CURED

First of all, this isn't much of a prog project. Again, I was warned about what kind of material I would find on it, but since it was Steve Hackett, well, what can I say? I bought it anyway. I was very disappointed. After all this time, I still only like about 3 of the tunes on this. I will talk about the songs I do like and leave it at that.

I really liked "Air conditioned Night" a lot! It is of course an instrumental that tears your throat out, you might say. Steve makes liberal use of the slide and does a good job. I have to say here that Steve Hackett isn't known for his soloing a whole lot and he stays true to form on this also. In fact there is not much to drool over at all on "Cured," as far as lead guitar goes. If you want to hear good solos, listen to people like Steve Vai. Steve Hackett has other qualities that make him a real standout. He is original, he does do some excellent mini solo runs. It is a treat to hear them. He is an absolute master on the classical guitar. So Steve makes up for any deficiencies he has as a soloist.

The next tune is "Cradle of Swans," which is a wonderful classical piece. Steve delivers the goods here and I loved it.

The last song I liked was "Overnight Sleeper." You feel like you are in mexico and the music also sounds like a roaring train. Steve sings and I like his voice, no matter what the criticism.

Other than that, I could care less about the rest of the material. It is like Steve is trying to sell out like Genesis did.

I would say there just isn't enough good music on this to warrant more than 11/2 stars. The classical guitar piece still isn't enough to salvage any higher ratings from me. It is a real shame too! So it gets 2 stars for PA.