Blues Concert

On Sunday, October 28th I went to the b.l.u.e.s bar in Lincoln Park, Chicago. We saw this cool blues band, the Billy Flynn band. Flynn is this older white gentlemen with glasses, who plays a mean blues guitar. He played this semi-hollow body Epiphone or Gibson that had a vibrato arm, whammy bar on it. He had another guitar playing primarily rhythm guitar but took a few solos, a bassist, and a drummer laying down the beat. 

The second guitar player was really good, although his solos weren't nearly as unique or characteristic as Flynns'. The drummer played the same beats for most songs. The bassist had a great tone, playing an Ernieball music man bass. They played a lot of what I would call Chicago blues, meaning that electric city blues with influences from BB King, Albert King, Muddy Waters, and John Lee Hooker, that unique city blues sound. 

Flynn's voice sounds nearly identical to aging Eric Clapton's voice, but I think Flynn is much more nuanced and careful with his guitar licks than say Clapton, who probably plays a lot more than this guy, a Chicago native. A lot of the songs were blues standards but a lot of them were also originals or songs going back to the 50s or 60s that were done by the greats of the blues tradition. 

The b.l.u.e.s bar is this small hole in the wall. Its even smaller and crappier than the bar I perform at open jams here in California. The mens room didn't have a lock, so that was kind of unexpected. The place is quite great though. The cover charge for the show was only $7 and there's no drink minimums. I did buy a Stella Artois which tasted great. There was maybe about 10 people there, the smallest audience I've ever seen for a concert. Well, this was a Sunday night in a college area so that's not too surprising.

I went to a classical and jazz concert during my trip to Chicago. I had to do a blues concert just to see three different genres, plus Chicago is a blues city, it would've been wrong not do see some great live blues. Flynn's guitar playing was inspirational, it takes me back to the roots of my playing, rock and blues. Sometimes all you need is one note to make a difference. 

Chicago blues! 

Chris Madsen/Adam Larson Quintet

So tonight I ended up going to a great jazz concert for only 12 bucks! Beat that LA. Chicago is a great town for live music, there's always somebody playing somewhere. The Constellation is a great, intimate venue. Its basically a warehouse converted into a studio space, looking like a basement but with amazing acoustics and natural reverb. Last year I saw my former UW-Parkside jazz teacher perform with a quartet, a trumpet player by the name of Russ Johnson (look him up on YouTube). 

Tonight I saw a double tenor saxophone quintet perform, the Chris Madsen/Adam Larson Quintet. They play modern straight ahead jazz. These guys aim to please, they never hit a bad note nor an ugly note. They play pretty. At their best I would say that they're a modern evolution of the post-Coltrane, post-Brecker sound. That is, a deep, throaty, emotive, and expressive tone. 

Adam Larson is a young tenor player from Normal, Illinois. At the concert, the music was split 50/50 Larson and Madsen tunes. Of the two I would say that Larson's music was more exciting. His melodies are very angular, which is my way of saying that its modern, and has that Giant Steps 'sheets of sound' aesthetic. At the end of the concert they played one of Larson's tunes, and it was so memorable that I was able to recall the melody on the bus trip home. His playing was great, in fact I believe that he could become one of the front runners in his generation (same as mine) for really great tenor sax players. 

Chris Madsen's (from and based in Chicago) tunes were more spiritual and expressive. He writes better ballads (if I can say they were ballads, they probably weren't considered such by the composer) than Larson, which is understandable because I believe Madsen is older and more accomplished, being apart of acadamia. He teaches jazz music at University of Chicago Illinois and lives here, whereas Larson is a Manhattan School of Music New York jazz musician. Madsen's onstage persona was more expressive and solemn as well, just like his music. 

On piano was Rob Clearfield, on bass was an older gentlemen (oldest guy in the band, probably the unoffical leader) named Curt Bley (who said it was great that I came from California to hear that), and Greg Artry the drummer and only black guy in the band. 

Clearfield's piano playing was one of accompaniment. He had one solo that stood out as virtuosic but not as expressive as the tenor playing. The comping was quite good though. He was pretty much comping most of the time the whole concert, laying out occasionly for extended sax solos. 

