Music Tech Gives Musicians a Sound Option to NAMM

Every January, the Carlsbad-based National Assn. of Music Merchants presents its annual West Coast convention in Anaheim. Better-known as the “NAMM show,” the mammoth event lets manufacturers exhibit and demonstrate the latest music technology, instruments, paraphernalia and related products for dealers and distributors from around the world.

The typical working musician--for whom the equipment is developed in the first place--has two basic gripes with the NAMM show, the foremost being that he can’t get in. Admission passes are reserved for those directly involved in the marketing, selling, distributing, or large-scale use of the merchandise. Live, breathing musicians are ignobly referred to in NAMM-speak as “end-users.” They are less welcome than dust at the show.

If an end-user somehow wangles a pass, he then discovers that his chances of having a one-on-one discussion with a company rep are greatly reduced by the reps’ emphasis on signing big- commission, bulk deals with dealer-distributors. And even if the reps were anxious to talk to these scurvy end-users, the floor of the Anaheim Convention Center frequently gets so crowded that productive discourse is all but impossible.

John Hernandez, the 32-year-old sales manager for New World Music & Sound, a local dealer in high-tech music gear, has first-hand knowledge of the frustrations musicians experience at the annual trade gala.

“The NAMM show has become a zoo, a madhouse,” he said in a phone conversation last week. “And every year it seems worse than the year before.”

Hernandez’s answer to the NAMM show is an annual, consumer-oriented event at which manufacturers and other musicians perform and demonstrate new equipment for the edification of the professional and amateur player. This year’s edition, “Music Tech ‘91,” will be presented by New World in conjunction with XTRA (91X) radio Saturday and Sunday at the Holiday Inn at Montgomery Field.

Hernandez didn’t originate “Music Tech.” The owners of what was then known as New World Audio held a keyboards-only show in 1987 in the store’s cramped quarters in a Kearny Mesa industrial park. But when Hernandez moved here from San Francisco in 1989 and assumed his role in the company, he made it a priority to expand the show and relocate it to a suitable exhibit hall.

Three subsequent Music Techs have showcased keyboards, public-address and sound-reinforcement systems, guitars, drums, recording equipment, computer hardware and software, the latest in MIDI (musical instrument digital interface) gear, and other state-of-the-art merchandise. Accordingly, Music Tech’s attendance has grown to the point where this weekend’s installment is expected to improve on last year’s record crowd of 3,500.

But Hernandez is quick to point out that size and scope aren’t the show’s only selling points. “Our emphasis is on education,” he said. “We’ll have more than 40 manufacturers on hand to demonstrate their equipment and answer questions, but we’ll also have well-known performers offering more than a dozen clinics on subjects of interest to musicians.”

Alan White, drummer for Yes, the Plastic Ono Band, and others, will give a drum clinic. Blues Saraceno, the young guitarist who toured with erstwhile member of Cream, Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker last year, will discuss how he recently completed a solo album using affordable recording equipment. Chris Isaak, who will be in concert at the Spreckels Theatre on Saturday night, will perform solo that afternoon. Jason Faulkner, guitarist for the popular alternative band, Jellyfish, will also perform on Saturday (see Grace Notes).

But Hernandez is just as excited about the participation of local standouts. “(Drummer) Duncan Moore and members of Fattburger will conduct clinics, and on Sunday the local band Sweat Engine will build a song from scratch to demonstrate the creative uses of the latest high-tech gear,” he said. “And that kind of local involvement is important to me. The primary purpose of this show is to provide a NAMM-like event for consumers, but I also want it to create an awareness that we have our own music scene here, that we are no longer operating in the shadows of L.A.”

The recent release on Rhino Records of a Beat Farmers rarities CD preceded by days the San Diego band’s own release from their current contract with Curb Records.

“Glad ‘N’ Greasy,” a six-song EP that the Farmers’ first label is marketing as the “great lost Beat Farmers album,” was recorded in England in July, 1985. It contains the band’s first recorded version of Neil Young’s “Powderfinger,” a testosterone rewrite of the traditional hobo-folk tune “Big Rock Candy Mountain,” and worthy but long-neglected originals by members of the band, including then-Farmer Buddy Blue.

The release of “Glad ‘N’ Greasy” neatly coincides with Rhino’s issue of Blue’s first solo album, “Guttersnipes ‘N’ Zealots,” and the label doesn’t forget to mention in press materials that the former represents Blue’s last recording with the band. Blue’s departure was not a gold-watch-and-roses affair, but he had a favorable reaction to the new-old recording.

“I think it’s the best Beat Farmers release yet,” said Blue last week. “The first Beat Farmers album, (“Tales of the New West”) was overrated; it had nice energy and an innocence that I like, but we were very green and the production was pretty dry. And I hated (the second LP) “Van Go.” That one was embarrassing. But this one is a pleasant diversion.”

Beat Farmers drummer-raconteur Country Dick Montana is equally pleased with the Rhino CD, but he is downright ecstatic about the parting with Curb Records. “The stuff on ‘Glad ‘N’ Greasy’ was supposed to have included some songs that were demos for our first album on Curb, but not surprisingly there was difficulty getting Curb to release the stuff, so it’s just an EP,” he said last Wednesday night at the Belly Up Tavern.

“But I’m happy with it; I think it’s as good as anything we’ve released. I especially like the idea that now people won’t have to work so hard to find it. That stuff’s been available as an import, but it was such a hassle to order it.”

“What I’m really celebrating tonight, though” he said, “is our freedom. Today I called Curb and told them we wanted out of our contract and they said, ‘OK.’ Just like that! It was easy. This might be the happiest day of my life.”

The water-and-oil relationship between Curb and the Beat Farmers was proving a psychological yoke for the musicians, and apparently they feel no urgency about signing with anyone else.

GRACE NOTES: Native San Diegan Tod Howarth, the multi-instrumentalist who has played with Ted Nugent, Cheap Trick, and Ace Frehley, brings his band to the Bacchanal on Friday. On Saturday, Jellyfish will be joined by If Tomorrow for a gig at the Backdoor. Jellyfish just finished shooting a video featuring a Felini-esque cast of characters for their first “official’ single, “Baby’s Coming Back.” They’re also doing a public-service video for “Rock the Vote,” an industry movement whose agenda is, in part, to persuade Congress to pass a bill making voter registration automatic when one obtains a driver’s license.