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| Dennis Taaffe: Modern Rock Guitar Volume II: Alien Guitar |
| 2001, Dennis Taaffe |
| CyberHome(s): http://www.DtGuitar.com/ |
Modern Rock Guitar Volume II is another collection of mostly instrumental rock pieces in a straight-ahead rock format with a slightly hard-edged feel from Dennis Taaffe. The guitar work is once again in the vein of 80s-ish type rock guitarists, Van Halen, U2, and other radio rock type stuff, though more distilled because of the instrumental format.
Though I again appreciate how difficult it is to invent an instrumental album from nothingness and applaud the effort, this album didn’t do much more for me than Volume I from Taaffe, mostly for the same reasons as the first volume did not wow me. There is obviously a lot of practice and work behind it, but the end effect of the music does not grab me and I’d prefer to listen to neoclassical or jazz fusion than this style of rock music that lacks the intensity and movement of these two genres.
| 1) Begin Again |
| 2) Free |
| 3) Still Moments |
| 4) Formations |
| 5) Song For Sinead |
| 6) Nightlights |
| 7) Silverfish |
| 8) The Final |
| 9) ESP |
| 10) Vision Of The Night |
| 11) Courage |
| 12) Cold |
| 13) Dilligence II |
~ Christopher Ruel ~ www.ChrisRuel.com ~ Chris@ChrisRuel.com
 Dennis Taaffe: Modern Rock Guitar Volume I: Abducted By Aliens |
| 1999, Dennis Taaffe |
| CyberHome(s): http://www.DtGuitar.com/ |
Modern Rock Guitar Volume I is a collection of mostly instrumental rock pieces in a straight-ahead rock format with a slightly hard-edged inclination. The guitar work is in the vein of 80s-ish type rock guitarists, Van Halen, U2, and other radio rock type stuff coming to mind, though more distilled because of the instrumental format.
Though I definitely appreciate how difficult it is to invent an instrumental album out of thin air and applaud the effort, this album generally came up short for me for several reasons. The compositions did not have as much attraction and movement as I like to hear, but were instead wandering aimlessly trying to find direction, making my attention hard-pressed to stay engaged. And, though the guitar playing is clean and polished, there just was not that much there to make it interesting relative to the world class rock instrumentalists such as Greg Howe, Shawn Lane, and Joe Satriani who keep your jaw agape the entire time you listen to them. This is not to say that you won’t find any good content on this album, just don’t expect a world class, ground-breaking material.
The one piece on the album that I enjoyed was “Plymouth Rock”, a composition in the fashion of JS Bach with strong classical influence. For me, this was far and away the best track on the album.
| 1) Abducted By Aliens |
| 2) You Don’t Have To Pretend |
| 3) Driven |
| 4) Countdown |
| 5) Adrenalin |
| 6) Maybrick Is The Ripper |
| 7) The Reef |
| 8) Night At The Beach |
| 9) Mighty Flesh Vehicles |
| 10) The Storm |
| 11) Territories |
| 12) Winter Passage |
| 13) 90210 |
| 14) Test Drive |
| 15) Plymouth Rock |
~ Christopher Ruel ~ www.ChrisRuel.com ~ Chris@ChrisRuel.com
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