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Boats are my number 1 interest and have been since I was eight years old. 

I am not one that just jumps on a boat for the sake of being on a boat.  I prefer them as my home and if I had my way I'd rather just jump aboard and stay there as I had done in the past.   

Boats are a great way to travel without packing and unpacking.  If I cannot live on a boat I race them.   My Moore 24 Spitfire (USYRU 77674) had the "highest trophy to race entered ratio" at 84% (85% of those were 1st place) of any boat on the west coast for a number of years.  

I love Santa Cruz "Ultralights" and have owned boats that span the ULDB types, conventional types, and multi-hulls. Open 60 class of single handed ocean racers are one of the most impressive boats on the sea from my point of view.  The mini-transat 6.50 is also a blast. A boat is like a tool, use the right tool for the job. Power boats? Love them too. No matter what the vessel, I prefer to be on a boat that is small enough to be in touch with the elements. I do not consider a cruise ship a boat (it is really a ship) but have had a lot of fun on cruise ships.

Music is my number 2 interest in my life overall but generally it is my first priority and takes up the majority of my time.  I work with many artists on a daily basis.   Many of these artists can be seen on my GAB website.  Many are also listed on the link here - http://www.groovetubes.com/f-n-r.cfm  

When I have a bit of spare time I like to focus on new artists that are on their way up.  If they need any techical assistance, amp design, amplifier consulting, amplifier blueprinting, arranging, composing, mixing, sound reinforcement, FOH or monitor console live work, or help with their song writing I try to help them.   If you want to talk about any of this just drop me a note.

When it comes to music I like just about every style if it is done well.   You can find many of the artists I work with in my friends list here on myspace.   There are many more who are not on myspace.   You can also see many of them on my GAB website, some with photos and in many cases photos of their gear, amps, and/or backline.   There is an entire section on the GAB website for owners of Dr. Z amps where there are photos of the amps of folks I have assisted and who are friends.

I grew up falling asleep to the radio before I could walk.   I listened to every kind of music from the 1950s on.   Decades ago, before the age of digital recording and punching in to correct mistakes, and even before the advent of stereo, recording was a grand production.   Scores of top musicians would back singers.   Backup singers were multiple in numbers to harmonize.   It was groups such as The Beatles that showed the world that a group could be self contained.  

There was a magic and charm to the old recordings. Back in that era there were lots of great examples.   The Motown sound with the group that has been on more recordings than any other group in history (The Funk Brothers) spanned 14 years of #1 hits behind various artists.   

When it comes to music I cannot tolerate bad production values, bad mixing or poor arrangements.  I always prefer live performances even with the occasional mistakes.

At times I feel the folks from Nashville are more fun to work with than folks right here in Los Angeles! That is a generality but tends to be somewhat true.   It seems like more than half of the folks I work with are out of Nashville.   The next 30% are from all over the globe and only about 20% are from Los Angeles or So Cal.   When groups are on tour I suppose it does not matter where they are from as we seem to be able to meet up and work without much trouble.

I design custom amplifiers and work with many amp designers. I do live sound work, engineering, producing, mastering, arranging, etc. I have played guitar since the age of 8. I did play the accordian from the age of 5 to 8 but will never admit that to anybody. 

I always find time to support a number of up and coming groups if I have faith in them.   This includes the loan of my own equipment and my support.   I do these things at no cost to the band if they need the support to grow.     I also do my best to arrange endorsements for these bands when it comes them wanting to purchase their own equipment.   I have just as much fun supporting a band in a club of 200 as I do working at a 30,000 seat arena.

I support many bands and acts out of self preservation.   If I am going to have to listen to them for one to three hours I don't want to spend 90% of my time thinking (or worse ... complaining to anybody that is around me) that their amp bias is off, their tubes are shot, they have the wrong preamp tube in V1 and have lost articulation and things are just not all that right.

Generally you will see a number of artists which I support in the top 20 videos on CMT and GAC.   Some of these can be seen on my GAB website.

The Nashville "A" Team

The "A Team" are a few folks that have stellar reputations whether on tour or in the studio.   Look them up or look in my top friends list for some of them.  They are worth the effort to find.  To shorten this page and fix broken links I have moved this part of this section to a blog post where some of the "A Team" folks are mentioned. 

Carl Verheyen - DVD Rumor Mill.  Carl is the best guitarist I have ever heard.   Period.   Above is the dual DVD Rumor Mill.  If you do not have this and you either play guitar or like guitar in the least or even love a great show then trust me ... get this ....  CLICK HERE

The two shots above are Carl's latest CD.  Two different cover shots, the Europe version above and USA version below.  This is  CD with a bonus DVD on the making of the record, recording info, band member info and more.  Sure you can get this at places like Amazon but I think getting it directly from the artist is pretty cool.  From Carl Verheyen

Michael Burks - One of the greatest blues players you will ever hear.  For more go to www.michaelburks.com

Brad Paisley - last CD.   A must for any guitar player.

