After seeing IG tag Cary from Electric Guitar Review I now see that Cary has tagged me in this Eight Random Facts madness. So here we go, here are eight random facts nobody cared to know about Matt Van Stone, but will now know.

1. I recently moved to a new house and my phone is not working. I am currently on hold with Shaw technical support trying to get my phone fixed.

2. I do not have a middle name and that really shocks a lot of people. Most people assume I say that because I have some horrible middle name like Remus or something, but my birth certificate doesn’t lie. I have none.

3. Sandwiches are my favorite food. I like breakfast sandwiches, sandwiches at lunch, dinner, and as snacks. Whether it’s cold meat or PB and J, I never get bored of them. Ask my girlfriend, I have been feeding her them for two years now and shes sick of ‘em.

4. I was home schooled between grade 2 and grade 7 at which point I went back to public school. I realize now that I put way too much effort into high school. Kids… dont read this, but I still believe it was mostly a waste of time.

5. If I didn’t go down the computers/IT career path I probably would have become some kind of a wood worker. Wood working and Computers were my favorite two subjects in school. Playing guitar was my favorite outside of school.

6. I love cheesy horror movies. In fact, yesterday was Friday the 13th and I had a cheesy horror movie party! We watched Freddy vs Jason (not so cheesy) and Adam and Evil (VERY cheesy). Basically we went to the local video store and found the best worst movie we could find in the horror section completely going by title and synopsis. It was a toss up between Adam and Evil and Death Tunnel.

7. I used to be a closet GAP whore. On any given day I could be caught wearing at least one piece of GAP clothing, and in some situations only my socks and shoes were GAP free. I have grown out of that, secretly I miss the GAP, but I can never find anything there I want to wear anymore.

8. I can’t grow a beard because it comes in too patchy and that saddens me on a daily basis. It sucks to have to shave all the time, but it sucks even more knowing I couldn’t let it grow if I wanted to.

Well there you go. I hope you learned something interesting.

And now to pass the curse on, here are a few people I’d like to tag:
Dave from eightface
T.L. from indieguitarist
Wookie from GuitarToyBox
Rich from GuitarBlog

And since Cary, IG, and I all seem to read the same blogs I only have 4 to tag. But I would like to double-tag Lori from Play Like a Girl and J.P. from Strat-O-Blogster.

Dean was one of the first, if not the first guitar company to use gorgeous models holding guitars as advertisements. Many companies have copied this advertising method. Thanks Dean! I can see the difference!

I was just going to post a comment on his blog, but I thought I’d just write a post on here in response to IG’s My top 5 music passions post. So here it is in reverse order:

5. Writing Music
I’m in the same boat as IG, I haven’t been blessed with the natural songwriters gene. I wish I could just pick up a pen and pour my soul out in rhyming meaningful metaphors and smilies, but it just doesn’t work for me. I am just not very good at expressing emotion through words. When it comes to writing guitar, I guess I’m an over achiever. I write one thing and spend too much time comparing it to other works instead of just being content with it. In the end I discard it. However, I am getting better with writing (the music portion at least), and I am passionate about it, so here it is at number five.

4. Talking about music.
I love to chat it up about my favorite music. I like talking about songs, riffs, solos, jams, concerts, guitars, history, legends, and rock gods. I can’t get enough of the social aspect of music.

3. Discovering Something New
The great thing about talking about music is it always leads to something new. Most of the great music I have discovered in my life has been by “hey, have you ever heard of” or “if you like that, you’ll love this”. How many of my favorite artists and songs would I not know about if I didn’t love to talk about music? I could have missed out on so many different styles too. Blues, flamenco, metal, could be on the list of genres I might have never gotten into if someone had not recommended some kick ass music.

2. Pure F%*#ing Metal
I love the extreme. I love over the top gore filled horror movies and I love metal music. I’m talking about harmonizing guitar, screaming vocals, pummeling drums, shredding keyboards heavy-metal. It allows me to vicariously live the image of a hard core lifestyle. It is so against my personality, and most people wouldn’t know it was my favorite music by looking at me, but it is.

