By: M.J. Brady
o say Mike Keneally can play a lot of music styles is a gross understatement, he is doing something a little left of what his mentor Frank Zappa was doing, his music can be intoxicatingly hook filled and extremely complex at the same time; his voice is very likeable, almost Elvis Costello like, and he maintains the zaniness of Zappa. There are some large differences to their music as well. Mike is equally adept as a guitarist and keyboardist, showing chops equal to the very best around. His compositional style, at least on this CD, is very fragmented, having 25 songs on it should be an indicator of that. So whats it like? Well, that's a good question, how about this for an explanation. Albert Einstein, who is also a schizophrenic, along with his genius, graduates from Julliard with a Phd in music theory, gets an electric guitar and some keyboards, and forces his band members to learn the non-sensical meanderings of his musical moods, locks them all in a studio and makes a CD of it. Sorry if this seems too unprofessional of an explanation, but listen and discover the genius of Keneally, he seemingly has grabbed the torch of Zappas' creative fire, and adopted his own twist on it, making for some very deep and humorous music - it's all about fun.
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Vol. 17, No. 2: Feb.-Mar. 2012
