2007 July 25 » Baggas’ Blog

25th July 2007

The Rock n Roll Hajj

Getting late here but I haven’t updated in a couple of days so time for a quick recap.

Monday morning I got up nice and early, bundled the boys in the car and drove halfway across Tennessee to Memphis, birthplace of the blues and home of The King - Elvis Presley. Was a smooth 3 hour drive through some beautiful countryside before we arrived at Graceland. And Graceland itself was well worth the effort, not only to see the 70s style home decorating, and Elvis’ cars and planes and gold records etc, but to really step back into history and connect with a man whose legacy is still with us today. Graceland, and the city of Memphis, would have to be the rock ‘n roll Mecca. It’s a shame Memphis was such a drive because there was so much more I wanted to see there - Beale St, Sun Studios, the Gibson factory - but after a drive through the city along the edge of the Mississippi, we had to head back East to Nashville, along the aptly titled “Music Highway” - between these two cities there is an awful lot of music history.

Today I created my own piece of Nashville related music history (well sort of) - I visited a couple of guitar shops and picked up that Fender VG stratocaster I’ve been wanting. The first shop didn’t have any but when I walked into the second there it was hanging on the wall, in the exact colour I wanted - Suburst with maple neck. Actually it’s the same colour as the strat in the domino picture I’ve had in my blog banner all these years which is kinda cool. So far I’m quite impressed. The essential strat tone is great, and the simulations seem very good. The alternate tunings see to track flawlessly, and there’s virtually no noise from any of the guitar sims, even the acoustic ones. Before now all the acoustic simulators I’ve ever tried have had a terrible hiss. I also grabbed a Roland Micro Cube amp so I can plug in and play for the rest of this trip, and as a useful practice amp for back home. Wish I had the money and the luggage space to pick up some more guitars - they had a huge range of beautiful Fenders, Gibsons and others at pretty good prices - but until the next trip this one versatile guitar will have to suffice. Oh, I also visited the Gibson store on Sunday after lunch - never seen such a fantastic range of Gibsons in my life, including some quite unusual models. Might try and get back there tomorrow for another look, since we’ll be over that way again.

Anyway everyone else is snoozing so I’d better log off. If it get time over the next couple of days I’ll post some more pictures (including Graceland), and my overall (very positive) impressions of Nashville and more updates on what we’ve been up to.

Categories : Guitar, Personal, Travel, music | 4 Comments