November '09
Artist Spotlight: Richard Z
of Rammstein
September '09
Interview: Shaun Glass and Dirge Within
Artist Spotlight: Doc Coyle
of God Forbid
August '09
Artist Spotlight: Will Adler (Lamb of God)
July '09
Artist Spotlight: Page Hamilton of Helmet
Winner's Circle: Mayem Sweepstakes
AVAILABLE FALL 2009: The new James Hetfield Truckster... now in black!
ESP and Spinefarm Records bring you Children of Bodom Fall 2009 North American Tour
Download Native Instruments Guitar Rig 3 Go for free and enter for a chance to win an LTD KH-602
Coming Soon: ESP Artist Podcasts
June '09
Hot New Models Coming This Fall!
Winner's Circle: "No Fear" Music Tour Sweepstakes
Get Rockin Now with an LTD Guitar or Bass Pack!
April '09
ESP Congratulates Metallica for Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction
ESP Artists Top Guitar World Reader's Poll!
New ESPs at 2009 Musikmesse Show!
March '09
Will Adler Appearance at Sam Ash Hollywood
ESP Gets in the Game with Guitar Hero: Metallica
February '09
Artist Interview: Ted Aguilar of Death Angel
ESP mourns the loss of Metal Mulisha rider Jeremy Lusk
January '09
ESP Announces New Models for 2009
New Kirk Hammett & James Hetfield Signature Series
ESP's Signature Series Gets 18 New Models at NAMM 2009
Artist Spotlight: Fred LeClercq of DragonForce
20 Years With ESP: Page Hamilton
ESP Artists Receive Grammy Nominations
ESP Artists Featured in Upcoming Comic Series
ESP on MySpace: Are you our friend?
A Collection of Memories from ESP at NAMM 2009
Letʼs start out with a fact: most of the people reading this story have never been to a NAMM Show. Hey, itʼs not your fault. NAMM is a trade show held once a year in Anaheim, California. Even if you live within a reasonable distance from Southern California (which many of you donʼt), NAMM is a trade-only show. Youʼre supposed to work in the music business, either at a store or for a manufacturer, to be able to get in. And let us tell you... the old days of borrowing someoneʼs badge to get into NAMM are long gone. The security people at the show these days are checking to make sure your ID matches your badge every few feet, it seemed at times.
So letʼs assume youʼve never been to NAMM. Weʼll try and describe it to you, and maybe youʼll start to understand the scope of what happens there. NAMM is held at a large convention center, with five halls and multiple stories, thatʼs packed with instruments and music production tools. You literally have everything from bass amps to tubas, from African percussion to digital audio workstations, from kazoos to clarinets to banjos to... well, you get the idea.
As you walk down the aisles of the various halls, you notice a few things. First, itʼs loud. Like, really loud. Not “third row at Metallica” loud, but you still have to yell to have a conversation from two feet away most of the time. Second, itʼs packed. Especially at times when famous musicians are doing signing sessions, you can find yourself feeling like a sardine in a can. It can take ten minutes to get 20 feet if make that one wrong turn down a busy aisle. And, as you can imagine, between the volume level and the crowds, it doesnʼt seem like the greatest place for the folks from the music stores to check out the new gear of the year, which is supposedly the whole purpose of the NAMM show.
Thatʼs why, in 2008, ESP left its long-time spot down on the floor, and moved upstairs to its own large and private demo room. After so many years in the same old spot, people were used to seeing us downstairs, but when ESP fans are in a building, theyʼre gonna find us one way or the other. We ended up having a great show last year in Room 213D, and knew this year would be even more kick ass. And we were right.
Whatʼs new from ESP?
The big question at NAMM is always, “What do you have thatʼs new?” ESP always delivers a slew of new products around the time of NAMM. This year, we did something cool: we announced nearly all of our new models two weeks before the show even started. When you have as many cool new guitars and basses as we had this year, we wanted to be sure that everyone -- not just the people who were going to NAMM -- could find out about this stuff ASAP.
