Some Post 2015 NAMM Thoughts

Sitting here on the Tuesday morning after the show I'm and still feeling NAMM lag.  Even after 12 years of doing the show I'm still amazed at the physical toll it takes.  I even got in shape for several weeks before it this year to prepare.  It helped a lot, but I'm still really needing the Monday and Tuesday that we traditionally take off to recover.  Whew.

We did things a bit different this year and stepped up to a 20' booth.  We had a fine selection of instruments from our OEM customers and friends and I think it was a big success.  I'd like to thank Roger Sadowsky, Michael and Daniel Tobias, Mike Lull, Spector, Tino Tedesco, Laurus and Federico Malaman, Warwick and Framus, Ibanez, Sheldon Dingwall, Frank Pasquale, Luke Sheridan, Mozina Guitars, Tim Cloonan (Callowhill), Aquilina Basses, Oscar Prat, and Darryl Anders.  I am truly humbled to have had such a stellar lineup of instruments on hand, all with our pickups and preamps in them.  Amazing.

I'm also really excited about the new CND pickups in several new Ibanez basses that are coming on line.  I was truly humbled at how many instruments in the Ibanez booth had my N logo on them.  I counted 16!  Absolutely incredible!

And the response we got to the Nordstrand Audio products was better than I could have hoped.  The preamp pedal was very well received, but the response to the cabinets was amazing.  The typical reaction was a few notes and a big smile.  Followed by a reluctance to stop playing.  I couldn't have asked for more.  A big highlight was having Bobby Vega play his Shark bass thought my rig.  It was like a sonic bass bath.  Inspiring!

A few notes about the Nordstrand Audio thing.  The products we had at the show were prototypes and were there to gauge player reaction.  Given the incredibly encouraging response I am going to move forward with the next step and begin the process of starting up the product line and making Nordstrand Audio official.  There are many ducks to line up to make it happen, but things are VERY promising.  Given the proper lining up of the aforementioned ducks, I expect to have pedals available for purchase in 3-4 months, cabinets in 4-6 months, and with any luck, at least a 700 watt amp in 6-8 months.  Pricing will be announced as it can be determined with some degree of accuracy.  A website is also in the works.

Another cool thing that is happening is our discovery of how awesome Alnico III is for bass pickups. It's stellar for Tele pickups, as the response to our NVT A3 set has shown.  Premier Guitar magazine reviewed them and gave them a Premier Gear award and the reviewer even purchased the review set.  Michael Thompson loves them and went so far as to say the neck pickup is "about the best I've ever heard".

After all that I thought why not try some bass pickups with the A3?  So we started with a NP5 that I put in my personal vP5 bass and I was blown away.  Warmer and more organic than A5, the A3 offers an inspiring alternative flavor that I'm really enjoying.

Here's a recording of how the NP5 A3 works in a mix:  NP5 A3 Demo

We quickly made NJ5 and NJ4 sets and the love affair continued.  Then I put an A3 set of Big Singles in my personal NJ5 and they are just fantastic.  At this time, we have plans to put the A3 magnets in just about every pickup we make.  The overwhelmingly positive response to the A3 at NAMM really helped me decide on that commitment.

Oh, there's one more thing.  The new on board preamps will be available in late February.  These are a surface mount epoxied version of our current hand made through hole design.  Having these made for us will increase the reliability, make them smaller allowing more installation options, and most importantly lower the price.

All in all, it was an amazing NAMM show.  Undoubtedly the best I've had in my 12 years of doing this.

The Three Fold Way to Freedom

Five and a half years ago my life as I knew it exploded.  Tensions that had been present in my marriage finally reached a point where something snapped and it was over.  My wife left.

At the time I couldn't understand why.  I was crushed and felt like there had to be something I could do to fix it and make it better.  It took me several weeks to move to a place of acceptance.  Several surreal, confusing, and painful weeks.

Even when I found acceptance there was a feeling of rebellion and resistance in it.  Kind of like "ok fine, you really want it to be over then I'll stop trying to fix it.  Let's see how you like THAT!"

Didn't matter.  My wife had grown tired of my controlling and judgmental nature and was done.  Now, looking back after all this time, I totally get it.  As a matter of fact, there are things that happened in my marriage - things that I did, judgmental nasty things - that now cause me great grief and elicit quite a bit of pain and regret.

The things is, I didn't know at the time how much of a monster I was.

How could I not have known?

Conditioning.  Adaptive survival conditioning that happened when I was very, very young.  Unconscious somatically embodied conditioning.

How do I know that?  I found a way out and became conscious of it.

