acoustic alchemy

Posted by: rafizi on 13 September 2003

hi there...


is anybody out there listens to Acoustic Alchemy?

do they do any live session jamming back there in the U.K?

regards,

rafizi
Posted on: 14 September 2003 by Minky
Ditto. I bought a few of their albums years ago when I was in my "practise 25 hours a day to be the fastest and bestest guitarist in the whole world" phase.

From memory the lads were technically proficient but mind crushingly boring. Memory will have to do, because the thought of ever listening to this stuff again makes me feel quite nauseous. As someone intimated a few days ago, these types can play as many notes as they like and still not approach ONE played from the heart by the Neil Youngs of this world.
Posted on: 14 September 2003 by jayd
I bought one because I read they played Lowden guitars, and I love the sound of them. Wasn't enough for me to keep the cd. Pretty unremarkable music.

Nowadays when I want to hear a Lowden played well, I put on Pierre Bensusan.
Posted on: 14 September 2003 by Minky
quote:
Originally posted by jayd:
I bought one because I read they played Lowden guitars, and I love the sound of them. Wasn't enough for me to keep the cd. Pretty unremarkable music.

Nowadays when I want to hear a Lowden played well, I put on Pierre Bensusan.


Yeah, Lowdens are lovely. Tell us more about this Pierre Bensusan dude.
Posted on: 15 September 2003 by jayd
When he sticks to playing guitar, Bensusan is a genius. Good enough to inspire the likes of Michael Hedges to write a piece in his honor ("Bensusan", from Aerial Boundaries). He uses DADGAD tuning a lot, and plays really lyrical stuff that's a lot more complex than it generally sounds.

Unfortunately (to my ears, at least) he sometimes fancies himself a new-agey vocalist as well, and as a result his albums are sometimes a mixed bag of pure folk guitar and some less enjoyable works.

A couple of links to mp3 samples are below (hope they work), including a snippet of "The Last Pint", my fave tune of his. His Anthology has just been released, and looks pretty good.

The Last Pint

Heman Dubh

Bourree Voltige