So, as you probably read here at espguitars.com, we announced 57 new models at the start of the year, and all of these guitars and basses were on prominent display around Room 213D. The reaction from everyone was over the top. Everything looked so spectacular in person that itʼs hard to say what the biggest hits were. The limited edition Clockwork Zombie Graphic Series guitars caught everyoneʼs attention right when they walked in the door, as did the Avatar and Outlaw graphic EX models. Several of the new LTD Standard and Deluxe models, like the EC-1000FR, the EX-401DX, and the V-401DX were met with the reaction of, “Finally! Weʼve been asking for this forever!” Well, no worries, people. If you ask, we will build.
We had to go around with a rag wiping the drool off the new Signature Series models. At least we hope that was drool. Anyway, with 18 new models from Alexi Laiho, George Lynch, Will Adler, Gus G., Wayne Static, Dan Jacobs, and Page Hamilton, there were plenty of new signature guitars at the ESP NAMM booth to grab the interest of serious fans and serious players alike.
In addition to the guitars we could talk about on January 1, there were four models that we didnʼt announce until the start of the show: two ESP Kirk Hammett Ouija models (in both original black and a new white version that looks insanely cool), the LTD KH-Ouija, and the ESP James Hetfield Iron Cross. We have to tell you; while everything we showed at NAMM this year was cool and got a great reaction, people were blown away by these Metallica guitaristsʼ sig models. And we donʼt want you to say we didnʼt warn you; these guitars are gong to be snapped up very, very quickly. All of them are destined to be collectorʼs items, so if you have your eye on a Ouija or an Iron Cross, donʼt think about it for too long or itʼll be gone... forever (weʼre only making them in 2009). Oh and by the way: OUIJA is a trademark of Hasbro and is used with permission.
The Signings
Whether youʼve been to NAMM yourself or have just read about it in the magazines and places like espguitars.com, you know that ESP is the prime choice at the entire NAMM show for artist signings. Itʼs like, look at this schedule. Just look at it.
On Friday January 16, we had our first session, with George Lynch, Dan Jacobs and Travis Miguel (Atreyu), Max Cavalera (Cavalera Conspiracy), and Stef Carpenter (Deftones). But that was just the start. The following day, we had Gus G. (Firewind), Will Adler (Lamb of God), Chuck Garric (Alice Cooper) and Galder (Dimmu Borgir). We also had Brian Deegan of Metal Mulisha cruising around and greeting the crowds. Then, with a signing all to himself, the iconic frontman of Slayer, Tom Araya, had people lined up for what seemed like blocks to get their autograph and pics taken. But the day wasnʼt over; we ended our signing sessions on Saturday with Alexi Laiho (Children of Bodom), Jon Donais (Shadows Fall), Michael Wilton (Queensryche), Wayne Static (Static-X), and Silenoz (Dimmu Borgir). people tend to freak out a little when all those heroes of rock are together in the same room, but as always, our ESP artists were calm, cool, and collected, even with people asking them to sign body parts that should never be touched by a Sharpie. All in all, it was one of our most organized signing sessions ever, with huge crowds getting in and out pretty smoothly. Big thanks again to our ESP family members who kept the whole thing rocking.
The Music
At NAMM, weʼre really not supposed to have live performances in our demo room, so we didnʼt. Instead, we had clinics. After all, if you have Gus G and Bob Katsionis of Firewind playing three feet in front of you, itʼs a clinic, man! You canʼt help but learn with shredders like these within armʼs reach. Gus and Bob did their clinics on both Friday and Saturday, and for an additional clinic treat, we had the mighty George Lynch on Saturday playing live for a select few invited guests. If you were lucky enough to be one of them, you can testify how awesome it is having a true legend of metal playing so close to you that you can hear the pick as it scrapes the strings. Unbelievably mindblowing.
In addition to their rather more well-known clinic-giving pals, we had guitarist Tony Gamble and bass player Tony Pimental giving more traditional clinics on their ESP instruments throughout the show. Watching these awesome players do their thing makes us want to turn off our computers and strap on our axes and start shredding (as opposed to writing NAMM reports).