How did that happen?  Well that's a bit of a long story.  It started with a bit of luck and a desperate attempt to end the pain resulting from the end of my marriage.  I went searching for a therapist.  I had decided that I could fix myself and not only end my own pain, but I could become what I needed to be to make others (like my wife) happy and love me again.

I did an online search for a therapist in Yucaipa/Redlands.  I ended up on Psychology Today magazine's referral page.  There was one man in Yucaipa (I lived there at the time) that looked great.  I called and left a message.  I also found a man in Redlands named Michael Sieck.  He got back to me first and we set up an appointment.  This was the beginning of a journey of awakening that I had no idea was even possible at the time and am still to this day quite amazed with.  (And it never ends.)

What I found in Michael was not only an incredible Western therapist that was able to help me intellectually understand my "issues", but a deep, non judgmental, spiritual, and witnessing presence that allowed me to finally, over the course of several years, let down and find some awareness of my conditioned "self".

My progress was aided by my participating in a retreat group that met every 3 months.  This was a "process" group that involved an instructional component at the beginning and then group work for the remainder.  Every participant got about an hour to bring up their "stuff" and then work through it in the group.

As profoundly effective as the personal therapy with Mike was, the group work was absolutely transformative.  I'm not going to get too deeply into the details here, but there was one weekend in particular that revealed to me how subconscious the need to be loved (exalted really, from the perspective of the very narcissistic adaptive self) had twisted my way of being into a nervous performance designed to "be" what I perceived the other wanted and needed.  I really had no idea of the degree to which it affected me until my anxiety was pointed out to me and I was invited to believe that I didn't have to "be" anything other than myself.  Or that I was ok and loved even if I revealed horrible and shameful things that I had done.

Essentially, I didn't "need" to be anything other than my true self.  I suppose this could sound really weird and quite possibly not make any sense.

But if it does make sense to you on some level then I invite you to start your own journey of self discovery.  I invite you to learn about a Way and a place and some amazing people that can help you find awareness of those unconscious ways of being that bring pain and frustration and impede your dreams and desires.  I invite you to begin a process of discovery of your true underlying self.  I invite you to find that self and allow it to come forth into the world.

You can start here - www.threefoldway.com.  This is the brand new website for the Three Fold Way, which is the system that I so luckily stumbled into when I found Michael Sieck in my moment of panic and pain.  I have very involved in putting this site together and am even interviewed in one of the videos on the "personal growth" page.  I am honored to be a part of it and share it with you now.

Please feel free to ask me any questions you might have about all this.  I'll do the best I can to help and provide answers, if I have them, given my available time.

I plan to have more writings about my journey of self discovery soon.  In particular I'm currently taking singing lessons and am learning a LOT about how my self emerges or is constrained in the voice.  My personal path is deeply related and intertwined with music and I think there is much that may be of value to many of my musical friends.  So much to share.

Thanks for your time.

A Rather Interesting Lakland Bass

We had a bass come in for a pickup replacement and some other work today.  It's quite interesting to say the least.

Here it is.  A Lakland.  Cool!  It has our NP5 pickup in it!  Wait a sec.  Then why does the owner want us to change out the pickup?

Well we opened it up and discovered that it's not our pickup.  It's a copy. 

And not an exact copy.  It has Neodymium bars on the bottom and shorter pole pieces.  Apparently the owner is not happy with the sound of this pickup.  
Lakland used to buy NP5's from us.  They stopped a couple years ago.  Now I know why.  
I looked for this bass on their website and couldn't find it.  There was a confusing post on Talkbass a while ago too.  But nothing that was that conclusive.  When this bass showed up my suspicions proved well founded.
I'm conflicted about this.  On the one hand I'm quite flattered that they like the basic design enough to copy it.  On the other I think it could be very confusing for the bass playing public to see and hear a bass like this and assume that it's our pickup and then have a wrongful impression about what we make.
Not sure what to do here, other than this blog post.  Maybe I'll look into legal options.

Pre NAMM thoughts

As I get ready to head to another NAMM show in a week my head is swimming with random thoughts.

I started working for myself at the very beginning of 2003.  I was planning to just make bass guitars.  I wanted a humble shop all to myself and I wanted to build what I had in my head.  I can remember that I was going to sell 4 string NJ basses starting at $1200.  Seems crazy now.  Might have been crazy then.

Fast forward 11 years and I have a pickup company that employs 10 people in some capacity.  We build OEM pickups for some major major companies.  Such as:

Sadowsky - I never imagined in my wildest dreams that Roger would ask to try out some pickups, let alone decide to have us supply him with PJ5 sets and all his single coil J pickups, both 4 and 5 string.  Wow.  Thank you Roger!

