RwK - Distant Light

Hear The Track Here

What? Why are you scratching your head then? Look, I know you are trying to place the oddly vowel-less name, so let me put you out of your misery. We last ran across Rick Kresiak (aka RwK) paired up with young Mike-K on Rain Dance (November 2009) where I did my usual rant about plank spankers, all no doubt falling on long dead ears. It's all that high volume ya see, makes them all a bit Mutt and Jeff. That why whenever guitarists enter the room, the decibel level goes up accordingly to say nothing of the air curdling under the weight of the shouted curses. It's a good job that when they do finally pick up their actual instrument, they can wail with the best of them. I really liked Rain Dance for a) it's tune and b) the rightness of someone like Rick to supply that magic ingredient, emotion.

Naahh. How can someone hammering on a wee dod of wood generate emotion? I compared Rick's playing, when reviewing that track, to Peter Green, erstwhile founder-member of Fleetwood Mac back in their blues heyday and the more I hear of his material the more I stand by that comparison. My early lead guitar life was supplied by Green, the inimitable Paul Kossof and other pioneers of the possibilities of blues out of the Gibson SG (no relation by the way but if you see one send it home to Daddy) and Rick has much of the control and tonal quality of these players but what comes through on Distant Light isn't so much the blues, well unless it favoured pink. Floyd, that is. Now that you are REALLY confused, it's probably time to listen to the track.

So much easier that way.

Considering that Rick is AFAIK an American, he does a very good Pink Floyd, complete with the right accent, intonation and lazy, can't-quite-get-out-of-bed phrasing. I say this as a long time fan of that band ever since the beginning. Ahhh, you think, a good copy then? Well (waggles palm), depends which way you look at it. I personally think that everyone borrows from what came before and I see no problem with that, so long as its used with respect to its roots and Distant Light gives the proper nod in the right direction. At this stage of the game I have heard quite a few RwK tracks and I know - for a fact - that this is no copyist musician. Whatever else you might think about Distant Light, it's undeniably RwK with the tired fingers and even more tired vocals.

Excellent Floyd-esque space opera. Highly Recommended.