Bissonette, Gregg

Satriani and Vai's drummer

Gregg Bissonette (1998)

Bissonette,GreggGreggBissonette With guest guitarsts:

- Steve Vai
- Paul Gilbert
- Scott Henderson
- Steve Lukather
- Ty Tabor		 Ranking
Rank: 4 guitars out of 5
Really enjoyed it
Reviewer:
lach (96)

 A friend of mine leant me this CD, chiefly because it has a couple of great guitarists: Vai, Ty Tabor, Paul Gilbert, Lukather, Scott Henderson and more. It has the honour of being the only drummer's solo CD in my collection.

The CD could be shelved into the instrumental rock category - most songs are in this vein, but there's also a great jazz track and a few metalish ones on there as well.

There are a couple of cool things about this CD:

  1. His brother, Matt Bissonette, produced it - can you imagine working on your solo CD with your brother and not killing him by the end of it?

  2. Matt also wrote all of the songs and played bass on all of them!

  3. Every track features a well known guitarist. The good thing is that each song is in the same vein as the guitarist in question. Eg, the track with Vai on it really sounds like a Vai song.

Considering how much input Matt had on this CD, it's possibly a bit unfair for Gregg's name to be plastered all over it. Oh well. Maybe Gregg did most of the leg-work?

Gregg doesn't really have a "monster" drum sound. His snare and kick drum sound don't quite knock your socks off - this has a great benefit of not giving you a headache after listening to it. Fortunately that makes the CD possibly even more enjoyable.

There's not many actual drum solo's on this album as you might expect. Hardly any "drop-out-all-instruments and have a 5 minute solo" bits, which is really great - because unless your name is Donati it's going to get boring.

A cover of Edgars Winters famous instrumental track "Frankenstein" is a real stand out. You'd probably know this song by listening to it, it's featured in a Simpsons episode :) There are a couple of other great tracks, but I don't want to single them out - it chiefly depends on what style you like the most.

I was quite surprised that a drummer's solo CD could be this enjoyable. It's a great introduction to lots of guitarists - so I'd recommend it for that reason alone. However it also features a lot of cool beats and rhythms to keep any drummer happy for a while.

My ranking: 4 - Really enjoyed it
Contribute my review of 'Gregg Bissonette'