Customer Reviews

The Endless Summer II: Music From The Motion Picture

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Gary Hoey does things with a guitar that I find amazing. As a guitarist myself, I know how difficult some of the things he does are. He plays some really fun songs, like 'Linus and Lucy' the Peanuts Theme, and gives them a hard rock edge. He's also done 'Low Rider' and a bunch of other songs that I think are great.

This CD, the soundtrack to the surfing movie, The Endless Summer II, is great. There is a wide assortment of songs on this disk from Linus and Lucy, to The Deep, one of my personal favorites.

Having never seen the movie, I can't tell you anything about it, but the soundtrack is fantastic!

I've now got 6 HOEY CD's and enjoy each and every one of them. This man is a genius. There may be better technicians playing the guitar today, but rarely does another guitarist write such consistently beautifull tunes. These are more than just vehicles for his solo's. These are great songs ( without words ) that at times are emotional enough to speak to you. Even when HOEY plays at full tilt he doesn't loose sight of the composition. The more I hear of this outstanding talent the more I love his stuff. VI and SATRIANI never reach the emotion that HOEY reaches with his musik. He rarely if ever plays for the sole purpose of impressing with his chops. His quiter moments bring tears to my eyes. Simply brilliant!!

First, I have never seen the movie and nor do you need to, to enjoy this CD. This CD came out at a very formitive point in my life and has helped me recover from a surgury or two. The music contained herein is magical. Gary's not preoccupied by beating you over the head with riff after riff. He's able to convey real emotion and pathos out of each song. There are quite a few homages to other guitar players works on this disk. But, Gary is able to maintain his style throught each song. Other players like Vai and Satch seem to favor more of a style over substance approach. Don't get me wrong, they are both great players. Gary's work seems less like a guitar playing exercise and more like a spiritual convergence. Brilliant album.

I had never even heard of Gary Hoey or the movie The Endless Summer 2 and still haven't seen it. When I first borrowed the CD from my uncle I emediatly started skiping through the songs and found a few favorites. I think the best on the Album are "Low Rider" "Walkin the nose" "Linus and lucy" "drive" and "la rosa negra". If the CD were made up of just those 5 songs i'd still pay twice as much for it. You will probally have your favorites like I did but you will really apriciate it more if your just sit down and listen to the whole thing and take in all teh different styles and the talent. Bottom line, buy it.

This might not be considered surf music, but it definitely shreds. On this strictly instrumental album, Gary Hoey turns his attention to more of a surf-oriented music. Don't worry about the movie if you love surf guitar. Hoey plays on the scale of Dick Dale, fast and loud, sounding a bit like Dale's later stuff sans the rapid picking. Ten of the fourteen tracks are from Hoey's pen, and there are no sleepers here. Jump on and get ready for a ride.

For Dick Dale fans, you can get excited here because the King of the Surf Guitar appears on "Shake & Stomp (Part II)". A great duo between the master and the student. Hoey does an excellent cover of Guaraldi's classic, "Linus and Lucy" in screaming harmonics, heavy rhythm and blinding solos, yet it is very tasteful. "Low Rider" is another cover that Hoey melds to match the theme of the album. Hoey slows it down (in relation to the other tracks) and gets soulful on "Pipe". "Walkin' the Nose" is a bluesy type number that has had the tempo picked up a bit to give it a shred feeling. "Drive" is an acoustical bit that has a great sound to it.

Hoey is a fine guitarist that has been improving since Animal Instinct. This is a great album for guitar lovers, especially if you're into Dick Dale, Joe Satriani, Eric Johnson, and guitar-hero type players. This album is definitely a good time.

Some of the previous reviewers suggest watching the movie before you listen to this CD; or listening to it under certain weather conditions or other nonsense. Summer doesn't matter, surfing doesn't matter and who cares about the movie; never even heard of it, JUST CRANK THIS... UP!!! Hoey ain't playing around with this CD. He's got a wide range of styles here and they all showcase his EXCEPTIONAL talent, both playing and writing. I like heavy guitar jams ( Atomic Bitchwax, Zaak Wylde, Satriani, Stevie Ray Vaughn {RIP} ) and Gary Hoey is at least the equal of those guys. I own 3 of his CD's, make sure you buy THIS ONE!!

