new: monthly column
Hi everyone!
So here it is, my first blog entry for TMA! I assume it isn’t relevant to bore you all with my resume or tell a long and winding story about how and why I was hired at TMA. Instead I’ll try and explain what these upcoming blogs will be about.
I’ve been employed as product manager for guitar strings, parts, accessories and luthier tools. You might think it seems a bit odd to focus on everything surrounding but not including my favorite instrument! However I feel the subject fits me like a glove. I am very much interested in why our guitars sound, play and feel the way they do. Whatever it is a musician qualifies as character, feel, mojo or vibe (or however you might call it) is up to a level caused by materials and parts used, design parameters but also the build quality and setup of our guitars. Because so many factors are at play simultaneously, even only partly understanding what’s going on there already is quite the challenge.
But there’s more. The appreciation of a player for his or her guitar is a pretty subjective judgement as well, based and influenced by personal taste, musical references, practical usability or maybe even the time of day. Someone might be completely in love with the clean, bell-like sound from a vintage Strat played through a Fender Twin Reverb. At the same time anyone playing loud stoner rock, tuned to drop-C through a loud 100W Marshall stack, might think of the exact same guitar as a scratchy sounding toy. To me both these players are right from their perspective and context.
In this blog I’ll get into topics ranging from ‘do all these different kinds of strings really matter that much?’ to ‘I finally got these wonderful pickups installed but I am really not that impressed’ and everything in between. I’ll approach these topics from alternating viewpoints, either as a guitar player or as a repairman from behind the work bench. Maybe I’ll use an appropriate anecdote from real life to explain or make my point but I might also use a more scientific physical approach instead.
So here’s my introduction for now. I’ll post a blog on a monthly basis and am definitely open to any input and suggestions on the subject matter! If you are curious about my views on a particular topic (or if you feel I’ve screwed up and completely missed the point somehow) don’t hesitate to send me a message at martijn@tma-benelux.com.
Till next time,
Martijn
Martijn Vink is TMA’s Product Manager Guitar SPA (Strings, Parts and Accessories). He has more than a decade of experience behind the work bench, performing setups and repairs on guitars and basses and communicating with his customers to get the best performance from their instruments. He managed a Dutch guitar store for several years and purchased, restored and traded vintage instruments worldwide. He enjoys playing lead guitar for The Maureens.
