November/December 2000
Preston Reed, "Handwritten Notes," 2000
Gone are the days when the solo guitar stylings of Preston Reed can be merely measured
against those of the now-legendary Michael Hedges. On "Handwritten Notes" Preston
Reed skillfully intertwines his trademark raucous slam-bang percussives with reflective and
melodious ballads in a way which will heretofore define him as a living guitar legend in his
own right. Reed eases into the quieter musical introspections on this CD with the pianistic
grace and voicings typical of Bill Evans: "First Summer Without You" has the halting and
leisurely beauty of "Waltz for Debby". "Crossing Open Water" and "What You Don’t
See" likewise allow us to glimpse Reed’s innate gift for compostion, a gift whereby the
listener’s focus zooms to the music rather than the technique. Reed blurs and melds
genres on "Lost Time", morphing what seems to open as a slow delta blues into a jazz
ballad which cries with a voice like Billie Holliday where you initially swore you may have
heard Ma Rainey. Don’t fret, tapping and slapping also abound for those Groovemaster
fans who take their music percussive, energizing and explosive. "Tractor Pull" and
"Shinkansen" are positively hypnotic, exuding a pulsatile energy both primeval and
visceral. In the liner notes, Reed says "We may not understand the mysterious power
music holds, but we know it brings us together and gives us pleasure and sometimes even
a miraculous recognition of our shared humanity". If I may take that statement one step
further, I would say that certain guitarists of true accomplishment seem to be more visible
stewards of that "miraculous power"... Preston Reed is on that short list.
Iain Matthews, "A Tiniest Wham," 2000
Iain Matthews opens up his new all-acoustic CD "A Tiniest Wham" with a tune resolutely
entitled "I’m Alive". Like Jackson Browne’s title cut of the same name, "I’m Alive" is a
triumphant declaration of freedom and renewal, both musically and lyrically. Singing "Let
me tell you something, I didn’t come this far to let go now", he perhaps recapitulates the
arc of his career to date. Matthews was a founding member of Fairport Convention in
1967, later saw success with his own band Matthews Southern Comfort and more recently
has been a member of the folk group Plainsong. But it wasn’t always smooth sailing. He
took a hiatus from professional music-making in the 1980s to work as an A&R rep for
Island Records and Windham Hill. With the recent release of "The Tiniest Wham"
Matthews now proves that he’s not about to let go of his passion for writing and
performing music after 34 years. He effectively mixes and matches elements of folk, rock,
country, bluegrass and swing into his own catchy style which might be compared to Hugh
Blumenfeld. The cuts "I’m Alive", "Swinging from the Yardarm" and "The Great
Afterthought" feature the kind of contagious Eagles-like harmony vocals that just beg you
to sing along when nobody’s looking. "Funk and Fire" and "Sister" are finger-poppin’
jazz swing in the tradition of Dan Hicks and his Hot Licks. "The Onliest" is
mainstream-as-can-be bluegrass, a composite of ringing and vertiginous mandolin and
acoustic guitar runs over cascading but subtle background vocals. "Sicknote" is folk-rock
at it’s most elemental, reminiscent of Neil Young’s early solo work. Iain Matthews is on
course with this new release, ever moving towards imbuing every word and note with life.
Doyle Dykes, "Zelf," 2000
A lifelong friend of mine shares a Christmas tradition with me of exchanging tapes of
music we like and admire. The tape he sent me in 1997 included the tune "Celtic
Cowboy" by Doyle Dykes and was my first epiphanous introduction to this guitar wizard
who seemed to control his instrument as though it was a banjo crossed with a pedal steel
guitar. "Zelf", Dykes’ newest solo recording opens with a similar sentiment on "Howling
of the Wood", chock-full of blisteringly quick Chet Atkins-like fingerpicking and Dykes’
trademark stretches of the B string at the headstock, abruptly and nimbly winching notes
from lax to taut and back without a blink. "Birmingham Steele" even more spectacularly
showcases these techniques... if a listen to this doesn’t cause you to sweat, swoon or
otherwise feel funny, then you’re obviously either not alive or else suffering from a severe
impaction of ear wax. The other 12 tracks depart from this formula, and it’s quickly
apparent that "Zelf" is a self-portrait of a very multifaceted guitarist whose artistry glints
and shines in kaleidoscopic brilliance depending on the angle from which Dykes chooses
to portray himself. "Self Portrait on Acoustic Guitar", "Misty Nights in Tokyo", "The
Changing of the Guard" and "Music of the Night Ships" are pretty and introspective
ballads. "Self Portrait on Nylon-string Guitar" and "Self Portrait on Jazz Guitar" validate
Dykes’ versatility in the classical/flamenco and jazz styles, respectively. Dykes gives us a
glimpse of his devotional side on two hymns. His rendition of Phil Collins’ "That’s All" is
just plain fun, which I find heartening: one often wonders whether many professional
guitarists begin to lose the pure joy of playing as they advance in their careers, but on
"That’s All" it sounds to me like Dykes is having more fun than a couple of kids playing in
the mud. There’s only one note of caution directed to guitar purists... four tracks are
"contaminated" by orchestral strings, somewhat paradoxically to Dykes’ "Opry" persona.
