Customer Reviews

Exotic Extremes

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Exotic Extremes is an incredible CD and deserves MUCH more praise and recognition and hype than it's received thus far. For all intents and purposes, it is comparable to the groundbreaking work of Shakti-era McLaughlin, in terms of the seemingly limitless possibilities of the guitar. Just the idea of taking these beautiful, traditional dance and folk gems and (somewhat) rearranging them for an electric rock guitar, is way cool and way overdue. And to my mind he's absolutely the first to do it with such an obvious degree of success.

The music of Exotic Extremes is performed by Kevin's trio ensemble, known as Teshkoto, featuring Chris Goldthrope on bass and percussionist Craig Carney. Teshkoto is also the name of one of the more ripping tunes on the record - a Macedonian 4/4 to 7/4 piece, sort of sounding like an Eastern European instrumental folk-dance version of Tool. It's an ultra cool and infectious tune.

The repertoire and song selection is exquisite, ranging from Bulgarian to Egyptian to Serbian and beyond. The tunes, while possessing beautiful and engaging harmonic and melodic content, also tend to integrate the rhythmic complexity of such groupings as 7, 9 and 11 beats/measure. Kevin's phrasing is ultra elegant, virtuosic and seemingly flawless. Much of this repertoire, according to the guitarist, was learned by ear- an unfathomable feat in and of itself.

Kevin's interpretation and rendering of these traditional pieces is nothing short of brilliant. The playing is so complex and virtuosic that is too damn difficult to even play air guitar to. Please be smart and wise and pick this record up immediately.

Ken Rubenstein

As a native of Macedonia (the Balkans)I am very impressed with "Exotic Extremes". For the Western World, the Balkan music is one of the "best kept secrets" perhaps. This region has a very rich tradition of incredible musicianship. Exhlarating, rich in ornamentation,unusual meters (7/16,11/16 etc.)are some of the atributes of the music. Kevin presents an innovative approach to playing these traditional tunes on an electric guitar. It is amazing how closely the electric guitar resembles the sound of the traditional intruments, for example "gajda". I highly recommend this CD. Anyone familiar with Balkan music would find this CD exceptional. Anyone who hasn't heard the music before, would be greatly enriched.