danstearns

MICROTONAL

PUNKJAZZ

..

"...a superb guitarist and all around musician, sophisticated arrangements with talent to spare..."

"...a young guitarist from Northboro, Dan is our pick to gain wide recognition with awesome technical ability and compositional sophistication..."

"...the second side of this tape may be the best I've heard all year, from soft acoustic and beautiful vocal, to incredible hot shit jazz..."

"...Rutland guitarist Dan Stearns recently finished second place in Guitar Player Magazine's 1991 Soundpage Competition, among a field of over 700 guitarist world-wide. His live shows are rare and stunning..."

"...innovative, kaleidoscopic..."

"...a wild trip through a maze of sound..."

"...Stearns is a composer with a truly original vision, "In a World Out of Tune" is a frenzied, industrialized, atonal guitar fest..."

"...Dan is one of the most original modern composers to have submitted a tape to this column. Hats off for an innovator..."

"...Dan Stearns, internationally recognized in Guitar Player and other publications, has finally put together a live band that approximates the dense, nightmarish music that has been issuing forth from Dan's tiny studio for years..."

"...Stearns crafts dense compositions that swerve into discordant meltdowns, then instantly snap into focus with impeccable musicianship, making each listen a little different from the last..."

"...in the overcrowded world of guitar players, Stearns is recognized by his unique style, which cannot easily be pegged. His music is very cinematic, themes and variations conjure darting images like erratic plot points in a surrealistic movie..."

"...WARNING: this music may be too intense for some listeners. Dan's technique, compositions and originality put him on another musical plane..."

"...Zorn meets Stravinsky..."

"...brutally difficult..."

"...a remarkable tape, playing as technically complex as any I've heard..."

"...a model of uniqueness..."

"...tomorrow's guitar today..."

"...if Charles Ives played metal guitar..."

"...our Charles Ives..."

"...a dizzying cacophony..."

"...hears and sees things most people never catch..."

"...un gran compositor norteamericano que nos gusta mucho y que explora mucho en este terreno con guitarras sin trastes es un tal Dan Stearns..."

"...I'd like to mention the work of Daniel Stearns, in particular as a standout, original example of an Ivesian approach to rock music with his combinations of microtonal melodies and bizarre theatrical climaxes..."

"...clearly all but the most technically talented of us can conceive and, much less, accurately play such forms, but Dan can do this stuff blind-folded..."

"...serious explorations of microtonal possibilities and, a New Englander himself, his connections to the music of Ives strike me as both honest and deep..."

"...the cassette he sent me back then did for harmony what Conlon Nancarrow did for rhythm -- cracked open an entirely new and unexplored musical space..."

"...just might be the most honest Ivesian of us all..."

"...fantastic harmolodic allan-holdsworth-raised by-wolves no-wave fusionist guitar skronk, tabletop concrete hybrids and microtonal works that are well worth your time. why this man is not HUGE is beyond me..."