Page 22 - ION Indie Magazine MarchApril 2019

ORANGE COUNTY POLICE CROWD CONTROL

I’ll bypass all the boring stuff I did and get to the meat of this event. This is my 9th year at NAMM and show attendance
was actually up once again with many more music vendors that had stopped exhibiting at NAMM returning again. And as
I have shared before, aside from being a photographer, I am a musician as well, making NAMM a great place to see my
old friends and meet new ones. I’ve also had the great pleasure of seeing, meeting, hanging out, having lunch with many
celebrities, artists, and musicians throughout my NAMM years, some being Stevie Wonder, Billy Bob Thornton, and Kerry
King, to name a few. This year in 2019, it was DJ Ashba of Guns N’ Roses, Robby Krieger of The Doors, and my personal
all-time favorite rock photographer, Neal Preston. I’ll let the photos in this article do the talking.

For some reason, I missed every single media breakfast, so, lunch became brunch. I was able to catch a couple
presentations with a cup of coffee and guest speakers announcing the day’s events, new products, and short presentations
with music company reps. A short walk from the hotel to the conference, NAMM doors opened at 10:00 sharp, as usual.
Security was a bit different. This time you were screened about 50 feet from all the entrances. With more security people,
it ran so much smoother than last year.