Recently I have been fascinated with hard rock artists stripping it down, and no I am not talking about losing their clothes; more like losing their amps. This is in part from the effect that the Corey Taylor show had on me a few months ago, but probably more because I am headed north to see Tesla do an all acoustic set. Now simply stating the fact that I am going to see Tesla is reason enough to be happy, however the fact that it will be an all acoustic set makes me all tingly inside. (oh and FYI Jeff Keith is one of the most underrated voices in the world)
1990 is the year, hair metal has made it's stain, grunge is approaching, however one little band from Sacramento does something vastly different on one of their newest albums. Not only is it a live album, it is all acoustic; this band is of course Tesla. I remember hearing this and thinking, why in the world would they do this? Why destroy the monster wall of amps and break it down to a granular level? It took a couple of listens however it finally hit me; stripping it down made it louder. You can feel this album; I mean you can really feel it; I dare you not to move to it. So where am I going with all this?
Rock and metal music has more heart than most give it credit for. It is filled with painful lyrics of failure and of love. However it is not until it gets stripped down that we can truly see it's soul. So much of the music I love is looked over by shitty awards shows and the public because 9 times out of 10 they can only hear the decibel of the amps. They don't take the time to strip it down to the granular level and really listen to the lyrics, the harmony, and the over all sound of it all. I think that Tesla's 1990 Five Man Acoustical Jam showed me that often more times than not we have to turn it down a notch to hear the real beauty of a song
Needless to say I am sure that some of you don't even know who Tesla is; however I encourage you to take a listen to that album.
