Thursday 3 November 2011

Yokohama Music Fair 2011

I had an almost all-nighter last night. Against my better judgement, I thought I'd do something different and go with some co-workers to small bars in Dogenzaka and Shinjuku.

Preceding a public holiday you'd expect them to be a little better patronised. Both places we went to were quite sparse in people, but made up for it in exorbitant beer prices. The loud Belgians in the Shinjuku bar convinced me NEVER to do this again. I got shortchanged on my beer too which didn't make me happy either.

We DID make a deviation beforehand at my favourite English bar in Shibuya, so not all bad. I got home around the 430am mark.

I woke up slightly later than my usual at 1030am to the sound of right wing extremists blaring their propaganda from their vans. I wanted to go to the biannual Yokohama Music Fair at Pacifico in Minato Mirai. I've been good and haven't bought any more guitars (for now). But not so good for other musical things.

By the time I could drag myself out of bed and make my way, we'd arrive there a little bit after 2pm. Because I was going to a music exhibition I thought I'd do the rockstar thing and wear my hair out which I rarely do. Always worth repeating a bit of the Halloween scares I did last week!

Like last time ESP had the most impressive guitar display with weird shapes and colours. Fender also had an interesting stand with some very nice flower-cloth covered telecasters inspired by the paisley Fenders, or Flower pattern JEMs. It's surprising I've never seen Ibanez at these events. I REALLY liked the black one, so I tried it out.

Yes, I like it!

I also tried the Moog guitar. I expected it to be a better version of my Sustainiac-equipped Steinberger, but it was overly complicated, and for the money I like what my guitar does more than this did. Good. A guitar I can cross off my "want" list.

While most of the gear I could easily have tried already in a music shop, it was nice to try them here without the added pressure to buy. I saw the new Boss RC-300 loop station. I didn't get to try it, because a Japanese guy was hogging it for a long time. Korg has a few interesting new virtual analog toys.

I haven't touched the guitars I already have for a while now, but this Fair has encouraged me to get off my ass (for a while at least). After we left Pacifico we walked in the dark into the adjacent Rinko Park.

It's funny that I've never been here before. By night it looked quite nice. My camera is with Panasonic to clean a bit of dust behind the glass in the EVF that was bothering me, before my warranty was up. They say that's going to take 3 weeks!

Sometime after I get it back I'll come back here during the day to take some photos. The Music Fair is on till Sunday. It's not just guitars, so anyone musically inclined should take the opportunity to check it out.

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