Chris Duarte and his group are familiar with the trenches of touring, averaging 250 gigs a year over the last few years. If you expect to hear a CD full of blue's shuffles based on the 1, 4 and 5 chords, then you should look elsewhere as this release is chock full of surprises and changes in direction.
Duarte has never been satisfied with the expected, and continues to experiment with genres, mixing blues, jazz, punk, and rock and roll into a musical stew of his own. Duarte and his cohorts, John Jordan on bass and Ed Miles on Drums are a rarity for a national touring group. They lug their own gear, set up amps, pedals and drums and continually put out high-energy music. Well read and also well versed in music theory, Duarte is as likely to recite Shakespeare while changing a string or pull out a John Coltrane tune right after a smokingTexas blues song.
Romp, Duarte's fourth "official" full release as a solo artist, is the closest to his live sound that I've heard. His forte has always been his live show and this CD certainly delivers. This CD is one that begs to be played LOUD, and has the dynamics to demand it. If your listening to this CD in your office, you won't feel the CD as it needs volume.......too much dynamics for the office. About the time you get the level about right, the volume drops and you can't hear the music. This CD is a great one for the car or anyplaceelse where you can put the volume up a ways.
This CD is raw....in a good way...you can hear the speakers and amps straining to keep from blowing up during most of the songs. You can hear guitar noise,
Chris switching between pickups and all sort of mean and nasty stuff coming out. This CD is certainly NOT overproduced...it's REAL, it's ROCKIN and it kicks butt! I think this CD captures Chris closer to his actual live sound better than anything previous other than "live" audience or soundboard recordings that I have picked up over the years. John's bass is right there adding to the whole feel of the CD. A lot of the CD sounds like Chris is just rippingthe music from the guitar.
"Romp" opens up with the Junior Kimbrough song by the same name. This songreminds me of a march driven by the dual hammer of guitar and snare drum.
'101' has Jimi Hendrix's name all over it style wise, and is a smokin instrumental.
'Fires Gone Out', a song about lost love in a relationship leans towardsthe pop side of things with an edge to it.
'Like Eric', one of Duarte's older songs which has finally made it to a real recording, is a tribute to Eric Johnson. This song is just what Eric Johnson would play if he got some heavy attitude! It has a lot of Johnson's trademark style but with a dirty edge to it that clearly makes this song Chris Duarte's. This song is very aggressive with very over the top Texas style.
'My, My' shifts gears with an almost slow jazz bass line to start with. The guitar starts out with slightly overdriven chords followed by a vocal that growls and the longer the song goes, the more aggressive it gets.
Bob Dylan's 'One More Cup' gets a laid back treatment from Duarte. To be honest, this song didn't grab me the first time I heard it. The more I listen to the CD, the more I like this song and it now is one of my favorites. Throwing in a lot of Wes Montgomery style chords and a relaxed vocal style, this song exudes a lot of class. Even the guitar solo is understated, without any excess embellishments that would detract from the song.
'B flat blues' harkens back to Freddy Kings 'Hideaway' as to style and is the only real traditional blues song on the CD.
'Last Night', another fairly new song for Duarte, and is one of the highlightsof the CD. Clocking in at almost nine and a half minutes, this song is a little different than when I heard it live in Tampa last year. The first time I heard this song it was really strange and evil sounding. To me it sounds like a very personal song to Chris, where he releases and then forces his inner demons back into a cage. there's an evilness about it that just grabs your attention. The verses are done in a spoken word style, and mixed with a heavy rock style chorus; this song is an example in extremes. Duarte sings this song with a conviction that's seldom heard from other artists. This song covers issues of drug use, suicide, alcohol problems, relationship issues, and mixes eerie sounding guitar sounds to great effect.
'Mr. Neighbor' struck me as a post 9/11 song when I first heard it with lines like "Peeking round to the corner to get a glimpse of what I might suspect", but the more I listen to it, the more I realized that this is a song about getting to know your neighbors and finding out what they are all about. Thisis also one of my favorites on this CD.
Bottom Line: This is a great Chris Duarte CD and would be an excellent introduction to what he is all about. The guitar work is smoking, as always on his CD's, and the vocals work well for his style of music. John Jordan and Ed Miles complement Chris with a rhythm section as solid as any that exist today. If you love hot guitar and your looking for something beyond the basic Texas Blues or 1,4,5 style of music, check out the Chris Duarte Group, you shouldn't be disappointed. I give this CD 5 stars out of 5, something that I don'tdo for many CD's that I review.
Chris Duarte - guitars and vocals
John Jordan - Bass
Ed Miles - drums
Web sites:
www.rounder.com
www.chrisduartegroupfans.com
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