Michael Schenker - Dreams and expressions - 2001
intro
I suppose that it is not necessary to introduce you to Michael Schenker, but just in case I remind you that he is one of the authors of the best albums of Scorpions (before the ballads) as Lonesome crow, and a fundamental piece of the impressive UFO in classic albums as indispensable as "Force it" or "Strangers in the night", although his maximum success was achieved in the first stage of Michael Schenker Group (MSG) which released marvels like "Assault Attack", "Rock will never die", or the live "A night at Budokan". Then he suffered from his project with the disgusting Robin McAuley and the creation of McAuley Schenker Group, which, although they tried to enter the world of melodic rock, didn't get the expected success. After the lack of success, Michael adopted a very cyberpunk image to delight us with works that, in spite of not reaching the level of his classics, at least maintain an acceptable level of quality.
review
I suppose that Michael, when seeing the large number of guitar heroes that are arising lately, has decided to show who really rules in the world of the six strings. He has thus used his eternal Gibson Flying V to release an amazing instrumental CD in 21 cuts without any especial concept. 20 consecutive pieces, each of them with the title of a letter of the phrase "Dreams and expressions" (OK, the sentence has just 20 letters, but there is a bonus track without a title).
To try to comment the pieces is nearly an impossible task, as Michael delights us with a successive storm of riffs, sometimes very rocker, sometimes more melodic, and others even experimental. The successive rhythm changes are guaranteed by the rhythm machinery formed by Shane Gaalaas (drums) and Barry Sparks (bass).
Sincerely I believe that, in spite of not being an album that can be considered inside the progressive genre, we can not classify "Dreams and expressions" either as heavy metal... these are simply three quarters of an hour of technical display of guitar without falling into easy exhibition or excess. The CD is nice to listen to and returns us to glorious moments of the universal career of this German genius.
conclusion
A compulsory purchase for those that play the guitar and to those that enjoy the most organic and less technical instrumental showcases. When Michael Schenker grabs his guitar, many supposed to be "teachers" have to hide in shame.