Have you ever heard of one person who can really make music and that which is pleasing to many-a-ear? It may sound like a funny question but Joe Satriani is the GOD of progressive rock. Well, for those who don’t know what Progressive Rock is, it is a genre in music, a type of Rock songs where the song starts very pleasantly and ends pleasantly. But in between, the song progresses to Hard Rock and some times even to Acid Rock. This is really a show of Guitar expertise and experience.
Joe Satriani, a very famous member of the G3 group consisting of Steve Vai, Van Halen and John Pertrucci among others, is a follower of the Guitar Legend, Jimi Hendrix. Joe Satriani has been among those who’s got his lessons right. He is a real master in putting the right music at the right place. I’ve heard to most of his albums which are all almost as old as I am. Each song in his albums have a strange ’’Something’’ hidden in them. He really tends to play with the human emotions with his songs. I mean, how many such artiste’s have you come across who can play with all sorts of Human emotions? I do know that many artistes make your mind and soul happy. But is Happiness all the emotions that any Human being experiences? My take on that is no. Well, lets take a look on how Joe Satriani or The Saint (as he is more popular) really tingles our senses.
Flying in a Blue Dream: This is an album (and also a song with the same title) which really went up to great heights. Is not all that great when listening to some of his more later albums, this one is a mixture of guitars. With a real stereophonic speaker system, one can make out the back-ground and fore-ground guitars. The Background tune is like a flowing stream of smoke-clouds (It just comes with the imagination, a person who can imagine well will love what I say after listening to this song) while the foreground Guitar, played by the Saint himself, gives you the feeling of Blues. Sounds like the blues are getting into you and you are floating in a grey atmospehere.
Crying: This is a song from the album ’’The Extremist’’. I’ve heard this song quite a number of times. It is not the child’s cry that Joe has projected here. Instead, it is the cry that a person would give out with a broken heart. As if all’s lost. A student who has failed in an exam, crying to know how his/her parents would react. A youth crying when his/her lover departs/ditches him/her. How the feeling of ’’What went wrong’’ or ’’Why Me’’. Finally, this number has an ending which gives the feeling that some one is consoling a person who is sobbing un-controllably. This is also a must listen for Metal-heads.
Midnight: Remember the good old days where a troupe dance the Mexican Hat Dance around the fire late in the night? This song is taken in a fully drunk state and the real clap-tap dance around the fire, Senor and Senorita dancing their glory. Midnight is a small song which starts off like a Mexican, goes on very fast like a Mexican and ends slowly like the dance slows down with the sleepy heads dropping after they are tired. Amazing one, worth listening to once a week.
Surfing with The Aliens: This is a classic album (with a song of the same name). It has some really really great songs like Midnight, Circles and Always With Me Always With You. Surfing with The Aliens is a song which generally may not give you a feeling other than happiness. Probably, because we dont know what the Aliens feel with this song, but mostly because this song is meant to be one trademark song in all his G3-Live performances. Dont expect much of this title song. It is good, but not upto the others in this album.
Strange Beautiful Music: As the name itself suggests, it is yet another collection of such fine mastery over music. Such class, so melodious. The two highly rated tracks in this album are
i)Sleep Walk => This can be used in movies for a background music when depicting a scene of a person walking in his/her sleep.
ii)Oriental Melody => This track simply is a class act for the sound track which people generally think is from the asian/eastern countries. The first word that will come to one’s mind when listening to this track could be China/Japan. The mongoloid faces, the communication accent and style.
Probably, Joe Satriani has mastered his act and dug deep into his own self as to ’’what means what’’. Gaining this knowledge, he keeps his audience on their tippy toes. Basically, he is one of the G3 troupe that can challenge the Metallica folks. He is also known to have trained one of Metallica’s lead guitarists for their ’’Live in Woodstock’’ programme. Just forgive me if your favorite song like the Moroccan Sunset or Motorcycle Rider have been left out here. There are too many Joe Songs in my DBase, that I’ll probably end up puttin another 10 additional comments myself, apart from the Review.
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