I would have to say that most of the songs on the cd remain un-modified from the movie and sound great! However, I actually wanted the cd for the theme song from Endless Summer II and it sounds horrible. Gary Hoey did not do to well with this one. I couldn't even relate it to the actual song from the movie at all.

Otherwise, a great CD!

Gary Hoey is clearly a unique hidden secret to most guitar music lovers. His ability to melt different guitar styles and scales is an indication of his great talent. If you like raw hardcore guitar and soothing guitar blends, you owe it to yourself to purchase this great innovative work of art!

I'm kind of a quirky character - "unique" is the word that my friends have used to describe me. Those who were not my friends used other less friendly words from time to time, but those people are all dead now so there's no point in our discussing them. One of my little "quirks" is to occasionally ask odd questions from out of the blue. It might be a reasonable question such as, "The year of your best Summer?" (Mine was '74, how 'bout yers?) Or the question might be something totally nonsensical like, "What did you do when the crops failed?" Now, if you expect to remain a friend of mine for very long you will be required to consistently reply immediately with something (at least mildly amusing) that we can develop into a full-blown, long-term nonsensical discussion. Acceptable answers to that last question would go something like: "We turned to cannibalism" or "I died in the famine." You get the idea?

When I suddenly blurted out, "Best guitarist?" to my buddy at work, The Great LC, he answered, "Gary Hoey." I said, "HOEY? WHO HE?" I thought I had heard of all the highly acclaimed guitarists but this cat was news to me. Well, the compact disc-addicted Rams fan, The Great LC, loaned me a copy of one of his Hoey CDs and I was turned onto truly one of the most unjustly unknown six-string slingers extant. And it came as an added surprise and bonus when I discovered that 'Who He Hoey' had also written and performed the musical soundtrack for the movie sequel 'ENDLESS SUMMER II' (1994). The first 'ENDLESS SUMMER' movie (1966) you'll remember was the original full-length movie on surfing that -- along with the fabulous music of The Beach Boys -- really pushed the sport into the American consciousness, and it is still considered the classic, holy grail of surfing films. (In the days before art house/cult flick movie theatres and Beta/VHS tapes, they used to show 'Endless Summer' at the packed Santa Monica Civic Auditorium to kids like me who rode waves all Summer long in our quest for skin cancer. That was before the invention of sunblock, ya understand!)

So, is 'Who He Hoey' really the "best guitarist"? Well, The Great LC ain't no dummy, and I'd say that Hoey is darned sure in the running; the cat can really sling it! I think I'd still have to side with Danny Gatton because, despite his amazing versatility, I'm not sure Hoey could quite match Gatton's exquisite finesse on numbers like 'Canadian Sunset' and 'Poinciana.' But I'd certainly be interested in seeing the boys duel. That won't happen any time soon though because Gatton "died in the famine" of '94.

But let's briefly examine this soundtrack and see what 'Who He Hoey' is doing on it: The first thing you'll be happy to find is that this does NOT sound like your typical movie soundtrack album. There is none of that draggy "movie music" with cheesy orchestras sawing away on strings that meander over nondescript melodies - you know wot ahm talkin' 'bout here: FILLER! No way dudes and dudettes, this is a SERIOUS surf guitar rock album! This is the one movie soundtrack album that REALLY ROCKS! I mean this baby makes most so-called "real" Hard Rock guitar albums sound like the "movie filler" we've been talkin' 'bout here!

It opens with 'RIPTIDE', a highly electrified excursion into swirling waters of sonic danger. (How many of you blokes know how to swim out of a riptide? There's a secret to it, but I'm keepin' it to myself.)

'BLAST' is a heavy-chorded piece of menace (think Black Sabbath or sumpin' like dat), but 'SWEET WATER' is a fluidly-picked bit of metal funk and neo-reggae rhythms.

Then we get Hoey's outrageous cover of the old War classic, 'LOW RIDER' - the unofficial theme song of my hometown, Los Angeles (maybe you've heard of the place?) It's obvious that Hoey's amplifiers go up to 11 and that's where he keeps 'em set during most of these recordings.

If you don't get mental pictures of some long-haired surfer dude pulling off spinners and hanging ten on his longboard while Hoey plays his original composition 'WALKIN' THE NOSE' then you simply have no imagination whatsoever (and yer gonna be in big trouble when out of the blue I ask you to, "Tell me about your business with Roger O'Vernout.")