Brad's latest CD ... out June 2007.  Best one yet.  It's going to be interesting seeing how many of these songs end up with award nominations.  There are at least four or five that could turn into amazing videos based on Brad's humor and writing.  The songs just keep getting better and better.  You can probably get this at www.bradpaisley.com or over at the old standby, Amazon by clicking here

Rebecca Lynn Howard - Forgive.   One of my favorite singers on the planet.

Loni Specter - Lapdancer Lap Steels.   Look on my GAB website for more info.

Carl Verheyen amp shootout - his plexi 50 vs the SRZ-65 from Dr. Z Amps.   The SRZ-65 won.

Carl's Blackface Twin Reverb - I am doing a bit of blueprinting on the amp.

Greg Leisz - maybe the most requested steel player around.   Playing the Pierson Amp tweed champ.

Jimmy Wigle - GT Lab - Killer hard rock player - and general all around crazy man.

Patrick Selfridge from GT - great player (Rockabilly is his forte') and all around great guy.  Patrick left GT mid December 2006 and is now over at Mercury Magnetics ... makers of the best transformers in the world.

Brad Paisley and Mike Zaite (Dr. Z).  

Loni Specter and John March (Zenblues)

Typical mess on my floor blueprinting somebodies Black Face twin Reverb (I believe)

One reason my wife hates amps - the corner of the living room.

I do not watch a lot of movies in the movie theater. The last cool movie I saw was Good Night and Good Luck. I do not go to a lot of movies as I really dislike when some people don't seem to care that others are there and are disruptive. I do not care for lines, parking in crowded lots at the theater locations, and the general chaos of many people being pushed together in one room.

Perhaps that is also why I stay on stage during concerts and also arrive 6-8 hours before the show. (Yes, there is work to be done but I also avoid the crowds by getting there early.)

I write music scores for movies with Dina Covington. I guess we do watch some of the movie we are trying to score if it grabs our attention.

On this page you will see a lot of boats. Boats are probably my favorite thing in life. I love all kinds of boats. I am not just a sailboat fan. A boat is a tool and having the right tool for the job is paramount. You would never go sport fishing on a sailboat!

I can fall pretty hard for a perfect boat of perfect design. Back in my "Spirit of Nemo" days I was walking along the docks with a close friend Eric Lambert before a big race and saw a yellow boat of twenty something feet with a flush deck named "Legs". I turned to Eric and said ... "I don't know what that thing is but if it is not still made today I will build one. I met the owner and learned that the builder was indeed in business. I contacted the builder, Ron Moore of Moore Sailboats in Santa Cruz, and started to build "Spitfire". Spitfire went on to hold the highest trophy to race entered ratio of any boat on the west coast for a number of years.

I fell in love with fast, small, seaworthy, fast, beautifully designed boats. The boats shown below are from a class called "650". These boats are raced, singlehanded, from Europe to the Brazil in one race and to the USA also every few years. The reason I have put this in the "movies" section of myspace is because in my video section there are a number of videos on these boats as well as videos on other boats.

As a side note, the boat I love to sail on more than any other is a boat of this class. The boat is named "Ashley Danielle" as it is a 21 foot boat that is small, fast, very well designed and can do just about anything. The real Ashley Danielle is a student (18 units) on her way to being a doctor, a model, a martial arts expert, actress, gymnast, and can do just about anything. Ashley is 5'1" tall. Both the boat and Ashley prove to old adage that great things come in small packages. You will find a lot more of Ashley all over my myspace page and also find her in my top row of friends.

When I race double handed races (two people on a boat) I race with Mya Scott who is with the Ritz Carlton Hotel chain. The Ritz Carlton is our sponsor. The relationship with the hotel chain goes back to my Infonet days when they would host Infonet's global events and conferences.

This is my favorite type of boat to sail alone or sometimes with one other.

Columbia 50 designed by Bill Tripp. Built in the late sixties and rebuilt continually.   There are two shots of the forepeak area in the little slideshow; one of the original design and one after being updated.  This boat can take you anywhere.  With H.O. 211, 229 and 249, two sextants, full charts and the more common GPS aids used today, finding your way across the globe is not much of a problem if you know what you are doing.

 

Do I watch TV? Yes

When I live on a boat I do not have a TV on the boat and never would.

I watch a lot of GAC and CMT as that is work related. I like old British WWII sea movies, any submarine movie on TV, and shows like NCIS, and some of the typical action shows.

