As a professional bassist, I buy a lot of musical gear. Let me highlight that, I buy as much musical gear as I possibly can, more than is reasonable or smart. As such, I patronize music stores – all kinds. I love ’em. There is no better therapy than OPG – Other People’s Guitars. One of the places I inhabit …
Gibson Guitars’ new rating from Moody’s means some ugly stuff
Ever since I did a little bit of research on Guitar Center (at the behest of their CEO on my Facebook page, weirdly) I’ve been told that every time corporate finance gets mixed into the musical instrument business, things get weird. There was that time Fender tried an IPO, but yanked it last minute. That was kinda weird. But their new media strategy, which …
The bright, small, entrepreneurial future of guitar stores
I’m excited to share this podcast with you that I just did with Jason Verlinde, publisher of Fretboard Journal on the future of guitar stores. Mr. Verlinde tells me that he has been pummeled with my articles on Guitar Center being shared across his social networks, and he wanted to get my take on what else is going on in …
This day in awesome guitar history
Sixty-one years ago today (awright, yesterday, but whatever) Clarence Leo Fender received the patent on the Broadcaster guitar which ultimately became the Telecaster. Note the branding which associates the new solid body electric guitar with the technological marvel of the era, tele-vision. I myself have been slowly converting from Leo Fender’s later innovation, the Stratocaster – to the simple, …
April 20 GTT Podcast
Lounge! It’s frustration over handcuffs, Donald Trump, Mike Flynn, Jim Comey, Baby Jesus, and…Guitar Center? Yes, Guitar Center.