Posted on 06/22/2017 4:29:03 PM PDT by Drew68
The convention couldn’t sound less rock-and-roll — the National Association of Music Merchants Show. But when the doors open at the Anaheim Convention Center, people stream in to scour rows of Fenders, Les Pauls and the oddball, custom-built creations such as the 5-foot-4-inch mermaid guitar crafted of 15 kinds of wood.
Standing in the center of the biggest, six-string candy store in the United States, you can almost believe all is well within the guitar world.
Except if, like George Gruhn, you know better. The 71-year-old Nashville dealer has sold guitars to Eric Clapton, Neil Young, Paul McCartney and Taylor Swift. Walking through NAMM with Gruhn is like shadowing Bill Belichick at the NFL Scouting Combine. There is great love for the product and great skepticism. What others might see as a boom — the seemingly endless line of dealers showcasing instruments — Gruhn sees as two trains on a collision course.
“There are more makers now than ever before in the history of the instrument, but the market is not growing,” Gruhn says in a voice that flutters between a groan and a grumble. “I’m not all doomsday, but this — this is not sustainable.”
The numbers back him up. In the past decade, electric guitar sales have plummeted, from about 1.5 million sold annually to just over 1 million. The two biggest companies, Gibson and Fender, are in debt, and a third, PRS Guitars, had to cut staff and expand production of cheaper guitars. In April, Moody’s downgraded Guitar Center, the largest chain retailer, as it faces $1.6 billion in debt. And at Sweetwater.com, the online retailer, a brand-new, interest-free Fender can be had for as little as $8 a month.
What worries Gruhn is not simply that profits are down. That happens in business.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
An incredible multi-instrumentalist, Rachel Flowers is inspiring.
She’s blind, but has mastered keyboards, guitar, base, flute, and even the harp!
She recently released an album of her own compositions, and can be seen and heard on YouTube with her flawless covers of ELP and Zappa tunes, as well as others. She’s absolutely incredible. She became friends with both Keith Emerson and Greg Lake, and will be playing at Keith Emerson’s memorial concert in England this July.
ELP - The Endless Enigma
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JiC_VDbqcA
ELP - Trilogy, Rachel playing in Keith Emerson’s home studio
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ib31-TDH05I
Montana - Rachel Flowers w/Zappa Plays Zappa
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RvBMHXLGms
Rachel Flowers - Piano Concerto No. 1 by Keith Emerson - piano & flute
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVgiaIJ31lY
Squires are made in Korea, Indonesia and mostly China. Made in Mexico Fenders are the next cut up.
In reality almost all guitars not made in the USA are made by three companies, Samick, Cort and WMIC. And many USA brands use “ghost” parts that carry the name of a domestic company but are made under license overseas. Good explanation here...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqV-hJeRIBc
Thanks! That was refreshing. May that young man’s success grow and his influence spread! The world needs it. I don’t see what good rap and hip hop have accomplished. I never thought the genre would last. Was I ever wrong on that!!!!
Yeah.
Guys like Mark Knopfler, Ian Anderson, Chris Rhea... these people put together bands that feature guitars but bring in all sorts of other instruments.
A poai guitar band with a drummer and maybe keyboards on some songs bores me in short order.
EVH was the all time best imho.
Have you been listening to the music of the latest commercials? “You can’t always get what you want...”
There’s soooooo many. Ton’s that found a sound or moment of genius that influenced thousands of ears.
But no one. NO ONE. Is responsible for more guitar sales than Eddie.
I think this is changing. I wrote an article on this at Big League Politics (”Gimme that Old time Nostalgia”). Some of the modern acts are very good, exceptional lyrics. No, not a lot of guitars. Unfortunately, rap “solos” have replaced guitar solos, sax solos, and keyboards.
But some of the music is very good. I say this as one who opened for Steppenwolf, the James Gang, Savoy Brown, hung out with the Allman Brothers, played with Jim McCarty (”Devil With a Blue Dress”), and so on.
Some of the electronics they sell today are incredible. Electro Harmonixs has a guitar "pedal" that turns the guitar into a Melotron! It sounds incredible!
Mark
One of very few guitarists you immediately know who is playing. No one plays or sounds like Eddie.
Thanks for posting that YouTube link. Last time I watched that, Prince was still alive. RIP.
That fella sure could play.
Prior to his passing, I didn’t realize how well he could play. I saw “Purple Rain” back in the day and admired that he was a good musician. but I didn’t realize that he was such an excellent guitarist.
Hendryx was very influential and pioneering in the use of special effects and the latest black boxes. He was a good guitarist, no doubt. But I think there were quite a few who were better. I saw Buddy Guy several years back in a small club and remember thinking he was. I’m not a great guitarist but a certain proportion of the popular acts - were pretty much hacks. Oftentimes they didn’t play on their hit records. Session musicians. That’s one reason they couldn’t pull off their songs live in anything like their studio releases. Maybe it’s boring for the performer to make a live performance that sounds just like the record - but the audience usually expects that, or something reasonably close.
What’s amazing is how bloody rich some of those guys became in the 60s, that business model is REALLY dead. That whole scenario of being a juke box hero seems dead and buried as far as “rock and roll” is concerned. Nice work if you can get it, and a lot of those guys busted their ass and really paid their dues, and are still out on the road.
Learning how to actually play an instrument is too much work. It takes a long time to become REALLY proficient, nobody wants to do that, and with digital electronics, they don’t have to. Doc Watson said “after about ten years I began to learn the lead line” to “Deep River Blues”. Nobody can play it like Doc, because he played it for 50 or 60... No effects.. no backwards tape delay and fuzz boxes. Hendryx couldn’t do much with an acoustic. Mississippi John Hurt had a smooth way of playing. When he was “discovered” they took him to a guitar shop and said pick out whatever you want. Instead of the top shelf Martin or Gibson, he chose a no frills Guild. The guitar itself is important, but not as much as people make it out to be.
I guess my point is, the really good guitarists and musicians in general, don’t make very much money. Course they don’t usually end up drowning in their own (or somebody else’s) vomit either, so there’s that.
Millennials suck. This world being built and catered to them is unliveable. Now their stupid, pre programmed rap, hip hop and electronic music is putting the musical instrument industry out.
The future is bleak indeed.
That might have been the underlying reason. I thought the overt reason was some BS over rare woods they used in some of their guitars.
Yes! And if you talk about what you saw with others at work, it amounts to recollecting the fun other people had! That sucks!
At least on the internet I can share in a tiny bit of the fun! :D
Bookmark
I attend NAMM every Year and I cannot believe how much Product is there.
It costs Vendors $5,000 for a 10’ by 20’ display Booth, and the big boys have massive floor space that must cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.
I have no idea who is buying all this stuff, but NAMM wouldn’t be as big as it is if they aren’t.
It was a little lean after the 2008 Crash, but they fill up every square inch of the Anaheim Convention Center year after year.
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