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ABOUT THE ARTIST:
San Diego, California native Chris Brian Gussa (also known as Uncle Gus) learned to play guitar in his sleep; absorbing the intricate guitar and song structures from a nearby radio station in Tijuana, Mexico at the tender age of six. By the presumably much less tender age of 16, Uncle Gus (I'm sure he was 'Lil Gus back in those days) was noted as "The Best Blues Guitarist in San Diego" by KGB radio. Spending years perfecting several styles of music, Uncle Gus has created "Surf Mambo" -- an interlocking fusion of several genres that, as he puts it, sounds like it should have been that way all along. Chris' previous release, Guitars of the Blue Cantina was recognized in 2004 by D.J. Rick Dees, who called Chris Brian Gussa the "King of Instrumental Background". His fourth and most recent release, Full Moon in Cancun (from which this single is, of course, the title track), is choc-full of several other instrumentals; all making you want to take a trip to Cancun yourself. But maybe I just get too involved with this stuff. Chris Brian Gussa now records out of Benson, Arizona, where he is apparently just close enough to the BandFreaks main crew in Tucson to scare them into cleaning up the place once in awhile.
ABOUT THE SONG:
"Full Moon in Cancun" is a masterful mixture of several solid style influences, beginning with a percussion intro and a catchy island guitar riff that quickly expands to a full set of instrumentation that, from what I can tell, is all performed by Chris Brian Gussa himself. This includes all guitars (even the fast ones), bass, percussion, the cool electric solo, and the pickup piano parts. The entire song grooves us right onto the sunny surf of Cancun, far away from the squares of the city ... or perhaps the rectangles if you're Uma ... and doesn't drop you off until it puts you down. I even think this tune's got three or four solos, which get slightly more technically angled as the song progresses. "Technically angled"? I meant "rocking". Sorry. ON THE DOWNSIDE:
There is this ... part ... near the very beginning when the instruments come in ... that gets kind of muddy for me. It's just like all the instruments slop together for just a moment when everything first steps in. I was kind of worried it would stay that way for a moment, it panned out quickly as the song progressed, and was eventually outweighed by the rest of the performances. STRONG POINTS:
Aside from several strong performances from Gussa, "Full Moon" is generally a great sounding track. With so many instruments -- guitars, percussion, shakers, piano, other guitars, another guitar -- you would expect a lot of noise. However, Gussa's performances and recording shows not only skill behind the guitar, but behind the recording console, as well. Everything is nicely laid out and separated here, with no overlapping performances or "dueling solos". Also, the instruments are nice and crisp. Many musicians who record themselves often make the mistake of over-reverb-ing their final mix, making everything wet and overly spacey and warm. Not our Uncle Gus. THE CONCLUSION?:
It's obvious this guy is no amateur -- solid performances all the way around ... all nineteen of them ... and a wonderfully laid out track in a very interesting fusion of musical genres. You can hear samples of all the songs from Full Moon in Cancun by going to Chris Brian Gussa's CDBaby page at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/unclegus4
Stone Bayliss
BandFreaks Staff Reviewer |
