DRAGON'S KISS

MARTY FRIEDMAN may be best known for his decade long stint as lead guitarist for Megadeth churning out metal masterpieces like "Rust In Piece" but it was this album that Dave Mustaine heard that convinced him to hire MARTY to fill that roll. His debut solo album DRAGON'S KISS has been a favorite shredding classic for a long time now. After the two album duration in Cacophony with fellow neoclassical shredder Jason Becker, MARTY FRIEDMAN released his own thunderous roar of a shredder's manifesto. This is an all instrumental affair with MARTY handling all guitars, bass and production. Jason Becker makes a cameo on three tracks and Deen Castronovo from Cacophony handles drumming duties. This is an early Shrapnel Records release and like most of them from the era the production is utter crap.

This is an album for lovers of virtuoso musicianship. MARTY FRIEDMAN remains one of the finest guitarists in all of rock history but on this debut album he displays his sweeping arpeggios, exotic scales, masterful picking and progressive time signatures with a sense of flair and bravado unmatched on his following solo releases. MARTY is all about worshiping the melody and nails it on every move here. Although he can shred like nobody's business, it's his calculated discretion as to when to do so and when to let the note wail milking every conceivable possibility for its use. The music here is thunderous traditional 80s metal with speed ladened licks running up and down the scales shifting moods and tempos in a flash but also contains fair amounts of laid back slow building crescendo inducing scales and chord changes. Every little note is well placed and the aim of this music is to create a pleasing emotional response while simultaneously blowing your mind technically speaking.

DRAGON'S KISS is simply put a brilliant masterpiece of instrumental music that works in every possible way. Melodically, energetically, exotic flair etc. I am so tempted to give this 5 stars because MARTY's guitar playing and songwriting are of that caliber however the production is just awful and MARTY's bass playing skills don't match his guitar talents. A very close call but these flaws really keep this album in the 4 star range. If you are thrilled by faster-than-the-speed-of-light guitar wizardry that worships the melody then this is a mandatory addition to any guitar freaks collection where melody rich metal will melt your soul with every sweeping picking frenzy. Every track on here is outstanding but I still have a few faves. One of my absolute favorite instrumental musical pieces ever is the mind-blowing "Forbidden City" followed by "Evil Thrill," the beautiful "Narada" and "Jewel."