2022 Dallas International Guitar Show Market Hall April 29,30, May 1

3 days man! 3 days! Sound familiar? Well that was from the Woodstock movie, this is actually the 2022 Dallas International Guitar Show. Welcome, welcome. April 29-May 1. So I grab my 3 day VIP pass and off I go to make a whole weekend out of this weekend. I got there about 1:30 for the Friday opener, skipped the line and cruised on in. There’s something special in the air when you walk into the Guitar Show on opening day, the booths, the vendors, people of like mind gathering for the celebration of the guitar. Quite glorious! Ah yes, the people, if you are into people watching you would love this, we got your 60’s / 70’s burnouts (hello), the 60+ yr old groupie wanna be’s that should really rethink that halter and leather pants look. Olds, Youngs, we’re all here. So after a precursory run thru to check the scene out, a couple of things I noticed, 1). more vendors than last year’s 2021 covid fest, 2). they wisely moved the Sweetwater stage back outside where it needed to be, unlike 2021 when it was inside and unless you were within the first 10-15 rows the echoes made listening durn near impossible. Alright back to the show.

The concerts are always a high point for me, I get the chance to see old favorites and new faces that lead me to new musical discoveries.

Friday, we start off with Israeli guitarist Dekel Bor, jazz guitarist, plays a 335, impressive chops, his style is a bit out there, spacey jazz. I saw his whole set and enjoyed it, but I don’t I would have cared for much more. Btw, Dekel’s bass player was ridiculous, I didn’t catch his name. Good stuff though.

Next up one Nili Brosh, a young female shredder, flavors of Malmsteen (without all the sweeps) and Tony Macalpine. Great tone, great technique, all instrumentals. An excellent set. I honestly thought I had a video of her, but it appears I do not. Drag.

In-between concerts, it’s back inside to continue my on-going quest of reasonably priced Les Paul Goldtops and Martin acoustics. Good luck, yeah I know, but the search is always fun. I of course found a few, now if I only had an extra $10K. I believe Steven Tyler said it best when he sang, “Dream On!, Dream On!, Dream On till your dreams come true”.

Ah yes now it’s time for the Ally Venable Band. A young female blues-rocker, she is a regular at the Guitar Show for good reason. This girl absolutely burns it up. Wonderful tone she gets from her Les Paul, tasteful phrasing with plenty of crunch to her cleaner side with a glorious rendition of SRV’s “Lenny”. I really dug her hot pink boots too.

How I managed to get this closeup of some dude’s head is beyond me

Another spin thru the vendors, I am also in search of logo picks and sticker, which I am planning on using in some art projects. A stop thru the godfather of the Dallas Guitar show, Jimmy Wallace’s booth with its myriad of electric and acoustic guitars, some of the most expensive ones as well I might add.

Thus Friday has ended with a nice buzzing in the ears, and a song or 4 in the heart. We head home to prepare for Saturday, argumentatively the best day of the festival. Most all of the vendors have arrived and gotten set up, the concerts come hot and fast. Best of all, I get to catch up with my good friend Brad Allen.

Saturday!

We arrive a 10am just in time to catch Rockin’ Robert T, a four piece band, one of whom was a really good sax player. Mr T, (sorry it was too easy), held forth about 40 mins with some raunchy, roadhouse blues. Lots of fun, I’ll have to keep an eye out for him.

Darren Wise was up next, he has a really good cover band, I hung out for 3 tunes, one of which was “Rebel Yell”, not that I don’t like Billy Idol, it’s just not what I want to see at the guitar show. They were very energetic and would probably be lots of fun in a club situation.

Back thru through the vendors to the Sweetwater stage to catch The Boogie Men, these guys were great, some Allmans, a little Santana, lots of good grooves. Another band to watch for.

Now we introduce Quinton Hope, really enjoyed this cat, great tone from his strat, very tasty phrasing. Once again we happily have a guitarist that allows his strat to sound like a strat. Quinton played a beauty of a version of The Cars “Drive”. His wife joined him onstage for some smoldering blues, she btw is an excellent blues singer, reminds me a bit of Maylee Thomas.

Another run thru the vendors to see what joys I can find, although my main quests are Goldtops and Martins. I am also on the prowl for Fender Super Reverbs, of which several were found, of which none with under $1500, oh well. We did find a big surprise with a “Dumble amp”, which I have heard of over the years but never seen. This combo has but one 12 inch speaker and the price tag of $100K! You are not going to find this one at Guitar Center. Wow!