But the real paradox of Doyle Dykes is that while his riffs don’t even sound humanly
possible, they resonate with a true human spirit.
Noah Zacharin, "aLIVE!," 2000
It’s a rare pleasure to hear a recording by an independent artist who is simultaneously
gifted at guitar, poetic songwriting and singing who hasn’t already been snatched away by
a label to be reproduced to their specifications. If nothing else, there’s no more rock-solid
proof that his or her artistic intentions are brutally honest and from the heart. On
"aLIVE!", Noah Zacharin, by himself and with acoustic guitar in hand at a live
performance at a Toronto club, proves just that. Zacharin has a remarkable gift for
juxtaposing words in his songs which move and soothe by their sound and meaning, so it’s
not surprising to learn that a literary history as a poet precedes the troubadour. Combine
that with a very engaging and bluesy fingerstyle ability on guitar, and you’ll see why
Zacharin deserves to be mentioned in the same breath with names such as James Taylor
and David Wilcox, whom he resembles stylistically. Although Zacharin’s voice might be
his one arguable Achille’s Heel, it can modulate chameleon-like from sounding like Alan
Wilson on Canned Heat’s "On the Road Again" to the rich quality of Michael Martin
Murphey on the sad "Did Not Reach". Zacharin says of the melancholy tone of his songs:
"The songs might seem sad, but I don’t feel sad when I’m playing. I feel like the ability to
make something out of it, to make some order from this chaos, is positive". If making
order of chaos is truly the essence of the purpose of music and people, Zacharin is one
musician and person who is fulfilling his purpose.
Richard Leo Johnson, "Language," 2000
Talk about strange bedfellows. Only someone like Richard Leo Johnson with a reputation
for musical experimentation could bring together representatives from such diametrically
opposed groups as The Allman Brothers Band and Paul Winter Consort to collaborate.
On "Language", Johnson forsakes the solo guitar format to be joined by Paul McCandless
on woodwinds, Glenn Moore on double bass, Warren Haynes on acoustic slide guitar,
Andy Reinhart on accordion, Matt Wilson on drums and Cyro Baptista on percussion.
But "collaboration" is a somewhat loose term when applied to this project, and again
highlights Johnson’s penchant for risk and experimentation. All 13 tracks were recorded
as solo guitar pieces, the tracks then delivered to the other individual musicians around the
country to add their parts, those musicians each never hearing more than the sole guitar
track. One might imagine that the synergy of musical interplay would be restrained with
such a detached songcrafting technique, but it works so remarkably well that on a blind
first listen to this CD I never suspected that everyone wasn’t recording in the same room
in realtime. The fact that it does work is testament both to Johnson’s rhythmic sense and
the high caliber of musicianship of the soloists. "1-5-00" is a beautiful musical
conversation between guitar and saxophone, spontaneous in it’s improvisations as though
McCandless and Johnson were face-to-face. Although I would never in my wildest dreams
have imagined it as a percussive instrument, Reinhart intuitively matches Johnson’s slaps
and clicks with the gasping exhalations and inhalations of his accordion on the rollicking
"Chuck Soup". Irving Berlin and Rodgers and Hammerstein might either be puzzled,
angry or delighted over Johnson’s quirky renditions of showtunes "Cheek to Cheek" and
"Happy Talk", but surely they would have to admire the creativity involved in crunching
these melodies to adapt to Johnson’s crepitant style. Richard Leo Johnson has again
re-defined what it means to be a guitar innovator.
©
A.F.
Buy it at Amazon.com
©
A.F.
Buy it at Amazon.com
©
A.F.
Buy it at Amazon.com
©
A.F.
Buy it at Amazon.com
©
A.F.
Buy it at Amazon.com