Ibanez - I owe a large debt of gratitude to Tim Cloonan of Callowhill Basses for really helping get Ibanez to notice us.  It was almost 3 years from first contact to first production order with them, but it's easily been one of the most significant things to happen to my business.  The order volume and support we've gotten has been humbling.  We are most grateful indeed for the wonderful partnership that has developed between us.  I can't reveal any details at the moment, but expect a lot more great stuff from us and Ibanez.

Warwick - We brought an OEM salesman onboard early last year named Pete Chiovarou, and he has been outstanding.  One of his biggest achievements so far has been connecting us with Warwick.  Warwick now distributes our products all over much of Europe and as of this NAMM show you'll see many basses and even guitars (coming soon) with OEM Nordstrand Pickups in them.  Again, I am absolutely amazed to realize that my name is going on a product that will be installed in basses that were objects of severe GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome) when I started playing bass over 20 years ago.

Beyond these big three, the list of OEM companies that we've supplied over the years is extensive and impressive.  Fodera, Ristola, Valenti, Cliff Bordwell, Roscoe, Modulus, Callowhill, De Geir, Mayones, Tino Tedesco, Le Compte, Martin Keith, Mike Lull, Jeff Mallia, Mollerup, Overwater, AV Guitars, R Basses, Normandy Guitars, SEI Basses, Soller Guitars, LedBelli Bass Guitars, Stambaugh, Allan Tomkins, Scott Ambush, Utrera Basses, Jerome Little, Xylem, the list goes on.  Somebody slap me.  Wow.

And we've sold pickups to all kinds of name players too.  Well, some we didn't sell to them directly, we sold them to companies that were making instruments for them.  But nevertheless, one way or another, our pickups have ended up in the hands of players like Stefan Lessard, Juan Aldrete, Jerry Watts Jr., Owen Biddle, Pino Palladino, Calvin Turner, Chris Tarry, Mike Kroeger, Chazz Frichtell, Bruce Stone, Michael Rhodes, Darryl Anders, Juraj Griglak, Walter Jones, Igor Saavedra, Edo Castro, Mark Egan, Darrell Freeman, Koko Powell, Rafe Bradford, Andy Cichon, Roland Guerin, Rob DiSantis, Chris Wood, Steve DiGiorgio, Bryant Siono, Gilles Loes, Dave Swift, Derrick Hodge, Tim LeFebvre, Steve Jenkins, Tommy Harron, Rick Skatore, Robin Ruscio, Amanda Ruzze, Ben Williams, Ben Jones, Will Birkhead, John Giblin, Travis Carlton, Hershel Yatovitz, Michael Thompson, Tye Zamora, Josh Smith, Vail Johnson, Scott Pazera, Brandon Gilliard, Keith Duffy, Federico Malaman, Marc Browne, Tom Hamilton, Paul Turner, YIKES!  I know there are many many more but I don't keep track and I forget.

Which is not very smart I think.  Were I to have an effective marketing plan, I'd take advantage of all of the above and put together a good campaign.  But I don't think in terms of "how can I sell more and more PICKUPS?"  Or "how can I make more and more MONEY?"  Because that's not what gets me going.

What gets me excited is great music.  And helping musicians make great music with inspiring pickups and instruments (and occasionally in my studio).  That is the singular focus of what I do and what I am about.

So, in these weeks before NAMM I start to worry that maybe I'm not doing it right.  Maybe I'm blowing it with my lack of marketing.  Maybe I should have tons of artist demo's at our booth and have artist signings and maybe I should be competing for top tier players and maybe I should have endorsement contracts, and maybe I should give pickups to all the players I like and maybe and maybe and on and on.

And then I think maybe this was all a big mistake and soon the fun will end.  Maybe I'll wake up and none of this will have happened. Then I'll go see my therapist and we'll start talking about my childhood again.  Ugh.

And then I calm down and realize that everything is as it should be.  That all of this has happened and is happening.  I am both lucky and skilled at what I do.  And I have a shop full of great people that believe in all this as much as I do.  I am truly blessed with the way my life has gone.

I will start working on some effective marketing.  I have to.  We have grown to the point where we can't afford not to.  Also, I want to see what is possible.  What will the next ten years bring as we grow and evolve into a "proper" company with a marketing department and a sales staff and an R & D division and a production floor?

I am genuinely curious.

Creatively Resurrected

I'm back.  It's been a long time.  I've been contemplating my relationship to this space for a while.  There has been a lot of "should" in mind as I think about what to do here.  I didn't want to abandon this for good, but at the same time I simply felt completely unmotivated to be here and do this.

Why?  Good question.  And one that has also been in my mind sharing space with the "shoulds".

