Farrell Jackson - Forever Endlessly (slack key tuning)

Hear The Track Here

First track up from Mixpo this month (Ed: Mixposure obviously) is from our old friend Farrell Jackson who we last encountered with Your Hat's On Way Too Tight (June 2010) so even the most mentally challenged of readers can remember that far back. Now, where was I? Ah yes, Farrell Jackson, an American rock musician who have come across as himself, as part of Jackson-Hart, as part of Rayon Vert and probably 20m other projects I've lost count of. hey, what can I tell you, Mixposure is that kind of place and one of the reasons why it is so special. It's a great site for interaction for other musicians, especially if you like your music to be made with six strings and a strong whammy bar.

Having said that Farrell has also had a couple of Must Haves from me - Last Day (September 2009) and Gypsy Princess (October 2009) - although I should note that Gypsy Princess was in fact a Jackson-Hart track. Like a lot of guitarists, Farrell likes to dabble with different string tunings (it makes your guitar playing look REALLY flash) and as a consequence Forever Endlessly (slack key tuning) is played in a Cmaj slack tuning. Which, if you are not a total machinehead/plankspanker, sounds looks and smells like you are speaking Martian. I've found that played with altered tunings like this to be tremendously liberating, especially if you've never tried it before, but it's actually quite difficult to compose with or at least that has been my experience.

What it does, at least for me, is for me to get within (but still a lifetime away) striking distance of sounding like Christopher Martin Hansen. What Farrell has with Forever Endlessly is the kind of guitar arrangement I love from musicians as accomplished as CMH, allied with Farrell's unerring rock sensibility to come up with a track that - although yet another guitar instrumental - stands tall and strong as a masterful performance in its own right. Mind you, as the owner of a 'fat bottom' acoustic guitar as well, I am bound to love that full, rich sound. Nonetheless, if I wasn't such a guitar nerd, and had to evaluate this as 'just' a piece of music I'd still be shouting the odds about how good it all sounds. As we all know, to our cost, the net is awash with guitar instrumentals of all stripes and colours, it takes a rare one to stand out. This is that rare one.

MUST HAVE acoustic guitar track.