Hey Guys! I Am Mark

So, always being one to take direction well, here I am! As I said my name is Mark and I live in Las Vegas NV. I am a working musician and businessman. I play guitar, Piano, bass and I sing. I am a Fender Strat guy and have been for many years. I own a wide variety of them ranging from a 2000 Yngwie strat to a 62 USA custom shop reissue. I actually have a mexi strat that is honestly one of my favorites. It was made in the mid 90's in Mexico but with a MIM serial number and all USA parts. It seems there was a big fire in the Mexico plant in 1994 and all their materials were lost. So Fender got them up and running with materials they needed from the California plant. Funny thing is I had no idea of this when I bought it from a pawn shop in Oklahoma City back in 1998, I just knew it played like a dream and had a 120.00 price tag on it. I scooped it up and immediately put HS3 pickups in it (all three) and a Callaham bridge and tremolo system. I have a USA made Jackson dinky XL from back in the day and a bunch of other electric and acoustic instruments.

I have a very capable recording studio in my home with excellent mics, preamps and all the other needed gear to make decent recordings.

My influences came in very definite order on my musical timeline. Early on it was Joe Perry, Richie Blackmore and Jeff Beck and then came eddie Van Halen but I rejected all things tapping due to arrogance and immaturity on my part. I will add that quite frankly over use at the time by all the wanna bee's also made me hate the technique for a long time. I embrace all techniques and styles of playing these days and am always looking to learn. Then came Al DiMeola and my fascination with him and desire to learn to play like him put me in the woodshed for about 3 years. I played a couple tunes with him during some clinics he did for Ovation in the 80's and consider it a real honor to have played Med Sundance with Al.
The next and MOST significant influence during my life was Yngwie. It will never leave me; that feeling and overwhelmed state of mind I lapsed into first time I heard Far beyond the sun. I will say that I have made sure to never sound like my hero's with regard to Vibrato and so fourth but I have definitely taken the time to learn the scales and shapes they use/used to achieve their style.
Wow did I really just write all this? OMG I am sorry...thanks for having me here. I look forward to learning from you all.
Cheers
I am 48 years old and have been playing guitar since I was 12 so that would be ...ugh 36 years. I started Piano at 8 years old.