A Great Gift Idea

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If you are not sure where to start, this is a great place to begin.  This is our Pick Punch Starter Kit. It’s $69.40 and it’s a perfect gift for the person that has everything.  If you have a music lover, this is the kit.  If you have a crafter, this is the kit.  It’s a great way to get those creative juices flowing.  And, you can add-on to this at any time, with many of our products at www.pickpunch.com !

 

Contest Time!

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In honor of National Guitar Month, we would like to challenge you to a contest. Using your Pick Punch, show us the most creative material you have used to make your pick.  We have shown you many different plastics, now you show us what you have used!  Please be careful and only use materials that are meant to be used with Pick Punch. Submit your pictures either here or on our Facebook page and we will select a winner at the end of the month. Winners will get to choose a Punch from our line of Custom Pick Punches. Good luck & have fun creating!

Where Do You Keep Your Picks?

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We keep ours on a professional pick porter stick pad. It sticks on your guitar, peels off, and leaves no residue. Our pick porter holds 7-8 picks. If it ever gets dirty, you can reactivate it and clean it with a little water….its good as new. We use this on all our expensive guitars and it leaves no trace. We include 3 medium yellow picks with the stick pad. This is a must have for every guitar player to keep your picks handy.  

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Our Pick Porter Stick Pad is $9.99.

 

Good Idea for Using Custom Picks to Make Art

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We found this cool piece of artwork on Pinterest, but can’t click on the link to tell you who it belongs to or how they did it.  Looks like they used guitar string, and picks over possibly a canvas board.  We love the idea, and think it’s so creative.  This would be a great project piece for your music room, above your bar or even as a gift to a fellow guitar player.  You could use different Pick Punch punches and make different instruments.  The possibilities are endless for a creative mind!  So Pick your Punch and get to making some amazing art!  Remember to send in any photos so we can see what you have made!

Two Great Places to Store Custom Made Picks

Have you custom-made a pick that you are super proud of and want to show off?  Or maybe you have a pick that you want to display, and you aren’t sure how to.  We have several options for you to choose from, and today we will show you two of them.

First, we have our guitar pick frame holder with stands. $5.99

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And, we have our guitar pick case with easel. $3.99

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Both are great options to hold your special picks.  PICK one up today!  www.pickpunch.com

 

 

 

 

3 Ways to get inspired this March, aka, “National Craft Month”

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We have several crafty punches available for purchase at Pick Punch, so we have our crafters covered this month.  Here are 3 ways to inspire you in March.

1. Think about your half-finished pile of crafty projects.  Now organize your thoughts and write them down.  Each day, try to cross something off your list.  At the end of March, you won’t believe how many of your half-finished projects have turned into finished works of art.

2. Think Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.  This might just inspire you to look around the house and make something amazing.  We like using gift cards and other plastics to make custom-made picks.  Think about what you have laying around…or what you are throwing out…use pinterest…that’s one of the best inspirational sites out there.  Just plug in what you have in the search bar to see what others have made with the same materials.

3. Give some supplies to the kids.  See what they come up with.  Sometimes kids are the best inspiration around.  A few of my favorite pieces around my house, are those my kids made.

Here are a couple of our crafty punches:

Circle $24.95 circlepickpunch

Square $24.95 square

Teardrop $24.95teardrop

Send us pictures of what you have crafted this month.  We will feature as many as we can on our blog or on our facebook page! Can’t wait to see what you come up with….

A Great Memory of the Jackson Five & 1984

Today in 1970, “ABC” by the Jackson Five was released.  Is there anyone out there that doesn’t love a good Jackson Five song?  When I was in second grade, I had to see Michael Jackson.  He was a part of the Victory Tour that year. It must have been 1984. My parents were totally into it. They flew us to Buffalo, New York. It was my first concert.  We had nosebleed seats, but I remember the experience. How amazing…to watch Michael Jackson dance. He had on his glove. I LOVED him!  He would get all caught up in the microphone cord and would do this crazy twirl to get out of it. I could see only because of a huge screen above our seats.  I also remember that we stayed in the same hotel as Michael and his brothers. The lady at the the hotel diner told me that I had “just missed him” or that “Michael Jackson had just left out the back door.”  Looking back at that now, I know there was no way the Jackson Five was staying at that same hotel… but I did believe it then, and that may have been the coolest experience my parents could have ever given me at that time in my life.  I wonder who that will be for my kids.  Justin Bieber?  Taylor Swift?  Will I be as cool as my parents were and take my kids?  What is your favorite Jackson Five memory?   First concert memory?