1. Playing my Guitar!
I picked up the guitar out of the blue when I was 16. I never had a desire to play it until that one day, and then all of a sudden I did. The next day I started playing, and I haven’t stopped since. I love playing all sorts of music on my guitar. I love jamming and teaching and learning. This is a lifestyle I will never give up.

What things are you passionate about in music?

PS, I dont know why I used that picture above, I just liked it.

Just a quick post about the BLS show on April 12th. It ruled. I went and saw them in Vancouver in May of ‘05 and this show blew that one out of the water. It was amazing. The sound was awesome, the playing was awesome. The band seemed to really enjoy themselves the whole time they were up there. I couldn’t have asked for a better show. And it was just that much better because I got to meet Zakk a few hours before.

Anyway, here’s some pictures, videos, and forum posts about the show.

Images on Flickr:

Black Label Society - April 12th, 2007 MacEwan Hall Calgary

BLS Playing Suicide Messiah

Zakk Introducing JD

That’s right. On April 12th at Guitar Works on 16th Ave in Calgary I met Zakk Wylde. Marshall held an autograph signing to which you had to enter a draw or buy a Marshall MG amp to attend. I, naturally not wanting to leave it up to luck and bought the amp.

First off, I should just say, the whole thing was a gong show from 11:30 when I showed up until 3:30 when I actually got through to meet him. The thing was poorly planned and totally unorganized. I don’t really want to get too much in it, but if you ever get the chance to meet the guy, bring something to get signed EVEN if they insist there will be no bringing in outside stuff to sign. I say that because they said there would be material to purchase to have him sign, and there wasn’t.

Anyway, the singing was supposed to go from 1pm to 3pm and you were supposed to arrive at 12pm to get an entrance bracelet. When I got there at 11:30 they wouldn’t give me one because I didn’t bring a CD to get signed. I wanted to purchase one there, but they hadn’t arrived yet. So I waited, and waited, and waited with about 20 other people for the CDs to come. Zakk showed up at about 2:30, and we still had no CD. In the end they gave us Dunlop posters for Zakk’s new guitar strings to get signed. The poster is pretty sweet, but still, not a CD.

I waited in line for about an hour after this and finally made it through the doors at almost 3:30. I was in awe just being in his presence. I cant really explain what it was like talking to the guy. He gave me a one armed hug, asked me if I was coming out to the show that night, I responded and we shot the shit for a few minutes, then he gave me another one armed hug and sent me on my way. It was awesome. I still think back on it and it seems like it was a dream. It was a great experience.

Here is a photo of the poster that I got signed.

I wanted to get a picture taken with him, but that was strictly prohibited. So I didn’t push it.

Eric Clapton was awesome. This is a concert that I really never thought I would get a chance to see, and it was amazing. My favorite Eric Clapton is Blues Clapton, and this concert was 100% blues.

Sadly, when I purchased the tickets they had a different seating plan showing on Ticketmaster than the actual one they used. In the plan they show it looked like we were on the 6th row to the left of the stage. In actual fact we were in the 36th row. I know, sucks. Still, it was amazing to be at the show and I would have paid what I did again any day.

Robert Cray was Clapton’s opening act. He came on at about 7:30 and played for 30 minutes. He has a cool style and an amazing voice. I thought he was really good. By 8:30 Clapton was playing. He stuck to the blues this time and every song turned into an extended solo for every member of the band. He played songs including Keys to the Highway, Got to get Better in a Little While, Tell the Truth, Motherless Children, and Little Queen of Spades. At roughly 10pm the band left the stage but soon came back for an encore. For their encore they whipped out Crossroads and Little Wing. Oh yeah, and there was an acoustic set in the middle of the show. I loved hearing Running on Faith live.

On top of the amazing musicians, the sound setup was pristine. I have no complaints. It sounded just like it would if you had the DVD playing on your home stereo system. Whoever did the sound setup should give themselves a pat on the back. I was impressed.

I think the 14,999 other people at the Saddledome will agree with me that it was one of the best concerts they have ever seen. Anyone who likes Clapton would have been in heaven. I know I said I would try to get photos, but it was much too dark and nothing seemed to turn out on my digital camera.