Christopher Martin Hansen/Mike Kholgraf - Dance Of The Spanish Maiden

Hear The Track Here

Although I try my hardest to be objective and be seen NOT to 'play favourites', sometimes I jes' can't he'p it. As much as it counts to bring that objectivity to bear, I am also a human being with preferences and (yaaay happy me) friends. This collaboration bring those two things to bear; musical feasts of an acoustic nature (guitars and stuff) and a couple of my good friends. Christopher Martin Hansen got a special going over from me when I highlighted his work with a special Overview (August 2005) because I thought that anyone who played as beautifully as this guy needed as much publicity as I could give him. Not that it did him much good, ya understand, because the kind of interest my reviews drag up is the same kind of stuff you run away screaming from.

The other bloke in this suprisingly Spanish sounding peice (mmmm I wonder why?) is none other than the avuncular host of Saturday Night Rocks, a regular weekend haunt for your vile reviewer to spew insults to all and sundry. Long before he started his DJ thing Mike and I had musical encounters and I still have fond memories of some of them, although not others. That's usually down to style though because, like Chris, Mike is no slouch at the ol' geetar and that's fine by me no matter what the genre. Listening to this again and again (and again and again) I am struck by how TIGHT the two parts are, and although I recognise Chris's master touch, I'm having a lot of trouble figuring out who is doing what, to whom and where.

That doesn't stop me enjoying this light, very authentic sounding, acoustic lead line extravaganza, although I did think it started to wear on a bit after a while. Personally, I would shave a minute or so off this track but I have spent the day in an 'off with their heads' mood so that thought may be discounted. As I stated in my overveiw of Christopher Martin Hansen and endless reviews of Mike the K, you would need a preference for the lighter (and more classically inspired) genres to really get to the heart of the matter, think Leo Kottke, Julian Bream and John Renbourn to name just three artists who have inspired me.

Inspirational, yeah, that's the word. Recommended (especially for the finger blur)