It's not like I haven't been creative.  Anything but.  Over the last several months I have done the following:

1)  Designed and built a new bass from the ground up.  It's the headless NJ5HL.

2)  Built a stock vP5 with really cool acrylic and stone composite blocks.  I got inspired by the color of the block material to make the bass black and use an anodized gold guard.  And then I even had Devin make some matching knobs.  This bass turned out fantastically good.

3)  Finished the Shush Puppies, my hum canceling strat pickups.  These things sound fantastic and they have none of the hum that single coils suffer from.  Now we're just waiting for some custom covers so we can unleash them on the world in the most presentable fashion possible.

4)  Built a guitar for Hershel Yatovitz (almost - it's waiting on a pick guard).  He plays for Chris Isaak.  This thing has been a labor of love.  We came up with a unique paisley pearl finish.  It's getting Shush Puppies.  It's got a pretty neat weight reduced body.  Hersh is super excited about it, as am I.  Can't wait to get it finished and deliver it to him.

5)  I could go on and on.  

In search of pics for this post I looked back through my facebook upload gallery and I was almost shocked.  There's a ton of creative stuff in there.  Everything from grilling tools to unusual foods to guitars, basses, and bonsai.  Even costumes for Halloween.

So I move forward with curiosity about my relationship to this space and sharing my creative pursuits, which are abundant.  I do share things a LOT on FB, but it's typically a pic and a quick comment.  So maybe this feels redundant.  But I think the value here may come in the reflection about and presentation of creative pursuits.  

To write about something requires attention and organization.  And commitment.  And that's always been a sticky bit for me.  

I do realize how amazingly lucky I am to have the time and space to do all this crazy stuff.  I am grateful.  And I LOVE all of it.  I hope that shows.

I'll end by saying I should be back soon.  But then again, I may not.  Please don't take that personally.  :-)  I'm learning something here.

Write something!

Write something!!

Ok.

I'll be moving to a new rental home next weekend.  This has rather consumed me over the last few weeks.  Mentally more than physically so far.  So there hasn't been much time or energy to consider  this space.

That doesn't mean there hasn't been creativity.  Mike Cooper came in to the studio again last week and we tracked some more vocals for My Love Is Alive.  I think it's going to be killer when it's done.  Still have to track drums, which is a bit intimidating and is kinda putting me off.  Seems like too big a hill to climb and it's going to be a big time commitment.  I haven't felt the motivation to tackle all that stuff yet.  But It's coming.

I also bought a used Tanac winder that will be primarily for product development.

It's kind of a funny thing because this machine doesn't have a tail stock yet so I can't really use it.  So it's more about frustrating creativity than enabling it.  Ah well.  I was spending a bit of energy trying to figure out how to cobble together a tail stock attachment for cheap.  That may be a place where creative energy will pay off.  I'm letting it ferment for now.

In other news, we put our name on the front door.

I think it looks pretty cool.  And it feels pretty official.

Then I thought, lets take that little red sticker and make some more.  I'll put one on my car!!

So now we're working on getting our swag going.  We want to have stickers, shirts, hats, beer glasses, grilling tools, bottle openers, etc.  Lots of cool stuff.  I'll be sure to announce here when everything is on line and available.  

And now I'm going to go help Maurilio learn how to make his own basses from the design phase through woodworking to completion.  Should be interesting.  Then maybe I'll indulge in writing and recording some music...

Mixing It Up

Wheee!  Now this is fun!

I'm still working on the cover tune that I mentioned earlier.  Today I got to sink my teeth into some mixing.  

I LOVE mixing!  

It's what I went to school for almost 20 years ago now.  Having this studio with all the good gear and plug ins is quite a joy.  To hear the raw tracks and to be able to hear in my head what they are capable of becoming is one thing.  Having the tools and learning how to use them to get that sound out of one's head and into the mix is another.  And it's a blast!

We still have to track live drums.  And Mike is coming back in next Wednesday to have another go at the vocals.  

Drums are intimidating.  I'm going to do a full 8 channels.  Getting a good sound is going to be a good trick.  But even just messing around last week with 4 channels I got a very decent sound.  So I should be ok.

I think the drums are really going to bring the whole thing together.  I can't wait to dig into mixing them!!!

I will put up another sample some time next week.  After the new vocals and maybe after the drums.

Then I have to get a website together.  I want to do a What's New page.  How many record labels have a What's New Page?  I think it's a pretty cool idea.  Almost daily updates would be fun and could really generate a following.  It would be a chance to watch and see if the thing can get off the ground.  Maybe it would go the way my guitar company went.  And what goes on in studios is always such a mystery and typically veiled in secrecy.  This would be an honest and open way to really bring forth the music and the process of creating the music.

That would be quite a cool thing.