Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Koch, Greg
Label: Greg Koch Band
Release: 2013
Length: 64:47
Rating: 5/5
Greg Koch is considered one of the best guitarists on the planet. He’s the master of the Telecaster in all its varieties, both the ones already invented and the ones being invented as we speak. Since Greg Koch, sadly, isn’t as nicely polished and marketed as, say, Joe Bonamassa, he has to make a living with guitar clinics and teaching too. Otherwise he’d be known as an artist to anyone with even the slightest taste for the big, witty ideas of six-string theory. Maybe some of you caught Greg at a guitar clinic in Ljubljana in 2010, when the jovial giant boxed your ears and rattled your brain folds with his brilliant, boundless variety of approaches to playing guitar.
With the new album »Plays Well With Others«, Greg Koch has revealed two basic novelties. The first is that his playing can mesh perfectly with other musicians when it comes to teamwork. The second is that the new album is the work of a band rather than an individual, which steers it toward greater accessibility for wider audiences, especially compared with Koch’s earlier work, where the man mostly devoted himself to instrumental music. It’s easy to hear right away that Koch plays guitar with his fingers only, which gives him optimal control over every last note he draws from the guitar, however detailed, sophisticated and mellifluous. It’s downright incredible how, this way, you can feel the passion in Koch’s playing far more intensely and authentically. The same note can be played with a completely different sound, which strings together entirely different feelings in musical expression. That’s one of the big attractions not only of this album but of this guitar master’s whole guitar exposé. Richie Kotzen figured this out a while back too, and bid picks farewell for good.
Right from the opening legato, tear-clear, carefree, soaring and superbly controlled, buzzing like an enraged wasp in the opener Simone, it grabs your full attention. Picking up Koch’s solo in this song is none other than Joe Bonamassa. Bonamassa, for whom Koch is a big role model and guru, recorded the solo for this track in his California studio and sent it over to Koch,
It’s precisely this orientation of Koch’s, subordinating the character of the songs to teamwork, that opens up a plethora of new options for developing and exploring his artistic reach. All ten songs have an exceptionally expressive focal point. Crafted phrases, enriched by the brilliance of Koch’s practically perfect Telecaster playing. In fact, Koch developed a different sound for every single song using technicalities and studio logistics (pedals, effects, distinct amps, even different pickups, strings, types of guitars), and the guest grandmasters of guitar contribute their bit too. Particularly impressive is Robben Ford with his instantly recognizable, mildly overdriven, jazzy Stratocaster contour in Sho Nuff, What You Got To Loose and Walk Before You Crawl. Paul Berrere (Little Feat.) is here too. His sonic and stylistic quirks are impossible to miss, especially the sublime perfection of the moaning slide pulls in the excellent Whiskey RainStorm.
Jon Cleary’s refined piano solo in Spanish Wine adds new qualities to the teamwork, and there’s also the outstanding ballad Down the Road, where a Hammond adds important filler to the accompaniment. The album’s lead vocalist is John Sieger of Semi-Twang, who brings great sensitivity and a sophisticated, clean vocal approach. Interestingly, the guitar playing doesn’t actually take precedence over the vocal parts, which again speaks in favor of the teamwork. In the instrumental mid-eight sections in the middle, Koch and company naturally stretch out radically, while Koch’s other guitar touches just deftly fill in behind the vocal performance. John Sieger’s timbre couldn’t color Koch’s compositions on this album any better!
Then there’s Robben Ford, who can’t be overlooked, both for his playing specifics and for the sound of his famous white Stratocaster, typically steeped in jazz, which complements things superbly in What You Got To Loose, a mix of country and rag time elements, then in one of the album’s highlights, Walk Before You Crawl, and in the fun shuffle number Sho Nuff. There’s just no end in sight to the imagination and the resulting variety in using every possible technique and combination of them, or to the way jazz, country, rag-time and swing get folded into the starting points of blues. Koch does all this with exceptional sensitivity, yet also a lot of deliberation. Everything sits in the right doses in the right places. No move is superfluous, none is »too short«. Koch is an exceptional master of fingerpicking, which he uses to loosen up and animate his playing. He’s hugely unpredictable in his moves, precisely because in any given situation several options present themselves for him to pick from. And that’s the basic appeal of any kind of guitar playing. Koch, famed for his cunning precision, is at the same time boundlessly playful, even goofy, and limitlessly »wide« in choosing the forms he weaves together so sparklingly. It’s hard to find a guitarist who brings wit and fully developed guitar technique together so brilliantly. Koch has studied every sliver of wood in the instrument, every screw, the whole physics of it! You can’t get any deeper into it. And all of this he has of course enriched with exceptional musical receptiveness and a well-developed character, a depth of character in his playing.
Throughout this album it’s perfectly clear that complete harmony reigns among the musicians, and that the guest guitarists and Koch never get into any six-string swordfights that would muddy the album’s exceptional definition, precision and sophistication. 10 songs of exceptional charisma and well-crafted, arranged character, which don’t lack lucidity yet are finely structured. The production sound is exceptionally clean and lively; it feels like you’re listening to the album in a small bar that barely fits 50 people. »Greg Koch Plays Well With Others« delivers an extensive and enthralling guitar read that will surely satisfy even the most demanding and most spoiled gourmet ears.
Lineup
Greg Koch – guitar
Roscoe Beck – bass
Dylan Koch – drums
John Sieger – vocals
Theo Merriweather – keyboards
GUEST MUSICIANS:
Joe Bonamassa – guitar on track no. 1.
Robben Ford – guitar on tracks 2, 5 and 6.
Paul Berrere – guitar on tracks 4, 7, 9 and 10.
Jon Cleary – piano on track no. 3.
Brannen Temple – drums on tracks 2 and 6.
Production
Greg Koch
Track list
1. Simone (03:52)
2. Walk Before You Crawl (06:23)
3. Spanish Wine (06:10)
4. This Whole Town Has A Broken Heart (03:40)
5. Sho Nuff (05:02)
6. What You Got To Lose (05:36)
7. Whiskey Rainstorm (03:35)
8. Down The Road (04:43)
9. Night Owl Now (05:17)
10. Hey Godzilla (06:34)
11. Spanish Wine (radio mix) (04:55)
12. What You Got To Lose (radio mix) (04:46)
13. Hey Godzilla (radio mix) (04:09)
14. Welches Grape (digital bonus track) (07:06)
15. Sweet Tea (digital bonus track) (09:55)