'DRIVE' has a nice little melody; it's not gonna wake the children or anything, but it's got a good beat and you can dance to it.

With 'LA ROSA NEGRA' (that means "The White Petunia" in Spanish), Hoey gives us his Carlos Santana impersonation; it's fairly Latinized for a White Surfer-lookin' guy, and it's a "daisy" of a tune.

OK, yer halfway thru this disc now, Surfcats. 'LINUS AND LUCY' is a cover of Vince Guaraldi's famous theme song for the Charlie Brown TV specials, and Hoey launches into it with all kinds of weird harmonic shifts and...somehow I'm tinkin' dat Linus an' da kids (and even Snoopy) would have had a difficult time doing their goofy dances to this version!

'SURFDOGGIN' is one of my favorite tracks. It's a bit O' tickling Country/Surf pickin' (I dunno; me tinks 'Who He Hoey' may have invented a new genre with this composition) and it really shows off his nimble fingers as they fly all over that fretboard and make me smile - this piece has a real sense O' humor...SERIOUSLY! "No, no, I'm nuh kiddin' you, uh!"

'PIPE' is an almost indescribably moody composition with Hoey's sparking guitar trading licks with Bud "Barefoot and Slippery" Shank's nasty Tenor Sax and Tony Franklin's great grumbling Bass pushing everything through the whitewater - probably my very favorite cut.

Hoey duets with one of his heroes, surf guitar legend DICK DALE on Dale's classic 'SHAKE & STOMP (Part II)' and it sounds like that wacko who used to juggle live chain saws on Venice Beach...only faster and louder. Forget about waking the children, this one's gonna getcha evicted from yer apartment.

'THEME FROM THE ENDLESS SUMMER' is the theme song from the movie 'Endless Summer' (guess that's why they called it that) and I've liked the tune since I first heard the original recording by The Sandals. (Maybe that's the version some of these other reviewers here had in mind.)

'ESCAPE' is pure Heavy Metal "Shock 'N' Awe' pyrotechnics. You might as well crank it up because the manager's already on his way over to yer unit with the eviction notice in his hand anyway.

And the disc ends with the surprisingly "spiritual" 'THE DEEP' - it's an electric ballad with long notes of sustain. With this one, 'Who He Hoey' proves that still waters really do run DEEP - this is a genuinely moving piece of introspection and a fitting way to end what is otherwise an energetic assault, like an electric eel attack while riding waves in the Big Blue. And for that reason, I love to workout to this disc! Yer gonna dig it too.

I'll end this review now with just one question for ya: "What were you doing on the trail with Lewis and Clark?"

I remember quite well back in the '80s having guitar lessons from various teachers that I found in some newspapers classified ad, or from someone that referred me to them. For some reason, I was never happy with their style and really was reluctant to continue taking guitar lessons any longer. Then one day, I stumbled onto another newspaper classified ad that said learn heavy metal guitar styles of Yngwie Malmsteen, Joe Satriani, Steve Vai and other popular guitarists from GARY HOEY. I have to admit, the ad really caught my attention and it looked as if I found what I was looking for, however, I was still a bit reluctant, after having so many guitar teachers in the past that I was really not too happy with. I said let me give GARY HOEY a try. I called GARY HOEY and he sounded like a really cool person and I immediately made an appointment to see him. When I got to his home up in the Hollywood Hills and met him for the first time, I said to myself, this guy definitely has the Rock Star/Heavy Metal image with his long hair, leather jacket and pants. When I entered his room, he had Marshall stacks, Soldano amps and a whole effects processor library that just totally blew me away. He then asked me to have a seat next to him. He then looked at me as if he knew that I wanted him to demonstrate his guitar playing. He definitely read my mind and immediately turned on his Marshall amp and started turning up the gain knob to MAX. When he started playing, I was in a state of shock and I began to grin and smile, because I finally found the guitar teacher of my dreams that I was looking for. His guitar playing was like no other guitarist I have ever seen before. It was inspiring and stunning and was my strong foundation to become one hot guitarist myself. I would see GARY HOEY once or twice a week and we would record every single lesson on a blank cassette, so I would be able to come home and practice what I learned that day that was recorded on the cassette. I have 100's of valuable lessons of Gary's that I can always refer to and I feel proud to be taught by an inspiring and well known guitarist like GARY HOEY.

Best Wishes,

Allan Goldscher