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Magazine: www.proggnosis.com
Reviewer: MJ Brady
Review Date: September 2011
With "All Things Must Converge" multi-instrumental fusion musician Al Garcia, has achieved his 3rd solo outing. And again he has focused on the music that has provided the most inspiration for his ambitions as an artist, and to the listening audiences pleasure that means lots of Fusion! Nothing wrong with that from my point of view, Al really has proven to me on these three cds to date that he is equally adept on the guitar as he is on the bass. By listening to his compositions, I still am not certain which instruments he uses to write with, not that it matters, each song has it's own identity as they should. Yet the songs have such an adventurous way of defying the typical fusion affairs that take grooves and clever rhythms and featuring soloing throughout. It's quite apparent, that Al Garcia takes his creative compositional skills quite seriously.
I can't help to reference some of Holdsworth's outings in various settings, or that of Bill Connors. There is a lot of chord building going on, with nice complimentary melodic accompaniment, well placed, and creatively arranged, in such a way as to captivate the listeners attentive moods while drifting along to the ease of flow. Al Garcia now has 3 very convincing solo cds out now, and this one has shown him reaching new heights in most every aspect of his playing and writing. I especially enjoy hearing his bass take front and center, he has a very distinguished sound on bass, and has deft soloing skills, without over doing it, he balances his guitar and keyboard artistry quite evenly, I am not certain, but I believe that Al utilizes synths on his guitars for the keyboard sounds, which are brilliant sounding btw.
Love the adventure in his music, always hearkening back to the progressive side of rock and fusion, with forays into what can only be described as the Canterbury sound. Everytime I hear a new cd by Al I can only smile knowing he must get as much pleasure in creating his music, as I do in listening to it. So there you go, not one, not two, but three solid can't miss fusion cds by this multi-faceted artist, now to get hold of his Continuum material.