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Looking for a Chinese Instrument to Celebrate Chinese New Year?

While looking online for a Chinese instrument played with a pick (all inspired by today, as it is the first day of the Chinese New Year, and of course, we are Pick Punch) I found the most awesome videos of a girl, Michelle Kwan, playing the guzheng.  The guzheng is a Chinese plucked zither.  A zither is a stringed instrument, which can be played by plucking or with a bow.

Check out this video of Michelle Kwan playing “Sweet Child of Mine”

And, here she is covering Metallica’s “One”

Happy Chinese New Year!

 

Anthrax’s Scott Ian excerpt from Guitar Interactive Magazine

I found this article online and thought it was interesting to hear Scott Ian’s answer to what advice he would give to up and coming guitarists…regarding especially what he thought about social media skills playing an important role in becoming successful.
Here is  some of the article from ultimate guitar.com originally found in Guitar Interactive magazine.
I wouldn’t know. I don’t know what to tell somebody these days, because so much of the stuff… The Internet didn’t exist when I was coming up and when Anthrax started, and for years and years and years, so… We were a band for… Let’s say, if you wanna say, around ’97 or ’98, when the Internet kind of started becoming a tool that a band could use in a myriad number of ways, we were a band for 17 years before that became even something anyone knew of. So I have no idea. I don’t know anything about any of that stuff.“The only thing I can say to anyone is just play what you love. Play what makes you happy. That’s all I ever did, and that’s all I know most of the people I know in bands ever did. Granted, we’re from a different time. So, these days, I don’t know. I don’t know…”He continued: “Do you need to know how to use social media to be a guitar player? I don’t even understand what that means?

My attitude is, play what makes you happy and practice songwriting. Write songs.

I look at guitar probably in a completely different way than most people, and probably most of the people that read your magazines.

I would rather listen to Malcolm Young play an A chord than anything else on guitar – than anything, other than maybe Eddie Van Halen.

I’m a caveman when it comes to guitar.

Guitar, for me, has only ever been a tool to write songs. Guitar is a tool used to create music and to play with other people. That’s what guitar is for me. That’s what makes me happy as a guitar player.

If you’re a kid who wants to learn how to shred like… I don’t even know who… whatever is the new-school… I don’t know who’s the best lead guitar player out right now under 30 years old. There’s these super-technical bands with eight strings. Like, I know a band… And I’m not being negative about them, but I know there’s a band called Periphery, and I’ve heard of them, and I’ve heard some of the stuff, and I get it. From a technical standpoint, it’s amazing! But it’s not something I personally am gonna go home and put on. I totally respect it and I appreciate it, and I understand why kids are getting into that.

Ian added: “So, basically, what I’m saying is… it’s just what makes you happy. If that makes you happy, then do that. If Malcolm Young makes you happy, then do that. You know what I mean?! That’s all I cared about when I was a kid. I played guitar for fun; that’s all it was. And, truthfully, I didn’t become a lead guitar player, and I didn’t focus on that, because the work wasn’t fun for me. I just wanted to get up there and rip big chords and just do what makes you happy. That’s the best advice I can give.

 

Are you ready for Valentine’s?

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It’s tomorrow.  Are you ready?  We have some of the best gift items out there, for both men and women.  Hats, wallets, Pick Punch, Collar Stay Punch, Round or Square Punch for crafty types.  All kinds of gifts, just waiting for you.  Now go to www.pickpunch.com and get all your gifts at once! We LOVE to see you shop