Martone Clean
by Joe Mis
Staff Writer
Talent – immense. Execution – excellent. Content – inconsistent.
Clean is the latest release by the highly praised Canadian guitar virtuoso Dave Martone, and it is paradise for tech-savvy guitar fans, but may prove somewhat inaccessible for the average rocker due to its musical complexity. This is guitar music for well-trained guitarists.
The Martone power-trio consists of Dave Martone (guitar), David Spidel (bass) and Daniel Adair of Nickelback (drums), along with a rasher of guests – Greg Howe, Jennifer Batten, Joe Satriani, Billy Sheehan and Ric Fierabracci. Martone is a guitarist’s guitarist – extremely technical and very fast – the quintessential shredder. His style is a mix of Joe Satriani and Paul Gilbert, with touches of Yngwie and Steve Vai thrown in for good measure. Spidel is an excellent bass player who seems quite capable of keeping up with Martone no matter the style of music. Ric Fierabracci plays bass on two tracks. Adair is a very good drummer, but unfortunately doesn’t really get a chance to shine since this is a guitar showcase.
The CD opens with “The Goodie Squeegie Song,” a punchy technical piece with all sorts of squeals, harmonics and taps – just about anything and everything gets tossed in here. In a way this sums up both the good and bad of Martone’s album. The piece is amazingly technical and must be extraordinarily difficult to play, mixing a bunch of different tempos and styles making for an interesting listen. At the same time it really isn’t a “song” per se, more a collection of riffs loosely tied together by barrages of blistering notes and chords. “Nail Grinder” is more cohesive as a musical piece and features Joe Satriani as a soloist. “Bossa Dorado” is one of the highlights and probably the most “musical” of all of the tracks on Clean. It has a definite Latin, almost flamenco flavor and is a brilliant song that shows just how good Dave Martone can be. Billy Sheehan provides some truly remarkable bass on “Dinky Pinky,” but how do they come up with these song titles? “Coming Clean” is a nice acoustic jazz/blues track. Greg Howe helps to kick out some heavy riffs on “Hard Wired.” “If I Was A Piano” is a very Satriani-esque soft instrumental with some interesting structure to it. “Moron Face” features some great basswork and a powerful guitar solo by Jennifer Batten. “Turn On The Heater” starts out mellow and melodic, but then seems to deteriorate into high-speed scales and progressions. “Angel Fish” is a great rocker with a hooky melody and would be right at home on Satriani’s Surfing With The Alien. “Fading Into Change” is nice mellow wrap up to the CD.
Martone’s music is tough to pigeonhole. He seems to mix elements from rock, jazz, progressive rock, old school shredding metal and classical and comes out with a unique flavor. He has to remember that all of the talent and technique in the world is not enough to make “music”. Some of the songs work amazingly well because they have a consistent sound and style from beginning to end, while others seems to be just bits and pieces of random riffs stuck together with no clear musical structure. There are some incredible moments of brilliance and great riffs here – and some great music – but it does not carry from track to track.
Dave Martone has proven to the world on many an occasion that he is an incredible guitar player. An album like Clean seems to be more of a collection of demo pieces that a shredder would put together when trying to get noticed. Martone already has the attention and respect of the guitar world, now he needs to focus on gaining mainstream appeal by improving his composition skills. He needs to make music, not just play guitar.
On the whole, Martone’s Clean is a must have for fans of technical guitar. It may be too abstract to capture the average rock fan, but it does demonstrate that Dave Martone belongs as a member of the pantheon of Great Guitar Gods.
Label: Magna Carta
Web: http://www.magnacarta.net/releases/clean.html
http://www.davemartone.com
Track Listing:
01. The Goodie Squeegie Song
02. Nail Grinder
03. Bossa Dorado
04. Dinky Pinky
05. Coming Clean
06. Hard Wired
07. If I Was A Piano
08. Moron Face
09. Turn On The Heater
10. Angel Fish
11. Fading Into Change
HRH Rating: 8/10