A Manual Dexterity

Title: A Manual Dexterity

Label: GSL

Genre: experimental rock

Rating: 7 of 7

First of all, if you have never run across this name before, then maybe you should really question yourself as a music lover. Omar Rodriguez-Lopez is of course the insanely brilliant guitar player of a few bands you may have heard of including the Mars Volta, At the Drive In and De Facto, not to mention head honcho of Gold Standard Labs. On his first solo full-length, Rodriguez has penned the soundtrack to an unfinished movie that was conceived during the down period between ATDI and De Facto. Along with his group of good friends and collaborators including Cedric Bixler-Zavala (#10, 2), John Frusciante (#2, 3, 5, 10), Ikey Isaiah Owens (#8), the late Jeremy Michael Ward (#2, 5, 8), and others, Rodriguez has created a free-form, psychedelic soundtrack that is as adrenalized as delicate. Every song is pure boundary-pushing mayhem that can scare you as much as it will inspire you. The predominately instrumental album derives from all of his previous work (ATDI #2, De Facto #3, Mars Volta #10) as well as experimentation with Latin music (#4) and pure random noise. Every song here is instantly classic in a technical and creative sense but may not be accessible to everyone (including your sometimes narrow-minded listening audience). But none-the-less, it deserves your up most attention, so PLAY PLAY PLAY and respect. Oh yea, and this is only part 1.

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