Arty's drumming stood out for me. Not only was he a drum and cymbals virtuoso but he played with emotive style and grace. Sometimes he would go into double and even quadruple time on the kit, stunning artistry. I would say he plays the modern Brian Blade style of drumming. Brian Blade has been the drummer for Wayne Shorter's band for a long time now and he's been a big influence on modern jazz percussion, and for good reason, he's one of the younger leaders of the style. There were many moments when I had to tap my foot to the swinging beats, and I would move back and forth in my seat to the sound. It was infectious. Him being the only black guy in the band gave the band more jazz credentials, after all jazz is a black American art form. The guy had chops to burn and the tenor players, presumably the leaders here, let him play with wanton abandon. He owned the rythmn, alongside the bassist, Curt Bley. 

Bley was obviously the oldest member of the band, tall, balding, with plastic rimmed glasses. He played as any great bass player would play, he filled the space with low notes, and mostly stuck to the chordal structures of the tune. He only had one solo per say, which was just an introduction to a tune. It was very short and he spent most of the concert comping. His bass tone was so natural and loud, using only a very small amplifier, which probably broadened the natural acoustic tone of his instrument, a acoustic double-bass. 

It was an eventful day and night. I spent the entire day talking with my music mentor Frank Abbinanti, a new music composer based in Chicago. You can check out his album Labor Studies on YouTube, also check out a tune he wrote for me that I recorded back in March called Poachers, which you can find under my YouTube channel name Megafigueroa007. 

Anyways, it was a great concert, memorable for my Chicago trip. I plan on checking out more music from Madsen and Larson when I get back home. Apparently Larson has an album from 2017 that got four stars in Downbeat and favorable reviews in Jazziz, two magazines that I read often. Its good to see that jazz music is alive and well in the windy city.

Jazz in Chicago! 

Classical Music at DePaul

I've been in Chicago the last couple days and I've been checking out as much music as I can. Last night on the 25th I attended a free classical music concert at DePaul University, a Catholic institution in Lincoln Park. Amazingly it was free and all I had to do was rsvp online and pick up my "ticket" at their box office. Not bad! 

The actual performance was quite elegant. Here's the setlist:

Mozart 

String Quartet No. 19 in C Major, K. 465 (1785) 

Beethoven 

Piano Trio in C Minor, Op. 1, No. 3 (1795)

Piano Trio in D Major, Op. 70, No. 1 "Ghost" (1809)

String Quartet in C Minor, Op. 18, No. 4 (1801)

Debussy 

String Quartet in G Minor, Op. 10 (1893)

Jean Cras (1879-1932)

Trio for Violin, Viola, and Cello (1926)

Schubert 

String Quintet in C Major, Op. 163, D. 956 (1828) 

As you can see it was quite a standard string quartet 'showcase I' as they called it on their program. The Mozart piece opened things up nicely with that characteristic 'classical' sound. The Beethoven pieces were the main showpieces. The Debussy piece was unusual, mainly because I think its the only string quartet piece that he wrote. 

I've never heard of Jean Cras, and when I asked my music mentor, a new music composer named Frank Abbinanti (find his work on YouTube), he said he had never heard of the guy either. However, his composition was quite good. There was definitely a middle eastern sound here. It was refreshing because it was the only modern piece, written in 1926. 

The Beethoven piano pieces were grand. The most virtuosity and musicianship was displayed when the pianists got onstage and woo'd the crowd with their dazzling gymnastic pyrotechnics. I tend to think that most pianists are virtuosos, due to the fact that its a solo instrument. Most guitarists aren't virutosos because its mostly an instrument of accompaniment. Anyways, these piano trio tunes were the real highlight for me. 

The other high light for me was watching the cellists bow and play emotive low notes. Cello is quite an expressive instrument and I've been interested in playing it, but I've been unable to because the instrument is too damn expensive. Maybe one day when I get a better job. Cello would be a great instrument for me to get into, and become a new music musician, one of my goals as a musician; to move from rock and jazz into the new music, modern music scene. 

Lastly, they ended the program with Schubert, classic quartet stuff. I've actually heard a lot of Franz Schubert's quartet music, thanks to YouTube, my main source for music of all kinds. It was a good note to end it on. 

Chicago is known as a blues town but I spent my first night here going to a classical concert. Its good to know that Universities put on free shows for the public, not just for those affiliated with Uni. In the words of Ice Cube, "Yeah today was a good day." 

Poachers Live With Percussion

Hello everybody! Just wanted to share this new track from last week's open mic at Petie's Place. 

https://youtu.be/D-rHftwnEW8 

This is Poachers live, a piece written for me by new music composer Frank Abbinanti. It's quite avant-garde, it has its moments of melody and makes use of what I'd call "noise chords", real noisy chords. 

