NAMM 2022: When we heard that Rich Robinson would be at this year's NAMM show, we just had to track him down to get the lowdown on his new Martin signature model.
The guitar – a luxuriously appointed D-28 based on the Black Crowes guitarist's own 1954 D-28 – features top-of-the-line specs including aged satin-finished East Indian rosewood for its back and sides, an aged Sitka spruce top, Martin's traditional dovetail neck joint, authentic hide glue construction, aged nickel tuners and more. It's a “guitar player's dream," Martin promises.
Its specs are tantalizing, so when we spotted Robinson across the Anaheim Convention Center, we sent over our Tech Editor, Paul Riario, to learn more about the stunning acoustic guitar.
Robinson explains that the instrument was born because he didn't want to take his 1954 D-28 – which once belonged to his late father – on tour.
“I was talking to my guitar tech Lindz McKay, and I was like, ‘I wish I had a great Martin but I'm not taking my dad's on tour',” he explains. “It's the one guitar that I'm kinda precious about – the other ones, they are what they are.”
McKay subsequently reached out to a contact at Martin, and “the Appalachian” – named after a band his father played in in the '50s and '60s – evolved from there.
“From Martin's standpoint, it's not about doing things on the cheap to make money, it's about getting it right,” Robinson continues. “I sent them my dad's guitar, they had it, they studied it, they did everything really respectfully and correctly, and I couldn't be happier.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Robinson talks about the Black Crowes new covers EP, 1972, which he says took the band a grand total of three days to complete.
“We went in and just knocked it out,” he says. “We were in our comfort zone. We're always in the studio, we know how to play, we've been doing this for years. And so to me it was just fun. That was the whole point of it.”