The After Hours
Putting on a NAMM show is a lot of hard work for we people at ESP. Thereʼs months of planning, days of setup, and then lots of business to be done during the day. But after the show ends each day, itʼs time to hang out of blow off some steam. Most people whoʼve been going to NAMM for a long time will tell you that one place seems to be the central gathering point for the entire rock community, and thatʼs the bar and lobby area of the Anaheim Hilton hotel, which is next door to the convention center.
Itʼs hard to imagine if you havenʼt been there. Picture the most crowded bar youʼve ever been in. Now picture well-known rock stars there mingling with friends, with dozens of scantily-clad women trying to get their attention. Cram together everyone from blues artists to hardcore metalheads to goths to country players to classic rockers, and youʼd imagine itʼs a pretty trippy scene. Fortunately, the Hiltonʼs been used to handling the NAMM crowd for decades, and they have it pretty well dialed in so that you can get to one of many drink stations pretty easily, and occasionally even make it from one side of the room to the other in under an hour. By the way: itʼs not much easier trying to get around outside the Hilton either, since every rocker and his model girlfriend who step out for a smoke are hanging out directly in front of the hotel. In any case, itʼs fun, and you never know who youʼre going to run into there.
On the night of Saturday 1/17, ESP held its own little party. Well, it wasnʼt really little. In fact, it was huge. What else would you call a party that was sponsored by Coffin Case, ESP, Affliction Clothing and Monster Energy Drinks, and featured musical entertainment by Alice Cooper and God Forbid? The roomʼs capacity was 800 people, but weʼre pretty sure we had 801 in there. Okay, maybe more. Of course, in addition to God Forbid being an ESP band, weʼre tight with Alice Cooper bassist Chuck Garric, and have been friends with other members of his band over the years. In any case, Saturday night was epic, and everyone forgave us for looking a little ragged on Sunday morning back at the show.
The Announcements
Another cool thing about a NAMM show is that since you basically have the entire industry in one place at one time. That makes it the perfect time to announce special news, in addition to announcing the new guitars and basses. On Friday afternoon, ESP held a press conference that gave us the perfect opportunity to tell the media about some exciting stuff.
After telling the press about our new guitars and basses, we let everyone know about our sweepstakes along with the freestyle motocross team Metal Mulisha. This six month contest culminates this summer with a trip to the X Games, an ESP LTD Viper-MM limited edition guitar, and (hereʼs the big one) a custom ESP/Metal Mulisha Honda CR250 motorcycle, all for one lucky winner. At the press conference, we announced the sweepstakes in true ESP style by having the custom bike on display in front of us. We wanted to take it for a spin around the room, but I donʼt think our insurance would cover it.
For the next part of the press conference, we brought out some pretty exciting guests. Musician/artist Llexi Leon was joined by guitarist Rob Chapman, along with the legendary engineer/producer Eddie Kramer. In case you donʼt know Eddie by name, perhaps youʼll know some of the bands and artists heʼs worked with, like Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, the Rolling Stones, Kiss, AC/DC and many more. The reason we had these guys with us at ESP was that we were announcing Llexiʼs “Eternal Descent” comic series, which features ESP artists (including Dan Jacobs and Travis Miguel of Atreyu, Doc Coyle of God Forbid, Rob Arnold of Chimaira, and others). These real life musicians interact with comic book characters in the comic series, which is being developed into film, video games, and other media Sounds cool? You missed one part: Eddie Kramer will be producing the music to go along with this project. Stay tuned on this news... we guarantee youʼll be hearing more in the future.
The Recap
What can we say? NAMM was terrific for ESP in 2009. We successfully saw the introduction of a total of 61 new guitars and basses, and Room 213D was one of the hits of the show. Between our signings, our announcements, our clinics, and the overall vibe, it couldnʼt have been any better at NAMM 2009. Now our bosses want us to top it for NAMM 2010, so wish us luck.
