Last time I was in NYC, I was working at Electric Lady Studios producing a band.....

[Sandi]

You've touched on one of my old favorite haunts -- 48th Street.


There's only ONE store left there from the glory days, Bob -- Rudy's Music. Rudy

is still there, making deals, hanging out, buying selling and trading. He just

celebrated his 25th anniversary there, and every other store is either owned by

Sam ASS or is gone.



Let me see -- WE BUY GUITARS. One of the first dealers to realize that used

guitars were "vintage" guitars. I held Jimi Hendrix's fuzzface at that shop, and

they offered it to me for $1500. 48th Street Custom Guitars was an AMAZING

shop, and you could get ANY guitar built that you could dream up. They had their

own brand of guitars during the 80s, and the shop upstairs was FULL of Japanese

crasftmen building guitars for the ESP Custom shop.



Roger Sadowsky had his shop there, and that was my favorite of all. Roger has

since gone on to be one of the premier builders of basses in the entire world,

and moved his shop to the area by the Brooklyn bridge, where his rent is more

affordable. If you watch TV, movies, or listen to the radio, chances are at

least 4-5 times per day you are hearing a Roger Sadowsky bass guitar. Every

night on David Letterman you can see Will Lee playing one. I used to see him

bumping up and down 48th Street all the time back then. Another great guy who

always had a smile on.



You never knew who you were going to run into back then in the 80s. My sister

and I ended up having a great lunch with Steve Stevens, then the guitarist with

Billy Idol, and a heck of a cool guy.



Last time I was in NYC, I was working at Electric Lady Studios producing a band.

This was in 2005, and I went to 48th street to buy a few items and just hang out

at my former favorite place in NYC. But now it's just another street in midtown.

All the good stores left in NYC are either in the Village (Matt Umanovs) or the

Lower East Side (Ludlow Guitars, Rivington Guitars) or across the river in

Brooklyn/Williamsburg.



I still miss NYC...



Bobby DeVito