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updated: 7/28/01

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2001 Summer NAMM Notes (Part 2)
July 20-22, 2001  Nashville, TN

by Jason A.Barker

 
 

PART 1

PART 3

PART 4

We were honored to share a booth with our friends at Terry McInturff Guitars.  Terry's shop is based near us in North Carolina, so we are well aware of his products.  Terry has worked on some of my guitars before, and it will not be long before I have him build an instrument for me.

It was a real pleasure getting to know Terry and his wife Tracy better.  The opportunity to hang out with them was a treat.  Picking Terry's brain on guitar topics was a valuable experience.  McInturff guitars continue to receive stellar reviews and I could tell that something good was happening by all of the interest in his products at the show. 

Terry and Tracy introduced me to John Sebastian, which I thought was very cool.  Sebastian, best known for his work with the Lovin' Spoonful and as composer of the theme to TV's "Welcome Back Kotter," was visiting them to check out the world-class guitars.  John played the McInturff instruments through some of Steve Carr's amps, which was fun for us.
 
 

We spent a lot of time with the McInturffs at this year's show and ate dinner together on a couple of occasions.  Terry is one of the most knowledgeable guitar people I have met and he is also a super nice guy, not to mention a fantastic player!  Tracy does a great job of representing their line, and she has an obvious passion for the instruments.

Doug Abrams, Eddie Berman and the rest of the entourage from  Raleigh, North Carolina's  Indoor Storm paid us several visits at the booths.  It's always fun when your friends from back home show up.
 
 

Terry debuted the new McInturff Taurus Sportster model.  What a fine guitar!  The prototype was immaculately constructed and featured a very lively and resonant tone with the P-90-style pickups.  He also lent us a gorgeous red Taurus Standard for use over in the Carr Amps booth.
 
 

I had been hearing about an overdrive/distortion pedal on the Internet for the past year or so called the Blackstone Mosfet Overdrive.  Imagine my surprise and pleasure when none other than its inventor, Jon Blackstone, stopped in to check out the Carr Amps booth.  Like so many people we met this week, Jon was a very personable guy and we had a chance to talk shop with him when Ted Weber graciously took us all out to dinner.

Though he was not formally exhibiting at a particular NAMM show site, Jon luckily had a few of his pedals with him for testing.  The Blackstone Mosfet Overdrive impressed us so much that we bought his display units on the spot.  Very small and stylish, the pedal has versatility and tone that belies its size.  A lot of manufacturers are offering multi-channel overdrive boxes these days but few have the type of sound that this unit has.

Though I haven't had time to explore the pedal in depth since we just got back from the show, my initial impressions are that it is very unique in form and function.  The first channel reminds me of a nice and warm Tube Screamer- style sound, maybe with a little more rawness,  that seems to be the current rage.  It is very useful and toneful.  Where this box differs from the competition is in the higher gain stages.  It made our single-coil demo guitars in the booth sound like fat humbuckers with no loss of clarity.  The tones were very reminiscent of Billy Gibbons' and Mark Knopfler's Les Paul tones.  I have noticed that it reacts very differently to various guitars and amps.  The one concern I have is that this design demands that the Blackstone is placed first in the effects chain at all time due to buffering issues.  This means no wah, tuner, or Uni-Vibe can go before the pedal.

There are a lot of interesting tonal options with the box, and it might take me a little time to get everything dialed in just as I like it, but I am intrigued by its possibilities.  Jon was very helpful in explaining his design theory for the unit.

For more information, check out Jon Blackstone's excellent Web site at: http://www.mindspring.com/~j.blackstone/