Got a text that Brad Allen had arrived, we met at the Reverend guitar booth and got a chance to talk with Greg Koch, the Gristleman! To say that Greg is a good guitarist, would be the biggest understatement in the history of the universe.

While we are on the subject of Greg Koch, let’s go catch his set and find out why he is called the crazed mad-loon of the guitar world. Come on Greg, at least try and make it seem like it’s difficult, but nooooooo, he just smiles and effortlessly plays some of the most ridiculous stuff you have ever seen.

So back to the vendors as Brad is looking for an inexpensive to take with him on his upcoming move to the beach paradise of Mexico. Which we did find btw, he even got Greg Koch to sign the back of his headstock. I, on the other hand, got one of his shirts. Fun, fun.

Now if you are into slide guitar you will love Sonny Landreth, while not my favorite style of guitar, Sonny is absolutely stupid good. Watching him work the slide is akin to attending a masterclass. He is a phenom.

How bout the South Austin Moonlighters? We caught their set at the Category 5 Stage, I caught the tail end of their set last year. So it was super to catch their whole set. Brad pointed out that they are very reminiscent of “The Band”. Smooth, great tone, great songs. Another one to watch for.

Now comes the show I have been waiting for since I found him on the 2022 schedule back in January. The incredible face-melting Philip Sayce! I found Mr Sayce from a reference on Anthony Stauffer’s Texas Blues Alley website a couple of years back, what a great find. Philip’s style is, in my humble opinion a cross between SRV / Hendrix. He played a lot from his Spirit Rising album. (which I might add I reviewed last year in this very spot). He plays with such frenzy and abandon that it makes one wonder, what on earth did those guitar strings do to piss you off so much!

Sunday ! Sunday !, Sunday!, Be There!, sorry got lost in an old commercial. Sunday is closing time, with a lot of the vendors shutting down thru out the course of the afternoon. This is your last chance for “a deal”, some collection picks, stickers and t-shirts. The concerts are still smoking.

Whilst searching for a spot to sit down and figure what strange item had mysteriously found it’s way into my shoe. I found Greg Koch and (sorry forgot his name) the Reverend Guitars owner. They were talking Reverend guitars at the seminar stage. Bonus!

We start off with Texas Tornado, guitar legend, The Rocky Athas Band. Rocky has played with everyone from Lightning, Black Oak Arkansas to John Mayall. A master of Les Paul tone, second only to, if not equal to, the legendary Les Paul sling-er Gary Moore. Rocky had a special guest, one that I would not have guessed in a million years, one Jay Jay French, guitarist with Twisted Sister. Most interesting. Bluesy, driving, good times music. Rocky never fails to deliver.

Next was Mark Lettieri, of Snarky Puppy and solo. Mark is always enjoyable, and again stupid good. This was my 3rd time to see him.

Now here’s another cat that I had been waiting to see, Alastair Greene. I discovered Mr Greene sometime last year while listening to Amazon music, he popped up as a “you may like this” suggestion. Why yes, yes I did like this suggestion! Alastair was supposed to play Saturday afternoon, but the Cat 5 stage schedule got a bit out of whack, much to my luck I was able to catch him. Alastair just oozes great tone and makes his 335 sing.

The last concert of the weekend is another I have been wanting to see, one Paul Gilbert, now I have known about him since his hair metal days of Racer X and Mr Big. I just never got the chance to see him until now. Let’s all let out a gasp of WOW! Dat boy can play! And play he does, most of Paul’s set was instrumentals, but not in the guitar wanker, shredmeister way. Paul would play medleys, complex, intricate medleys. For instance, he may play Stevie Nicks with Zep, a commercial theme, movie song, ending with Van Halen. He was jaw-dropping good. Plays an upside down right-handed Ibanez Iceman thru a Marshall (of course). I did not detect the use of a bunch of pedals which was refreshing. Paul did have an interesting way he kept his slide at the ready. He had a magnet on his guitar where he got stash and retrieve said slide at a seconds notice. Most ingenious I thought.

Well all good things have to eventually close and the 2022 Guitar Show is no different. A good time was had by me, saw a couple of old friends, got my picture with Redd Volkaert, got to speak to Greg Koch and most importantly, I was able to make it thru the weekend without dropping thousands of dollars on A guitar. The lovely Mrs K was most pleased with that. Until next year.

Make A JoyFul Noise,

dave

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