I have NEVER watched a sports show in my life. I do not play sports that are team sports. I only get involved in sports where there are huge expenses to cover the equipment used. These sports are ones like sailboat racing and aerobatic airplanes. What do you get in basketball? A ball ... sometimes. Baseball? A mit, ball, and bat. If you win or loose it is a team effort. In aerobatics it is all on you. The same goes for long distance single handed sailboat racing. Then again, I sometimes will catch a sports show out of the corner of my eye when I am visiting friends. I now smile at football and basketball games as my oldest son is a basketball sports agent and he played football in high school and college. He had schlorships cover his college education so I see one great aspect of these sorts of sports.

I do NOT watch ANY reality shows including music related shows. I would rather experience my own reality. On those survivor shows I cannot bear to watch lame mistake after lame mistake. I guess I can thank my military training for not being able to tolerate these shows! I watch The Unit, ER, Desperate Housewives, The Sopranos, most HBO series if I am around. I will admit to watching Sex and the City when it was on. My favorite series of all time was Northern Exposure.

I guess my shows are varied something like my choices when I drink which is rare.   I prefer B-52's, good rum, wine on occasion, but never drink beer. I love those fruity drinks like Pina Coladas. I had a friend that once said to me .... "I cannot figure you out. You drive a big 4WD truck, ride a Harley, fly airplanes and sail boats. You shoot guns and wear levis and flannel with western boots but you drink Pina Coladas". I guess that says a bit about me right there. Sort the the same as my TV habits.

Something of an understatement would be that I am not an avid reader.

My favorite book of all time is 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (have about 5 different versions). What can you not like about a man that bails out on the conventional world to live on the sea?

I have my Merchant Marine seaman's papers for both Captain and Engineer for very large vessels. I am more than happy to be a "hired gun" as a single handed racer. In France they have the right idea - they pay their singlehanded sponsored sailors more than they pay any other sporting people. They also pour tons of money into the boats that are supplied to their sailors. That is why they are very hard to beat.

I have had sponsorship and backing from Coca Cola, United Technologies, Infonet, Motorola, Maxwell Winches of New Zealand, Horizon Sails, and Moore Sailboats of Santa Cruz.

My race record seems to impress some people. In the end I can make an amp sound pretty decent, sail a boat pretty fast, or shoot pretty straight (another aspect of my life I suppose). On the minus side I am probably less than a desirable husband as boats and music generally come before most anything else.

I read some of Timothy Leary's book but it was somewhat like a second hand acid trip ... sort of disjointed. I could not finish it. But he did autograph it for me when we worked together at Apple.

I read Brave New World and 1984.

Those are about 1/2 of the total books I have read by choice.

I tend to read a lot technical material or magazines much more than I read books.

I have two heros.  One is real and one from a book. Phil Weld who was the most amazing person I have ever met and Captain Nemo from 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.  Phil Weld, at the age of 65, won the 1980 OSTAR (Observer Single Handed Trans Atlantic Race). He was the oldest competitor in the event. This just goes to show you that growing old is something that is earned (a quote from the movie "The Guardian"). Experience and skill overcame younger age once again. Captain Nemo ... I named my favorite boat after him ... "Spirit of Nemo" which I lived aboard for a number of years.

As far as real people to mention that I admire, there is one more. I only have one autograph ... it is from him, Timothy Leary. 

Saunders Stewart Models on Myspace

There are a number of models who can be seen at

www.saunders-stewart-models.com

The models below may be seen at Saunders Stewart Models or at their own websites or their own myspace pages. The SSM models have extensive portfolios at Saunders Stewart Models where there are about 80 models available for music video work, CD cover work or other photographic projects. You can check the SSM website to see if there are any models that meet your project requirements. Some of the SSM models here on myspace may also have links to their own SSM pages.

My favorite photographers here on myspace are shown in one of the rows of my top folks.  Look on their pages for some great work.

Below in the first section are a few of the featured models at Saunders Stewart. If you want to get in touch with them or learn more about them you will find their myspace links in the top row of my favorites.

Below are a few shots of Ashley Danielle.  You can see more of Ashley Danielle on her own myspace page. She is in my top row of friends.

Below - Featured model Kelly Kaye

You can see more of Kelly in my top row of friends and on her own myspace page at www.myspace.com/kellykayemodel  You can see more of Kelly who is one of the featured models at the top of the page at www.saunders-stewart-models.com   

Below is Michelle. Michelle can cover just about any photo project that you can think of. Michelle can be contacted via myspace by clicking on her icon in my top friends row or by contacting Charlie Couch (who took most of the photos below) in my top friends row of great photographers.

Below will be a few of the models from Saunders Stewart Models or some of our myspace model friends.  These will be rotated on this page.  There are over 70 models available for your photographic or music video requirements.  You can find these models at www.saunders-stewart-models.com If the link does not work (as myspace has problems with links often) just copy and paste it into your browser.

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