TADASHI GOTO - INNERVISIONS - 2008

Tadashi Goto is a talented young Japanese keyboardist whose second album is entitled Innervisions. This is an all instrumental record, except for a few spoken word passages and vocalizations. The music combines elements of metal, fusion, jazz and prog with plenty of time signatures and discordant rhythms to keep things fairly interesting. Although there are plenty of keyboard sounds, textures, and solos there is also an abundance of guitar and bass grooves to help flesh out the sound. At times the music gets pretty chaotic, however, there are also some lighter almost ambient sounds and jazzy moments to help break up the intensity of some of the songs. Some of the softer tunes have a real jazz feel. There is no doubting the talent level exhibited by Mr. Goto and he has quite a lot of help such as Ty Tabor (Kings X), Chris Poland (Megadeth), Marco Ahrens (Poverty's No Crime), Tony Franklin (The Firm) and Tony Levin (King Crimson). That is quite a distinguished cast for such a young musician to have assembled.

The album rocks hard right off the bat with "Karma" displaying lots of fast guitar and keyboard interaction. Lots of interesting keyboard sounds make this one very electronic sounding. The beginning of "The Cycle Of The Suffering" has an almost 90's Rush sound and is another up-tempo number. For those of you who are Star Trek buffs you might find interesting some quotes can be heard here from the original series. The very jazzy "Inner Peace" has a nice melody that makes for a relaxing listen. The album ends with the jazz influenced "The Spirits Within" another mellow affair and not as interesting as some of the heavier tunes but pleasant nonetheless.

While I do think this is a good cd it did not blow me away. Though there is a lot of shredding and virtuoso playing by all members, I felt a little more melody infused into the music, especially the heavier numbers, would have really made this a killer album. Another minor complaint is the programmed drumming. It is just too artificial sounding. I cannot help but think real drums would have made a huge difference to the album's sound. That being said, this is still a good release and one that I will reach for again. Recommended for fans of fusion and jazz inflected instrumental progressive rock. Those of you who like modern jazz should also check this out.
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