We played this piece last week and at the time it was quite nerve-wracking because I'd never played the piece live in front of anyone other than just by dad when I was practicing it. However, the nervousness comes out in a good way. I hit a few bum notes in the beginning but nothing that sets the piece off balance. 

Jim's drumming was quite remarkable. His fills, while keeping time in between is quite good. He played it like a real jazz drummer. My favorite band I've seen him perform with is a jazz-rock fusion guitar trio. He's the best musician I get to play with at these open mics, and its great making music with the guy. 

I do think the piece would've been cooler if that guy didn't yell "Yeah!" at the end but even some of the best classical performances are cluttered with coughing. 

Anyways, enjoy the tune!

Personel
Orlando Figueroa Guitar
Jim X Drums
Frank Abbinanti Composer

Band Update: We're a death metal band called Wolves to the Slaughter, playing a show soon!

Hey, just wanted to do a short update on the band's status. For a short while I was just practicing and performing at the weekly open jam as a duo, two piece band with my drummer friend Martin but now we're working with a metal (screamer) vocalist, we're playing death metal with a little bit of black metal influence, mostly in the drumming. My guitar playing is more straight death metal with 80s shred guitar and progressive rock (jazzy distorted chords) bits here and there, a bit of black metal influence there as well. But I digress...

What happened with Martin's other group was that they decided their guitar player was holding them back so they kicked him out and recruited me to join. I reluctantly joined because at first I left that band (some months ago) because I didn't want to play death metal. But I changed my mind and I've been working with Alex (vocals) and Martin (drums) for a while now. So far we've only been practicing two hours a week but I think we're already ready to gig. We need a bass player but I think I've already found one, one of my friends.

We've got four songs down already that are originals, more if we count covers but we're not sure if we're going to perform covers, you see we've already got a gig lined up. We're going to be playing a backyard show at Martin's friends' house downtown LA (more information available as I find out more) on March 2nd. 

So yeah we're playing a show on March 2nd on a Friday. Unfortunately we aren't getting paid but it will be my first real official gig in California (not counting the open jams). I haven't played a gig since 2013 so this is quite a musical milestone for me and I'm quite pleased with the band, even if we ain't playing jazz (I wish I could be in a gigging jazz band). These guys couldn't play jazz anyways but they are pretty good rock and roll musicians.

It's all quite exciting and cool. Oh, and by the way the band is called Wolves to the Slaughter, I thought of the name and everybody agreed on it that it was cool. Hurrah for democracy! 

I'm using my 7-string Jackson for the band, I'll bring my Marshall amp for the gig, straight through the amp, no effects. The drummer plays a small jazz kit (even though he's a metal drummer), he likes the sound of small snares. And the singer has this whole vocal effects setup with his own personal microphone. The gig will probably go great. I'll post more information once I learn more about the gig. 

Another thing I'm gonna prioritize for the band is recording. I think we're ready for it, I could even record the bass parts if need be. 

Last week's jam

Here's some music I played last week at the open jam I go to all the time. We played Sunshine of Your Love (a staple for us, my drummer and I) and Spirits of the Dead, an original metal tune I wrote on the first day of October this year. Upon listening to Sunshine I've realized I gotta get my vocals better. The first lines of the song are tuneless but later in the song I start to sing with more authority and tone. On Spirits of the Dead I was going to sing the whole song but my lyrics fell off the music stand! Oh well. I sang it again last night and it sounded amazing. I'll post that when I get the tracks from the percussionist, there's a guy who plays tambourines and hand drums that records everything and sends it to me. Whatta guy! You can find the tracks below.

https://soundcloud.com/orlando-figueroa-17/sunshine-of-your-love-1
https://soundcloud.com/orlando-figueroa-17/spirits-of-the-dead

Open jam recording, fusion set

So I've been going to the open jams and I got some more recordings. These turned out quite nicely. I ended up playing with a young drummer, a blues bass player, and the percussionist that shows up every week. I called out two chord vamps for both of the jams and it ended up being kind of a heavy jazz fusion sort of set. I thought my guitar tone was trying to do too much at times but it ended up sounding really progressive and fusion-y. I really liked that I was the only guitarist on the set, it hasn't been that way since like when I first started going. Great stuff. You can hear both of the tracks here. 

https://soundcloud.com/user-294063763/two-chord-vamp-amin7-d7 

https://soundcloud.com/user-294063763/two-chord-vamp-fmaj7-cmin7

Enjoy! 

