The last weekend of August 2008 saw the Flaxwood USA crew on the road again taking the guitars to the people at the "James Burton International Guitar Festival" in Shreveport Louisiana. Harry Orlove , our intrepid demo guy  and I flew into Dallas to meet up with Ed Klein, our Texas Rep,  where we piled the Flaxwood display and the guitars into a van and headed off to Cajun country. It's about a three hour drive down there so we cranked up some Hank Williams, some Elvis along with a lot of 60's and 70's country twang and reminisced about the times we had seen James play over the years.  My first introduction to James Burton playing live came in London in the mid seventies. Emmylou Harris did a couple of shows with the "Hot Band" at the New Victoria Theatre opening for some band that I no longer remember and James Burton played some stuff that night that sent all of us British Tele players back to the drawing board. If you want to know just how influential those shows were go and ask Albert Lee, Jerry Donahue and Elvis Costello. Back in the fifties James pretty much defined electric lead playing during his time with the great Ricky Nelson band. Check out this clip and listen closely around the three minute mark. You can hear that same solo echoing through the first half dozen Stones and Beatles albums. James is the real thing. Here' s a YouTube video that gives you a pretty good overview of the kind of things he did that night that almost made me give up playing. 

Shreveport has become something of a hub for the movie business of late and parts of downtown have become semi permanent movie sets. While we were there they were filming "I Hope They Serve Beer in Heaven" a sentiment shared by all of us present, and apparently there were movie stars on every corner. I never saw one though. The first night we were there was James' 79th birthday and we were invited to celebrate at a club that James used to own that now apparently belongs to the movie people. It looks like a bar but it's really a movie set and this week it was decorated as a beach bar with all kinds of posters from the 1940's imploring us to join the coastguard. Go figure. Rusty Young (of Poco, Buffalo Springfield etc.) dropped by where we were propping up the fake bar to say hi and we convinced him to come by the booth later to check out a Flaxwood. James arrived with his lovely wife Louise followed by the legendary Phil Chen.  Phil played bass on Jeff Beck's "Blow By Blow" and did sessions on thousands of records over the years. They call him the Asian Jamaican because he grew up in the Islands and sounds like a Rasta when he talks which contrasts wonderfully with his Chinese ethnicity.  James and he became close friends after they played some tribute shows together with the great Jerry Lee Lewis and he claims he is the best bassist he has ever played with.

James asked us to come to this  show earlier in the summer after he got a chance to play a Flaxwood at the NAMM Show in Nashville. Like every guitar manufacturer at the show we welcomed the opportunity to push an instrument into his hands as he walked the floor and by the time he got to us he must have held just about every brand on the market today. It didn't take long for him to get excited about the Flaxwood though and ended up spending a good part of the afternoon with us. He finally left and I stumbled on him a short while later raving about the guitar to Vince Gill a couple of aisles away. Harry and James have worked together in the past and Harry knows his wife Louise and it was her who persuaded us to sign up for the show in James' home town. As you can probably guess there was not too much persuading necessary.

James Burton falls for a Flaxwood at Summer NAMM 2008 in Nashville

The second day in Shreveport heralded the opening of the Guitar Show exhibit hall. I must send a mention out and a big thank you to all the players that stopped by to check out the guitars in the booth. We had people from as far away as Australia, Manchester in the UK, folks from everywhere in the US and several great players from the local area. We employed our usual practice of pulling unsuspecting guitarists off the floor and making them play the instrument. As usual most of them were skeptical about another composite guitar but it didn't take long before they were converted. Once again we went through another show without hearing any negative comments at all. At the end of the first day Harry and I spotted a black face Fender twin in great shape for sale at another booth for $700 and it sent us to ebay to check the going rate. The evening was spent plotting how we could get it back home and trying to figure out why it was so cheap. The next morning when we went to close the deal the owner pointed out it was a reissue which both disappointed us and reinforced the fact that we should never go into the used gear business. We also drooled over a plastic all original Farfisa organ from the sixties that neither of us were rich enough to buy.  

Saturday night we headed over to the historic Municipal Auditorium for the "James Burton International Guitar Festival Concert" headlined by Emmylou and featuring sets from an amazing number of artists. Among the highlights for me were Rusty Young, Billy Swann, Jim Messina and of course Emmylou. Phil Keaggy did some jaw dropping things with his acoustic as did Doyle Dykes while James ran on and off stage sitting in with just about everyone.  The star of the show for us however had to be the theatre itself. This was the location for the famous "Louisiana Hayride" radio show that first broadcast Hank Williams, Johnny Cash and Elvis Presley to an unsuspecting world. The guy sitting next to Harry was a Shreveport native who recalled seeing Hank several times there as a child. Yet another amazing historical building that was almost torn down to make a parking lot, it's been recently renovated and looks much the way it did back in the day. Back in March 1955 Elvis made his TV debut there on the Hayride and sang "That's Alright Mama" and many credit that performance as the one that finally launched rock and roll to a national audience. The profits from the Festival are funneled to a foundation that supplies instruments to the local schools ensuring that Shreveport continues its tradition of nurturing new talent. Flaxwood is proud to be a part of this very worthy cause. Sunday was a little quieter in the exhibition hall and it gave us a chance to hang with Mr Burton and deliver his brand new Flaxwood "Liekki" to him. We were a little surprised that he wanted one considering how married he is to his Tele but we apparently made quite an impression in Nashville earlier this year. After we presented him with the guitar his assistant said he would make sure it got delivered later but James would have none of it.  He wanted to carry it out himself and take it home.

James Burton and Harry Orlove with their Flaxwood Liekkis

 Sunday night saw Harry and I lose more money on the penny and nickel slots at the casino (I think I lost the most, around ten bucks), while Ed won a few hundred dollars at the craps table which allowed him to treat us to a celebratory drink at the hotel bar. All in all a very successful first jaunt into Cajun country for the Flaxwood brand. There was much Gumbo and  Catfish and Okra consumed at the Blind Tiger restaurant and bar in Shrevepoort, a place that should not be missed and many new friends made. The next morning I had the pleasure of humming the Bob Wills classic "Miles and Miles of Texas" as we crossed the Red river into that state on our way back to Cowtown.

Here's how it goes.....

I was born in Louisiana down on the old bayou
Raised on shrimp and catfish and Mammy's good gumbo

I got that ramblin fever said goodbye to ma and pa
I crossed the old Red River and this is what I saw.
I saw miles and miles of Texas.

I rode up in to Cowtown the cradle of the west
Just ask any cowboy he'll tell you it's the best
I met a Texas beauty got friendly with her pa
I looked into her big blue eyes and this is what I saw.
I saw miles and miles of Texas

And yes, we did see a lot of miles in Texas but I sadly never got to stare into the eyes of any Texas beauties. I did however get to stare into the mirrored shades of a local law enforcement official who pulled us over for exceeding the posted speed limit on the interstate by seven miles an hour. He turned out to be friendly just like everybody else we met on this trip and after wagging his finger at me for a few moments, smiled and let us go with a warning. A quick stop for some real Texas Barbecue on the way to the airport made the trip close to perfect. Thanks again to all our new Flaxwood friends we met in Shreveport, drop me a line and keep in touch.

Gordon Roberts

Flaxwood USA