Rock of Ages reviews
Les Fradkin - Strat heaven (Reality Rock Organisation RRO-1029)
"One thing for sure, guitar is here to stay", Les told me. And Les is living proof of that. In spite of his excursion into more spacey realms on 'One link between them', Strat heaven is a return to form. In a very diverse selection of songs the guitar is the main ingredient and rightfully so. It's what Les does best. The cd opens with a track that takes you back to when surf and hot rod instrumentals were king. It ends with the Beatles song Good Night and in the meantime it has visited a whole bunch of very different style of songs, going from Led Zeppelin over Gary Glitter to Gnarls Barkley. But Les always knows how to set them to his own hand. Blistering guitar solos and layers of guitar behind it, that's what always makes it such a pleasure to listen to Fradkin's music. The fact that he interprets the songs as instrumentals lifts them above being just a cover version, avoids comparisons to the original and takes you right back to when the guitar instrumental ruled. Bring it on, Les ! I'm ready for more !
Les Fradkin - One link between them (Reality Rock Organisation RRO-1027)
This album is quite a change of direction ! I guess it will be a lot easier to get into for somebody who is not really familiar with Les's work. Because in all fairness, there's just no comparison to previous albums. The guitar had to make room for the Ztar, an instrument aimed at guitar players, I take it, but which sounds like a synthesiser. So forget about the guitar antics here. Think Vangelis and the by Les mentioned J-M Jarre and to a lesser degree Tangerine Dream. Add to that a solid dose of Joe Meek and you'll see how this varies from Fradkin's dozen-plus previous albums.
There's definitely some excellent sounds on there and as Les and I already agree to, what does it all matter as long as the music's great. Now that may be so in my (and Les's) case because my interests reach to both of those far apart corners. But will somebody who's into Jeff Beck also go for Vangelis ? Or more accurately, will somebody who loves Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac also endorse the Buckingham-Nicks line-up ? Me...I would, but a word of caution to those who are expecting more guitar antics. Those who enter with an open mind, will indeed discover that Les is still a talent to be reckoned with in his new field of expertise.
Available as a download from iTunes
Les Fradkin - 12 (Reality Rock Organisation RRO-1015)
"12" is Les Fradkin's 12th album and except for one song is every bit as good as Les has done so far. Some Byrds, some Dylan, a few originals...they make an excellent mixture on which Les excells. Jumping out from the batch of guest musicians are Buddy Cage on pedal steel and ex-Manassas keyboardist Paul Harris.
But the real treat here is the song I made exception for earlier on : Alone Again Or ! This is obviously a cover version of the opening track on Love's Forever Changes. I'm a big fan of the Love original, but this one's right up there as well ! For me this track alone is worth the price of admission. Fans of Les will no doubt enjoy the entire album, but everybody else should at least own Alone Again Or and since it's available as an individual download...what's the problem ? ;)
Also check out Les's comments on the individual tracks at the CDbaby link below :
Buy at CDbaby or download at iTunes
Elinas - Elinas (Private release)
You know how people sometimes talk about a friend who has a friend who has a sister etc etc ? Well, this is something like that. Apparently one of the guys in this band is related to my wife's favorite niece's husband. Which is of course why my wife is twisting my arm and you're reading about it here ;)
Elinas is a German 4-piece band and this is their debut EP. It consists of three songs that lean towards power-pop and one acoustic number that kinda sticks out like a sore thumb inbetween all this electricity. But all in all this EP is not bad as debuts go. I'm sure the indie generation will like this a lot better, but there's definitely bits to enjoy for everybody. It'll be interesting to see where this band is going with a full length cd !
