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I have been reviewing CDs for many years now and have
the bald head and white beard to prove it. During this time, I have
listened to literally thousands of recordings from a very wide
variety of artists, ranging in style from folk blues to near metal
and every shape and size in between. While "purists" may not care
for our approach here, we are very pleased that we have reviewed
such a wide range of artists, with the common denominator of all
being excellence. While I have reviewed a very large number of
recordings over the years, I have that I can recall only reviewed a
couple of all or mostly instrumental guitar recordings. I don't
have anything against instrumental recordings, but generally find
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they rarely if ever hold my interest from start to finish
and therefore I cannot honestly recommend them to my readers.
Welcome if you will today, perhaps to read of only the third all
instrumental guitar CD I have recommended to you, "Electric Roots"
from an enormously talented Italian guitarist Nicola Costa. Costa
is an extremely gifted young guitarist who offers 10 tracks of
original and extremely diverse instrumentals on this CD. He is all
over the board style and sound wise, which adds much to the charm
of this recording. He never wears you out on any particular sound
or tone, but plays them all with precision and power. He shows both
the beauty and the beast to you here as he can nearly lull you to
sleep with a track of gentle beauty, then blow the hat off your
head with the fury of the beast.
His supporting players are also top notch and include Cristiano
Micalizzi on drums, Massimo Pizzale on bass, and both Lorenzo
Capelli and Clemente Ferrari on keys, and brother are they all
good. Pizzale especially impressed me with his playing but then
again this is an extremely talented band.
I guarantee you that if you listen long enough to this set you are
going to find something you like. I would suggest you start with
track 1 and continue through track 10 as they are all wonderful
tunes. My personal favorite was a bit difficult to select, as all
the material is so good, but I particularly enjoyed the 8 minute
plus "Little Boy Blues" which showcases a lot of why I am so
impressed by this artist: as gentle as a baby's breath one minute,
as savage as an angry crocodile the next.
"Electric Roots" is truly a remarkable recording by an artist who
has such a bright future ahead of him. I am considering this a
"must own" recording for anyone who likes great blues, blues/rock,
or jazz guitar work or just plain good music in general. You can
visit online with Nicola at his official web site www.nicolacosta.com. Stop by and listen to sound
samples and buy a copy here in the US from our friends at
CD
Baby. You will most definitely be glad you did as this one
will spend a lot of time in your player.
Tom Branson
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