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VOICE
Throughout his career, Neal Schon has had a distinguished style that was
instantly recognizable, from his scorching lead work in JOURNEY, through
his
later projects such as HARDLINE and BAD ENGLISH, Schon has always kept a
balance of fire and finesse with the greatest of ease. As a solo artist,
his
repertoire runs more toward the mellow, dare I say New Age direction. Yet
he still burns, even with a low flame.
On his third Higher Octave release,
Schon tackles on some of the best known pop-ballads ever to come out of
Dianne Warren's closet. His choice of material is pretty straight ahead,
from
the mellow blues of Mariah Carey's "Hero" to the melodramatic schmaltz of
Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On". Now before you run to your toilets
heaving from the thought of Neal Schon reduced to playing lounge act
guitarist,
there are some bright moments on this CD. For one, Schon's use of note
choice is impeccable, always hitting the 'right' note at the 'right' time.
His
tone is fluid and light, yet when he attacks with vigor, he can still
conjure up
some ripping solos. The downfall of this record is that it pretty much
sounds
like an exact duplicate of the original tracks. Annie Lennox's 'Why' could
have
been directly lifted of her "Diva" album, and no one would know the
difference.
This seems to plague the disc from start to finish. It's too slick and not
enough
emphasis on interplay. These tracks just sound like glorified karaoke
versions
with a really good guitarist playing all the melody lines. This is nice if
you want
to hear these tracks in a different head space, but for a guitarist as
versatile
and creative as Schon (for further proof, check out his album Beyond the
Thunder)
these arrangements are flat and stale. Even worse, are some of the song
choices:
Shania Twain "From This Moment", Bryan Adams' "Everything I Do (I Do It
For
You)
are pure sugar coated, dreadful "Smooth Jazz". Schon should have reached
deeper
and found some songs that were more suited for solo improvisation and he
should
have used a real 'live' band, not sequencing. This immediately creates
stale
sounding
music. Look to hearing this in an elevator near you. This album is perfect
for your
girlfriend or a nice candle light dinner music, where your not really
paying
attention
to what's going on. For guitar diehards, this record is a letdown, and
believe me, this
is not an easy thing to say when it comes to Neal Schon. Now go out and
get
some old
Journey discs and please, for the love of god, get their new release
'Arrival'. These
albums pack enough arena rock and terrific playing to satisfy even the
staunchest
critic.
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