ETTORE SALATI

This month's Artist in Spotlight is Ettore Salati from Italy. Ettore is a sought after session guitarist by many prog musicians not just in Italy but all around the world. He started playing piano at a very young age (mostly classical music) but when he became a teenager and discovered the world of Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, Genesis and 70's rock in general, he was immediately fascinated by guitar... more

KAT EPPLE (Emerald Web)

KAT EPPLE, flautist and composer, is our interview guest this month. She has won 8 Emmy awards, was nominated for a Grammy and she has released 18 albums internationally. Most of you know her as the other half of the legendary ambient/new age duo EMERALD WEB. She has a very large collection (over 200) of flutes that she gathered from all around the world during her travels. Kat composes original New Age/Jazz/World/orchestral music and has produced film scores and television soundtracks for National Geographic, Nova, CNN, Carl Sagan, Another World, The Travel Channel, Turner Broadcasting System, History Channel, HGN, The Guiding Light, PBS, and NASA among others, and was Music Director for the feature-length film, Captiva Island. She also owns a record company and works on both sides of the music industry as a musician and as a business woman... more

New Grass Revival / On The Boulevard

New Grass Revival are one of the pioneers of progressive bluegrass. Formed in 1971 by Sam Bush (mandolin/vocals), Curtis Burch (guitar), Ebo Walker (bass) and Courtney Johnson (banjo), they immediately got the attention from the industry both in a good and bad way. First of all, they were often told that their music was not bluegrass, and they knew it wasn’t “bluegrass” in its traditional sense, and it wasn’t what they were trying to achieve anyways. They were blending rock, soul and blues rhythms with the traditional bluegrass music. They were not wearing suites, but instead they had a more casual style along with long hair... more

HAPPY RHODES / FIND ME

This was a long awaited album for Happy fans, nearly 10 years after her “Many Worlds Are Born Tonight” CD, Happy finally came back with “Find Me”. This project was delayed due to financial reasons since she is not signed to any label anymore; most of the songs on the CD date back to early 2000’s.

I still remember the very first time I heard Happy’s voice. It was way after midnight when everybody else was sleeping, I had my headphones on and I started listening to her “Many Worlds…” album. I immediately felt like I was surrounded by “strange beings”, it was both a chilling and an irresistible feeling. Many layers of keyboards and vocals and complex and unusual song structures combined with her unique lyrics make her music very special, uncategorized and progressive. After that night I started collecting her music.

Find Me will hit you before you even start listening to the CD, with the art work, Happy’s own. Next to her self portrait, you will find drawings of monster/alien type of creatures. These interesting illustrations can be found all over the lyrics sheet. There are 11 songs on the album. Happy does all the vocals and programming and plays acoustic guitar. Bob Muller plays drums and percussions. Other musicians who have contributed to the album are: Hansford Rowe (electric bass), Teddy Kumpel (electric guitars, acoustic guitar, and tambourica), Rob Schwimmer (piano), Carl Adami (bass), John Catler (fretless electric guitar), Trey Gunn (war guitar), Bon Lozaga (electric guitar), Fab (additional programming), Michael Seifert (orchestral arrangement).

Now get ready to be haunted by Happy’s 4 octave voice. Just like the opening track “One and Many” that talks about multiple personality “issues”, first time listeners of Happy Rhodes will often wonder how many people are singing. Well, the answer is “one and many” really, because in a split second she can go from an angel to demon no problem. In this sense I think the song “One and Many” ironically fits the situation.

One of the most thrilling moments on this album is the song “Find Me”, both lyrically and vocally. Picture someone floating in the middle of the ocean for days and waiting for help. Happy’s vocals are very intense here, and she uses sounds to make the situation even more dramatic, that will really give you chills. For instance, the helicopter is flying around to find the person, but can’t see her as she sings “Now I can feel you flying overhead / But I’m swallowed in the waves” and you hear the helicopter in the background, slowly fading out. And she shouts “Oh God, please find me, alive” with a high pitch scream coming from the debts of the ocean almost. Throughout the song there are sound effects that made me think of dolphins and whales as if they are watching that person or welcoming her underwater.

“Can’t Let Go”… A time frame in your life that made you who you are today, that you try in vain to let go, because it bothers you so much, because it haunts you all the time, wherever you go, every time you look in the mirror and wherever you are. You want to free yourself from it because you want to change things, but it keeps you from moving forward, it is stuck on you so much that everyone else identifies you with it. It is the reason why you built yourself a “Treehouse” to protect yourself from harm, and pain, from everything happening outside. I find some kind of connection between these two songs on the CD. “This is my treehouse, I built it this summer / All by myself, without your help / And only those who like me / Are gonna be invited in”.

Happy paints a not so self-confident picture on “Here and Hereafter” and “The Chosen One”. First one is a love song of someone who is scared of losing their love, the person who you think is everything to you and without whom you wouldn’t know how to survive. Although the song has a calm and soft rhythm, the lyrics appear to reflect a moment of panic attack, when suddenly you realize that there is the possibility of “losing” and how you never thought about what it would be like. With “The Chosen One” you look into yourself and question what it is you missed in life that others seem to get so easily. People would look at you and think of you as a “solitary entity” as Happy describes it, and wouldn’t realize that like everyone else you long to be loved by somebody, and be the most important person in their lives. It is actually ironic that situations like “a perfectly planned wedding” in a white dress, with guests so cheerful almost to the degree of being artificial, make you think like you are a loser. After all, they are the ones who meet the society’s guidelines, not you. Maybe you never wanted it to be this way for yourself, but you wanted “somebody”. “The Chosen One” is a very nice acoustic song on which you can hear Happy’s wide range of vocals, which with the ups and downs perfectly describe the emotions.

Happy’s lyrics, unlike her name, are pretty dark and heavy. Like “Charlie”, a song inspired by Charles Crumb, talks about how some things in life can drive a person into madness and finally suicide, although for many there is a thin line that stops them from getting there. What is it that pulls the trigger in some people, and what is it that holds another one just near the edge? She boldly states: “If I had stayed that day / It would have been me / Wishing for a handgun / Or a rope on a sturdy tree”. The song has a little bit of David Bowie taste as well.

“Queen” and “Fall” are the songs of “acceptance” although the lyrics at first may seem like “giving up”. This kind of acceptance surely comes with age, maturity and experience. It may not be a very pleasant situation, but harshly, it is what it is. That is why I believe when she says “I’ve accepted my fate / Very reluctantly” or “I surrender all hope to youth” it has virtue in it rather than weakness.

I find this album to be the mixture of her electronic and acoustic works. In this sense, if you have discovered her with this album, it will give you access to her early works. Lyrically speaking, she is in my opinion, better than ever. Hopefully she won’t make us wait for another 10 years. And lastly, I will not give this one a star rating, only because I don’t want to categorize it that way.