Our Shop Manager Allen Whitman gets the call to do the Joe Satriani CD and Tour! What!

Allen and his world of basses

Joe and Gary talking tone

Drums anyone

Can you really ever have enough guitars

Gary-Allen-Kirkwood

Magic Mike, tuning it up

Oooooooo YEAH!!!

Yes, that tall long haired fellow that helps you figure out how we can help you with your guitar will be taking a few breaks now and again. But never fear, Fernando who you usually see Mondays and Tuesdays will be filling in, until his band Jet Boy hits the road for a small tour in November. How did this happen you ask. Well, lf you did not know, Allen is a most amazing musician and happens to be a fabulous rocking bass player. His main claim to fame is his band the Mermen, which is a 3 piece "surf-ish" but rocking band. So Allen is no stranger to holding down a 3 piece, which happens to be what Joe needed. I believe it all got rolling when Joe and drummer (an all around nice guy) Jeff Campitelli went to see the Mermen play a CD release party for the Merman CD they just finished. Joe and Jeff must of been sufficiently impressed to invite Allen to a few casual "jams" to have a little fun ;-), and check out the chemistry. Yada-yada-yada..... Off to the recording studio to record the next Joe Satriani CD. Somewhere in the middle of all that fun, Allen was also invited to join the tour that begins this fall. Most of the CD is done and what little I heard the band was amazing. A new addition is Mike Keneally on Keyboards. If you do not know Mike he has a long musical past and can play almost any instrument with precision and skill.... We did a-lot of guitar preparation for Joe and Allen before the session started. We changed strings, milled or re-fretted when needed, changed pickups, put together some new ones and got everything ready to be recorded. Even with all the prep I still had to make a studio call to check out some other guitars and to bring a few over. It was fun and inspiring to see, and be a part of it all coming together. We are Happy for Allen and Joe to be working together and look forward to checking out the show when it hits the road. Read about it here, http://satriani.com/perl/2004/news/main?thread=1&age=new