Now if any of the following names feature strongly in your album collection - Eric Johnson, Steve Morse, Pat Methney, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Jeff Beck, Shawn Lane, Steve Howe, Wes Montgomery, Albert Lee, then do yourself a favour and check out this guy. Most of these legends of the six string axe are mentioned as influences of Eric Mantel, however The Unstruck Melody should not be viewed as some sort of plagiarised tribute to these guys, but more an album by an undiscovered contemporary.

I have to say that The Unstruck Melody is a long album and took some listening, and with some twenty one tracks it would be nigh on impossible to review each of the pieces individually. So I'm going to try and lump things together and give a broad prospective overview. The album has eight vocal tracks and thirteen instrumentals. Album opener sees a whistling Mantel flick through some of his local radio stations. Yes we've heard it before although I thought it was a nice touch that he used his own music for each of the channel changes - so diverse is the material on the album that it worked very well.

Firstly then the vocal offerings: The Simple Things is our first taster of the vocal Mantel, and although I doubt he would win any Grammy's for his vocal talents they work really well in this setting. I was reminded of Eric Johnson's vocals (say no more). My favourite vocal track on The Unstruck Melody, The Simple Things is laid back number with a great repetitive vocal hook courtesy of Keith Marx, Amanda Elliot and Mari Zen. The song also features two great melodic solos. Same applies to Shine On although this time around wrapped up in a jaunty shuffle beat - again the choruses are infectious.

However with the exception of perhaps the balladic True Home which has a pleasant a cappella intro courtesy of Paula Mantel and just enough happening to keep my attention (including some nice E-bowing), I have to admit that the rest of the vocal tracks did little for me. Not necessarily because they were bad, but more that they just didn't appeal. The more I got into the album the more I tended to skip over these tracks. Only Want Your Love does have a great solo break, but not enough to warrant repeated listenings. OK on to the instrumental tracks. The first cut, Tribute, and if I'd listened to this album blind I could well have believed that this was that other fine Eric, namely Mr Johnson, playing a tribute to Jeff Beck. The Real You on the other hand has a rather funky groove and one that I might have expected from say The Doobies or the Allman Brothers or perhaps Steely Dan. The "chorus" courtesy of Bon Jovi. Accompanying the infectious beat are the Hammond-like organ fills and with Eric employing sitar and Voice Box (Golden Throat) effects.

Best cut on the album has to be Tai-Chi again a fairly laid back piece with Eric utilising some subtle sound effects and extracting a gorgeous tone from his guitar. And at the point he cuts loose - what a delight. Now there was a time when I would have bought an album just for a track like this... The pace also remains restrained for the majority of Under A Different Lite - a great relaxing track, nice acoustic guitar, soft synth melodies and another fine solo to finish. Exit 10 moves more into Steve Morse terrain followed by the brief gentle resting point, the aptly titled Intermission. In the days of vinyl this release would have been a double LP, so we should view Act II as side three presumably. And after the somewhat forgettable Gloria are a trio of diverse instrumentals. The first, Affectionately Yours is a delightful acoustic passage, whilst the jazzier side of Eric Mantel is explored in There Are No Words. This track featured on Guitar Nine's sampler Guitars At An Exhibition, which I heard some time back. The last of this trio is the rocky Wings Of Fire, which harks back to the halcyon days of rock, albeit with a modern slant. The first of the final two instrumentals Finger Pickin' Country is fairly self explanatory whilst The Unstruck Melody [Reprise] - is similar to the Intermission and the latter part of the album opener, featuring sitar and percussion.

I really, really enjoyed this album and although not much of the material could be deemed as progressive in the traditional sense, I felt there was enough interest to warrant its inclusion in these pages. I did struggle as to whether or not this should feature a DPRP recommended tag, not a reflection of Mr Mantel's guitar playing or even the music I hasten to add, but more of the nature of recommending this to "all" prog fans. In the end I awarded it the highest possible marks without the tag.

Eric Mantel is certainly a force to be reckoned with and hopefully The Unstruck Melody will be the hook to greater things. Fans of Eric Johnson and great guitar playing in general should give firstly the MP3s on Eric's site a listen and then go and buy the album.

Conclusion: 8 out of 10.