[Slightly OT] Dos and dont's in NJ - PA?

[Tommi]

Hey everyone

 

I will visit USA for the first time in September together with nine colleagues. We will be staying in Lawrence, north of Trenton, and our training will be held in Newtown, PA. We arrive on Sep. 22nd and depart Oct. 15th. Weekdays will probably be long days but the weekends will be off from training. I could need some recommendations about:

 

- Where to get my hands on a nice MM Stingray 5? So far i've found New Jersey Guitar & Bass Center. Any good stores in Philly?

 

- We also plan to see some NHL hockey. Is it possible to buy tickets on site or should we order them in advance?

 

- Concerts during the visit. Queensryche in Atlantic City, Aerosmith/Moetley Crue in Camden, Iron Maiden also in Camden and an old favourite of mine, Frank Marino & Mahogany Rush in Sellersville, PA. So many concerts i'd like to see and so little time. You have more concerts in three weeks than we have in one year in Sweden.

 

- NYC. I will try to do a weekend in New York to see what has to bee seen while in NY. A hotel for one night?

 

Anything else in the neighbourhood of Lawrence - Trenton - Newtown that we should see or do during weekdays?

 

Thanks in advance for your input

 

--->Tommi

[butcherNburn]

Do- Be careful in Camden.. serious Do...

[The Bear Jew]

Yo Tommi...

If you want to check out some good independent music stores in Philly and South Jersey, you can try:

8th St. Music

Cintioli\'s Music

Marlton Guitar Gallery

And, of course, there are Guitar Centers in Cherry Hill, Neshaminy and Plymouth Meeting. Similarly, there are Sam Ash stores in Franklin Mills, King Of Prussia and Cherry Hill. If you wanna find a MM 5-er, you may have to look in the big stores, since the littler ones don't always have stuff like that.

 

I don't know anything about hockey, but good luck getting Flyers tickets... that may be quite difficult. Philly hockey fans are nuts.

 

As for concerts, you might wanna look into

The Trocadero for some shows that might not be so hard on your wallet. No, you won't see Aerosmith there, but you can see Venom, Rancid and KMFDM.

 

But yeah, DO be careful in Camden. I hang out there quite a bit. You wouldn't wanna run into anyone like me, would ya?

[ZZ Thorn]

Anyone been to the Bass Palace in Scranton, PA? It's the home of Dunder-Mifflin Paper and is a couple hours from Philly.

 

I heard it's a palace for basses. On-line I saw they had some killer stuff. Bass-centric stores are hard to find. If I ever get out that way I planned to swing by.

[Tommi]

I saw some pages, while checking out the Tweeter Center on the web, that reported Camden as "Americas most dangerous city". But if they look like CMDN in Camden i dont see any problem.:-)

 

Yeah, if we go to Camden we will be careful.

 

Maybe it's easier to get tickets for the Devils or Rangers games?

[getz out]

I assume you will be renting a car for your stay?

 

It is relatively easy to get Devils tickets, but they are not cheap. NHL is an expensive game to go to, not including the food and drink. If you have a car, getting to the Meadowlands arena to see the devils is as simple as taking the NJ Turnpike north. It takes about 1 to 1.5 hours.

 

The Devils fans are true fans. There are a lot of hardcore Devils' fans from northwest New Jersey that go to most of the games. There are a lot of hardcore Rangers' fans, but they are usually not in Madison Square Garden. Almost all of the good seats are corporate tickets, and the cheap seats are expensive as well.

 

I will second Erik's recommendation for 8th St. Music. Nice folks with some nice gear.

 

Camden is a not-so-nice place to be. The Tweeter Center is harmless, but make sure you know how to get in and out of the area. Stay in the parking lot and in the venue.

 

Manhattan is a great place. I like it so much I go every day. You should carve out some time to go. You can find hotels for a single night, but it does not come cheap.

[Nicklab]

Originally posted by Tommi:

 

- Where to get my hands on a nice MM Stingray 5? So far i've found New Jersey Guitar & Bass Center. Any good stores in Philly?

It seems like you've already done some good research. Jay and the staff at NJ Guitar and Bass Center are arguably one of the best Musicman dealers in the United States. Definitely take advantage of your proximity to these guys to check out their stock.

[Tommi]

Thanks for your input, apppreciated.

 

We will have two cars available during our visit. But we are ten people and I guess that they aren't to impressed hanging out with me chasing basses. Therefore I have checked the Amtrak website and saw that Trenton has a station so I can go both to NJ-NY easily and also to Camden/Philly. Yes, I/we will be careful with those in Camden:-)

 

I'm more interested in finding used gear than stores carrying new stuff. The prices are really good on used Musicman basses compared to Swedish prices so I might buy more than one if I find'em.

G&L, Dingwalls and a Roscoe Beck Fender etc. are of course interesting buys too.

 

Venom played the Sweden Rock Festival this summer and set a new record of Marshall stacks on stage. If I remember right, the new Marshall- stacks-on-stage-record at SRF is now 42.

 

--->Tommi

[kenfxj]

Tommi,

 

You'll be staying about ten minutes from my house. If you'd like, I'd be happy to take a weekend afternoon and show you around some of the area bass stores. I'll PM you my contact information, if you're interested.

 

Ken