Open Jam Nights

The last two nights I went out to open jam nights at these bars. Tuesday I went to this place called the Canby. Its a dive bar not too far from my house. The atmosphere there is a little more street than the other place I went to but the musicians let me jam with them a bit. They were mostly doing covers. I played my friend's acoustic dobro guitar and plugged it into the amp.

The tone I got was a pretty distorted rock and roll tone for an acoustic steel guitar. It was pretty awesome. I started improvising and we went off for a while. It was pretty good but they weren't really improvising type of musicians, they're better at playing songs by the book more so than originals or jamming. So I asked them if they knew Hey Joe and I showed them the riffs and changes in the song. Then we played a rocking version of it. It was pretty awesome.

We even had two singers and they did a good job. My guitar solos sounded pretty great even though I was playing on acoustic and my fingers bloody hurt like hell. Because I couldn't do the bends (too hard on acoustic) I resorted to doing a ton of double stop Hendrix/Chuck Berry style. It sounded pretty good. What sounded even better was my rhythm, the sound of the chords was sparkly clean yet slightly distorted. Heavenly guitar tone for a tone I just dialed in automatically without any setup.

The other bar was this place called Petie's Place and its even closer to my house. I would still classify this place as a dive bar but its a lot nicer than the Canby and it has a much cooler vibe. The people here were much nicer to me than at the Canby. It seemed like at the Canby I had to prove myself to the musicians playing there. They were a bit stand offish towards me at first before they saw me play. At Petie's it was the opposite, they were super nice right off the bat.

There was a house drummer and bass player and everybody else came through to either jam with them or with their own drummer/bass player. I signed up and got onstage and we did a fantastic Hendrix inspired version of Sunshine of Your Love. We did all the songs I played with them as instrumentals. After that I asked them if they could do Stratus and I even began teaching them the main riffs and whatnot but the bass player wasn't having it. So instead we did Hey Joe. It ended up working out great. I sounded great on my Hagstrom Les Paul and I was getting a really good distorted guitar tone. Great for Hendrix tunes. I got a sense that the drummer could play any type of rock and roll and jazz too even maybe if I could've gotten to play Stratus with him but the bass player was definitely a rock and roll only type of guy it seemed. 

Later that night I played again. I was originally planning on playing War Pigs and Black Sabbath but this old guy came up to me and asked me what I wanted to play. I told him those two Sabbath tunes and he was like oh well maybe I should get the other drummer for that stuff, he plays great on that stuff. But I noticed he had drum sticks in his hand and I didn't wanna leave him hanging so I asked him what songs he knew? He said a ton. I asked if he knew Foxy Lady and Spanish Castle Magic and he said he did. So I said lets do Foxy and from that break into Spanish Castle.

It ended up working out great. He played pretty well. We straight rocked that place hard. The bass player was a little off on Spanish Castle Magic but we'll give him the benefit of the doubt, maybe he doesn't know too much Hendrix? So yeah it turned out to be a real Hendrix night of jamming for me.

I had so much fun at Petie's that I'm planning to go to their open jam next week as I'm off that day. I might even work on memorizing lyrics to songs I already know how to play so I can do the songs as its meant to be with a vocalist (not just as an instrumental). People there liked me so much. It was great getting respect from fellow musicians and love from the audience, even hot girls and women. If I keep doing this maybe I can find musicians to play in a band with. At the very least I'm keeping my chops up and playing real music in front of a live audience and enjoying it.

Open jams are awesome!

