Well - the final day of NAMM was a bit uneventful but exciting. Spent most of the day walking the show floor - looking at things I might of missed - trying not to think too much about the pain in my feet or the back of my legs...
Spent the majority of the day walking the floor snapping photo's and talking with people just about the show in general, drums, pedals, music and anything else we could come across. Ran into Jim Feck and his lovely wife and we spent some in depth time talking about the new Mapex pedals, the new Mapex Panther snares and the new throws. After that it was just wandering around taking some random photo's and soaking up the vibe one last time before leaving the floor.
The last thing we did before leaving the show was interview a drummer who is just a blast ot watch play and a blast to talk to. Kirk Covington is best known for his work with the group Tribal Tech. back in the 90's and is also the other half of the drumming pair that just completely shreds in the band known as Volto. This is a guy that can rock a kit that consists of an 18" kick, a snare a tom and a few cymbals - and keep pace and trade it back and forth with none other than Danny Carey himself. We interviewed Kirk who tried his damnedest to get Danny in on it - but Danny due to his better known group, Tool, was just overwhelmed with appearances etc, and couldn't make it. I honestly didn't mind - talking with Kirk (and when you read the interview it's going to read more like a conversation than a traditional interview - which is the way I like it - you'll understand) was great and I'm REALLY lookign forward to seeing these guys play - every chance I get. As a group these guys are phenominal from Kirk, to the bassist Lance, to John (or Volto as his nicknamed), and of course Danny. They shred, kick ass, and are just a thrill to watch play. Now they just need to rock out an album.
So here are some photo's to end day three - I'll have the lot of all of our pix on line by the end of the week and expect our big write up as soon as we can get it done. Hoping to have Kirks interview up by the end of the week as well. There'll be a preview of the new E-Pro Live kit (from the show floor going up this week as well.
In the coming weeks expect reviews of the new Mapex Pedal, the Drum Dial (not from NAMM but still going to review it). Interviews in the work include Jason Bittner from Shadow's Fall and Ray Luzier from Korn.
Some photos....
New Mapex snares:
New Mapex Throw:
Another of the Pearl E-Pro:
DW 2000 and 3000 series pedals:
Humor from Mike Portnoy:
Dave!
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And last but not least me yapping it up with Kirk Covington (Tribal Tech, Volto):
That's it for this show....wrap up comign soon!!!!