Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Mike-K - Guitar Blues

Hear The Track Here

Over the years I have known him Mike K has unearthed a wealth of talents from every genre under the sun, and even a few from outside the Solar System entirely in all likelihood. For me, some of the best Blues and Country artists I have encountered over those years were originally played on Mike-K's awesome Saturday Night Rocks radio spot over on Songplanet. From the getgo, the show had no boundaries whatsoever - except the taste and presence of the Mic Meister - and the one thing the man has is taste. However, it's the authority that counts as well for me and I usually find that hard too judge when I review Mike's normal MOR style.

In fact within the first ten seconds of this track I knew this could only be a Mike K track.

It's hard to fake the blues. Nay, it's fekkin impossible. You either can play it, or you can't. Sure, it's still a skill and can be learnt and improved on but ultimately if you can't make that axe wail and gnash its teeth, it's nowhere baby. Authoritah is what I'm talking about and you don't hear it much in the blues these days. Welp, considering that Mike and Christopher Martin Hansen (who also plays lead on this) are not well known for their blues, I'd say they do a perfectly respectable job...

and accordingly shall keep their heads.

The difference between their two individual styles has never been more evident than on this track and I'm sure that Mike would be the first to point out that Chris's work on this is superb. As always, that liquid bubbling sound he gets perfectly suits the slickness and depth of the arrangement - for which Mike must get top honours. His own guitar parts were more than adequate although his fingers seemed a little more tentative than ol' Speedo (Ed: He means CMH) but that is also something I feel Mike would agree with. Nonetheless, bringing the authoritah back into the review, both guitarists had that.

Highly Recommended Guitar Blues (like wot it sez)

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