Michael Landau Group at the Baked Potato

     Saw a pretty cool concert tonight at the Baked Potato. This is my third time there. This wasn't as good as the last show I saw there, but still better than the first show. I saw the Michael Landau Group, which consists of Michael Landau on guitar, Reggie Hamilton on bass, and Gary Novak on drums. I gotta say first of all that Landau is a great guitar player but I can see that most of his skills come from being a session player, and that perhaps he doesn't really have much of a career going for him in terms of the performer context. The one thing that surprised me was that he has such an amazing rhythm section, why don't they get to play any solos? The obvious answer is because Landau is the leader but with a bass player and drummer that good, its a bit wrong not to feature them. The style of music they play is more akin to blues-rock and progressive-rock, but most of what they played was based on the blues. There are moments where he adds some spice to the chords, maybe playing some slightly jazz sounding chords but I wouldn't call Landau a jazz guitarist. I noticed his favorite chord is a simple bluesy 9th chord. However, Reggie Hamilton sounds like a jazz bass player to me, I could see him playing jazz fusion or standards. Same with the drummer. When it comes to improvisation I'd say that Landau is great when it comes to great rock and blues licks, and he adds a lot of chromatic jazzy licks in there as well, but his improvisation only goes so far. However, he does have his moments and those moments were amazing! There were times when he pulled off these great blues licks that sounded just like stuff Jeff Beck would play. Another great thing about Landau's guitar playing is that he has a great guitar tone. He sounds like Jeff Beck, Jimi Hendrix, and Eric Johnson, all great players with great tone. Do I think he has his own sound and personality? Sound, probably not. But I do think he has his own personality and unique sound as a player, one of the all time great achievements in being a musician. Part of his own voice is that he rarely ever 'goes for it' when he's playing solos. By that I mean he never gets into a show off-y kind of thing, he's very relaxed and he's always holding back until just the perfect moment to cut loose with a flurry of blues based licks. It's actually amazing how he never overplays. If anything, he underplays, which me and my friend both agreed he did that.
     Now, let's talk about the rhythm section. Reggie Hamilton is an amazing bass player but he played much better bass just warming up before the show started testing out his 12-string bass with a huge neck. He played some jazz stuff on it but when it came to the band playing together, he was confined to simply playing root notes and background, not even really playing fills. He is another great example of not overplaying. But when you don't overplay to the point where everything you play is very simple, you run the risk of underplaying, which I felt happened for sure. I don't think regular people notice it that much but musicians can definitely tell. Its a shame because he sounded like a monster bass player when he was testing out some jazz stuff on his 12-string bass but when he was playing it with the band he was just playing single note stuff. A little underwhelming but he did have a great sound. It's hard to say who he sounds like as a bass player because I'm not familiar with enough great black bass players to say who's who, but he does sound like a funky bass player from the 70's, that's for sure. I think Hamilton is probably the most talented musician in the band, especially judging from the jazz stuff he was playing just testing out his bass before the show started.
     Next, Gary Novak is a good driving drummer. Again, he kind of underplays. I would say he had maybe one moment where he sort of kind of had a drum solo, but I don't think I can call it a drum solo because it was just a flurry of great fills, but it only lasted like 30 seconds. They could've let him stretch it out a little bit longer than that! His style is really good. He's a great all around drummer and he can even do a bit of that fusion stuff, he sounded great on the more moody jazzy sounding stuff, especially his cymbal work. I could see him working in a fusion context for sure, he would probably sound better than doing simple blues-rock stuff. He sticks to the rhythm mainly, and he doesn't really add too many fills, a great drummer for a leader who doesn't want a a drummer who shows off. He was really good.
     Lastly, it was a bit hard to enjoy the show because I was standing in the back. However, I was able to see all of the musicians clearly, especially the guitar so that was cool and satisfying for the money I paid. It's become a hang out place for me lately, but it isn't cheap. It was $25 at the door plus 2 drinks that came out to $14, not exactly cheap for me because I only work part time. However, it is worth the money and I did enjoy it. Even my friend had a good time. The sound quality was terrific too by the way. Everything in the mix was clear and sounded 'tasty', as they say. One thing I have to say is that every tune he played sounded the same. They all sounded like some kind of blues-rock jam with some quiet jazzy parts. At that point, he's not really playing songs, he's just playing an outline of a song just for the purpose of extended solos. Nothing wrong with that because I love solos, but this isn't really a band that plays 'songs'. Every time I go to these concerts I feel like I'm learning something on the guitar, and as a musician in general. Came for the fun with friends. Left with some great blues-rock guitar sounds in my head.

