Pete Townshend

Earnie Bailey was mesmerized as a kid, sitting in the front row of an Earth, Wind & Fire concert and seeing all the instruments up close! This experience inspired him to go to the library to learn all he could about guitar building and repair. While in high school Earnie made a guitar in wood shop, which led to requests from his friends to repair their instruments. While working as a repairman for music stores by day, in his off hours Earnie provided his services for free to area rock bands in exchange for concert tickets.

Tim Hinkley has been an active studio musician in both Los Angeles and Nashville for most of his career.  As first-call keyboardist, Tim has recorded with George Harrison, Pete Townshend, The Who and the Rolling Stones.  Tim also recorded with the Memphis Horns, a group founded by Wayne Jackson, who passed away the week of Tim’s NAMM Oral History interview.

Gary Stewart Hurst is known around the industry as “Gary the Fuzzman” for being the inventor of the Tone Bender fuzz pedal, which he began producing in the 1960s. Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page started using Gary’s Tone Benders in 1965 and soon demand for his fuzz pedals came in from around the world.

Eddie Veale is the studio designer who worked hand in hand with some of music’s greatest artists to create their own home studios. Eddie designed the home studio John Lennon used to record “Imagine.”  In fact, John was so excited to get in and use his new studio, he began recording while Eddie was still there. As a result, Eddie became one of the first acousticians to engineer a record. Once complete, George Harrison requested a home studio design from Eddie as well and soon the ball was rolling. Years earlier, Eddie was asked by Bob Moog to pop over to Abbey Roads Studios to repa

Stephen Zelenka has had quite the career in the music industry. His love for music started early while he was growing up and playing gigs in London,  he eventually landed a job working for the band Gentle Giant. This job entailed a lot of tasks associated with touring, and Stephen earned the nickname of “Zoomie Zelenka”  at the tender age of sixteen  by running around with so much to do having been awarded the job title of guitar tech, projectionist and PA engineer all on the same gig! After touring with Gentle Giant, Stephen went on to work with TFA Electrosound in the UK and wen