JOE SATRIANI - "LIVE IN SAN FRANCISCO" (EPIC)
With his last studio album ("Engines of Creation"), Joe Satriani has taken a bit of an industrial turn, musically. When listening to it, I could only conclude that the sensitive, beautiful aspect of Joe's guitar playing had vanished from the mixture.
I have in the mean time listened to the album quite a few more times and, like "Flying in a Blue Dream" (which I initially didn't like at all, would you believe?) it has grown a lot on me. In retrospect it might have deserved a five bullet rating instead of the four that it got, but hey, like we say in Holland, "deeds that are done take no other side" (or something like that).
June was a month of total bliss for the guitar fan, with live CDs released of Steve Vai as well as, indeed, Satriani. And double CDs at that! On this live CD the newer tracks sound less industrial, i.e. I like them more than the studio versions. We get "Devil's Slide" and "Borg Sex" from "Engines of Creation", together with 22 other songs taken from all of his regular albums (six from "Crystal Planet", too!). His playing is awesome and inspired, Stuart Hamm's bass solo is spot-on and as impressive as can be expected, Jeff Campitelli adds groove to all the tracks...these are all the ingredients for a thoroughly enjoyable Joe Satriani live experience. And did I already mention that it clocks in at nearly 150 minutes?
A DVD is (or will soon be) released. I'll be checking that one out for certain!
Click here to check out or buy this CD
RK
Written June 2001