Alex Machacek live at the Baked Potato

  
     On Tuesday night I went to see Alex Machacek at the Baked Potato, a jazz club here in the valley, in Studio City. Alex played with bassist Ben Shepard and drummer Eric Valentine. The Baked Potato is named so because they have a menu that consists of nothing but different kinds of baked potatoes. You can even get a baked potato Philly cheese steak. I knew that the place was small from the pictures I saw of it online but I didn't realize how small the place was until I got inside and sat down. That being said, the club is very intimate and the band is right in your face. Perfect for the listening experience and the visuals. The cover charge at the door for this concert was only $20, and they require a two drink minimum. With a baked potato I got as well I ended up only spending about $40, pretty reasonable to see a concert and have food and drink. Anyways, let's talk about the actual music.
     First, Alex started off the concert playing a song that he's playing here in this short clip https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mDvhTDljZxs. I don't know the name of the tune but in that clip is where I first heard it. It was great and refreshing to hear him open up with that tune. It's a great opening tune that has some great rhythmic syncopation. From this tune we can tell that not only is Alex a great guitarist with lots of technique but that he's also a great composer as well. You can say that this tune is like progressive rock meets jazz fusion, which is really what Alex's whole musical style is all about. He mixes odd time signatures with jazz chord progressions and rhythmic motifs to create original material. As far as the concert went I would say that this was the best tune that he played just for the sheer amount of excitement that was displayed during this number. This song is exciting the whole way through, like a car race speeding across the 101. You got the sense that the whole band was all together on this one, speeding through the complex snare hits, bass fills, and guitar chords. As far as the concert went though, I would say this was the only interesting thing they played during the entire first set.
     That being said, once you hear a few of Alex's tunes you begin to realize that he uses the same kinds of orchestrations and the same kinds of chord progressions, with maybe a different melody here and there. I think at this particular concert Alex really wasn't feeling the music. He was just coasting. Whereas his sidemen were really pushing the envelop, truly improvising. I felt like there were only like maybe two times where Alex was really improvising and pulling off some great stuff in the process. The rest of the time he was coasting. By coasting I mean he's playing the tunes well but isn't really 'there' in the moment when it comes to his time for improvising. I was a bit disappointed to say the least but realistically I shouldn't have expected much for only $20. But his sidemen were terrific! Especially Eric Valentine on drums. He was playing these incredible odd time signatures and incredible snare/cymbal hits and never missing a fill. At times Valentine reminded me of the drummer from Return to Forever, Lenny White. He was my favorite part of the whole concert. Then the bassist Ben Shepard was playing some incredible bass fills and showing us what its like to play and get a great sound out of a 6-string bass. I didn't even know they made 6-string basses until I saw him play it that night! Shepard is a very melodic bassist that can play the bass like a guitar player plays the guitar. Very much like a Jack Bruce type player. The reason why I think Alex was kind of off this night was because I think this was just a pick up band he was playing with. These aren't the typical people he would usually play with so he was just laying low and again, coasting. The other thing I wish Alex would do is let the other guys write compositions for the band to play because after a while all his tunes start sounding the same. He uses the same tone on most of his songs. At best he sounds like a great Allan Holdsworth imitation, especially with that creamy slightly distorted lead guitar tone on his solos and that synthesizer sounding guitar chord stuff he does where it sounds like whales from the ocean. He definitely got that from Holdsworth. Out of all the Holdsworth clones I think there is only one player who has surpassed the master. He's pretty famous, his name is Tosin Abasi, a great progressive metal jazz fusion type guitarist (check out his band Animals as Leaders and side-project T.R.A.M). Anyways, once you hear Alex's compositions back to back you realize that they all sound the same. This isn't really bad but it does get old. Jazz is suppose to be fresh and unique and have more intensive improvisation. But this concert felt more like a rock concert in comparison to some of the jazz concerts I've been to here in LA. I'm not hating on Alex but I think he could have done a better job when it came to his solos.
     Lastly, the other song that stood out to me was the last song he played, ending the first set. It was a Gospel-type tune entitled 'Oh, Lard'. This one was slow and moody, simplistic but made more complex with a jazzy series of chord changes for the improvisation. Again, here Alex's playing was nothing special but the bass playing and drumming were phenomenal. Plus it was nice seeing them play something simple and that had a Gospel type sound. Basically they made Alex sound great at this gig, not the other way around. This is the case where the sidemen make the star sound great. I think Alex is a great guitar player but I think he gives more of himself to the music when he plays with high profile musicians. In videos online I've seen him play with people like drummers Terry Bozzio and Gary Husband and in those videos he's giving it all he's got to the music. Maybe he just needs to play with musicians that push him to the farther reaches of great jazz improvisation. I've seen concerts where the star is a great performer with other big names but with a pick up band they're just coasting. It was a shame but I did enjoy myself that night. On the bright side now I know a place I can go to to hear jazz music!