ANTHONY PHILLIPS & ENRIQUE BERRO GARCIA: PRIVATE PARTS & PIECES III - ANTIQUES

The first of the three albums recorded by Phillips with the Argentinian classical guitarist Quique Berro-Garcia has still the mood of the acoustic parts of The Geese and the Ghost but being almost made of just two classical guitars, with few exceptions, appears to be more classical oriented. It's clear since the first track that, if I'm not wrong, has some J.S. Bach inside. The second track, an instrumental suite of about 12 minutes, contains classical inspired parts but also some fast passages which remind to Astor Piazzolla, clearly influenced by Quique.

Fully Genesis inspired, instead, is the 3rd track: "Suite in D Minor" on which Quique plays a nice clean electric guitar with some bluesy vibes. Unfortunately, Anthony can't avoid inserting tapes played reverted which I honestly find annoying. There's not even a Satanic message inside... Back to the pastoral version of Genesis and we are already in the B side (excuse me, but I have the vynil). Esperansa first, and Elegy have the pastoral mood that Genesis have quite lost after Trespass. In particular, Elegy features Ant at the 12-strings and again Quique at the electric. I think Ennio Morricone would have liked it.

The album proceeds with the happier "Otto's Face" and "Sand Dunes", another mini-suite very typical of Ant's sound of these times but a bit boring. The closer "Old Wives Tales" arrives too late. It's a good track, but after Sand Dunes I'm usually too tired to fully appreciate it.

So, not a bad album and very interesting for who likes classical and acoustic guitars. You have to, as it's almost everything you can find here. Good inside its genre.