunday, the final day of NAMM is always a bit quieter than the other days, but maybe that is just because everyone is worn out from all the partying. It did start off quietly, but at lunch time we were joined by the legend himself, Lemmy Kilminster. Lemmy had been playing the night before and flew back to LA early just to sign on the Marshall stand. What a legend. The queue went on for miles and yet again we had to cut the queue to allow Lemmy to get back and get his car home.
 
We all chilled out with a few drinks before getting ready to head back to the cold, but with some great memories, and magic moments.