Geoff Farina
Blobscape
Kimchee
I suppose that as far as 34-minute-long solo acoustic guitar albums by obscure indie-band-leaders recorded in a Grange Hall in Rhode Island go, this one definitely kicks ass. But who the hell was asking for that?
Geoff Farina is in a couple bands: Karate is one, and The Secret Stars is another. He apparently recorded over 100 tracks for this record while his friend and bandmate Jodi Buonanno did some kind of Jackson Pollock thing with the paints. I got that from the press kit they sent me. But press kits don’t make no album.
Look, Farina can play the heck out of the guitar, as a couple of these tracks prove: “Slurpy,” especially, and the beginning of the title track have some nice runs. It’s got kind of a sleepy ambient feel, kind of like when you’re sitting in a Grange Hall in Narragansett and your friend is doing some action painting. Ah, for some General Foods International Coffee….
But dammit, solo acoustic guitar albums have to be really, really freakin’ good to get me to actually listen to them… and this stuff is just okay. As my brother Ray says, “It sounds like he’s warming up.” Yep. But maybe you’re all about 34 minutes of a pretty good guitar player warming up.
Kimchee Records: http://www.kimchee.com
