Fender Musical Instruments is celebrating their 60th anniversary this year, and a few of us from the Warpdrive crew were invited to the big bash. Our weekend in Scottsdale, Arizona included a day at the Fender corporate headquarters and two nights of rock and roll at the Tempe Music Festival ( www.tempemusicfestival.com ) which was sponsored by Fender.

Friday night's concert was kicked off by two Milwaukee guitar gods, Willy Porter followed by Greg Koch, and then came the Arc Angels, Eric Johnson, and Jeff Beck. Other guitar-centric activities included pickup winding contests and building demonstrations in the Fender Village tent. Saturday consisted of much lounging by the pool at the hotel and another night at the festival.

We want to thank Fender for hosting us for the wonderful weekend. We very much appreciated having the chance to meet all the people we had previously known only through phone conversations. Meeting them in 80-degree sunny weather didn't hurt either.