And wasn’t he a beauty
Crikey what a gem
A dinkum Aussie treasure
A khaki larrakin
Throwin’ it all out there
With his heart upon his sleeve
Goodbye
Crocodile Hunter
Farewell Steve

One question I had was, what is a khaki larrakin? From answers.com,

khaki

n. A light olive brown to moderate or light yellowish brown.

and…

larrikin

n. A person given to comical or outlandish behavior.

Larrikin, an Australian slang term for a clownish or rowdy person, became a popular word since the untimely death of Steve Irwin, the Crocodile Hunter who was killed by a stingray while filming a documentary…

Sounds like I have just learnt a new Australian slang from an American website :)

Some songs are different from the Joe Satriani that I was familiar with — high gain fast paced space rock guitarists that moves up and down the fret like a crazy alien (actually the “alien” part still holds true). I mean it is different from classics like Flying in a Blue Dream, The Extremists or Crystal Planet. There is a lot of “music”, and some parts of compositions have thick layers of multiple guitar backings which produce that yummy rich texture. Wow.

One thing I also enjoyed is the Super Colossal podcasts, which were available before the official release. Satch had a introduction or a short story behind each song, like for track #4 “Redshift Raiders”:

Satch: “…crazy piece based on the idea that in the future people could travel through space/time … could take advantage of cosmological redshift effect so they can be swung around large planetary objects and get across universe a lot faster than normal…”

It is up to you to figure out what it sounds like. Redshift Rider is indeed one of my favourite track. It sounds more like old-school Satch but having a very “delicious” opening riff that just has so much texture (can’t seem to wrap words around tunes here). The song might start “light” but Satch went crazy in the last 30 second of the track after the last verse…

Other songs are more “relaxed”. It’s So Good is very groovy and “feel good” with an excellent base line that makes you want to swing yourself around. Movin’ On is another feel good song, with rock rhythm guitar and ringing melody (think “If I Could Fly” from Satch’s previous album). I love those songs — simple background riff, dominating lead like a versatile vocalist trying to sing a story, and amazing solo in the middle and to finish the song off.

Two slow songs in the album — Ten Words and A Love Eternal. Maybe I’ll say the former is the “Always with You Always with Me” of “Super Colossal” — a soft rock that just stuck in your mind. Later sounds more like “Cry’” from “The Extremist”, with its singing lead and each note struck at the right time. Lots of expression — so much to tell.

Songs like One Robot’s Dream and Made of Tears are just cool. One robot’s Dream has a very funky drum beat that sets up a futuristic groove for Satch to tell the story on top. Solo kicks in at around 4:20 and it’s just, hmm, cool?! “Made of Tears” on the other hand is my personal favour. 10-12 guitars overlay backing, very relaxing, overdrive lead, very nice tone. Yum.

There are cool songs, and there are weird songs. Crowd Chant, the last track of the album, is just plain weird. Satch plays a lick, and the crowd will hum the same tune back. I guess it will be funny having it in the concerts.

Indeed I have enjoyed this album very much. 19 years since “Surfing with the Alien”, and there are some good albums and some “not so good” ones (am I the only one that hates all the techno in “Engine of Creation”?) — however personally I found “Super Colossal” one of the better ones. Not something you’ll discover when you first listen to it, but after repeated wash and rinse, you’ll also discover the amazing depth inside.

Update: Found this review on Super Colossal, and here’s an interesting quote from the comments:

Steve Vai is a wizard but I think he seems to alternate between being too weird (ie, trying to be Zappa) or too many notes (ie, Malmsteen). Satriani, to me, strikes the very nice balance of having jaw-dropping shreds while still making music.

Couldn’t agree more.

Joe Satriani

Great performance. Great solos. Even the singing in “Rockin’ in the Free World” is not too bad. Still my favourite

Steve Vai

3 songs I’ve never heard from any of his albums, but his signature tune is still unmistaken. And his interpretation of “Litt;e Wing” – wow!!

Yngwie Malmsteen

Fast. Very fast. Freaking fast. Tastelessly fast.

I love how Satch and Vai played, but with Yngwie, it just feels weird. His “Trilogy Suite” feels like nothing but mindless jam showing off how fast he is on the fretboard. During the G3 jam, you can just hear this guitar flying up and down the scale like there is no tomorrow. Like a sore thumb that stuck out…

There are 5 songs from Satch. Excluding “Midnight”, which is just showing off the digital delay, I especially like the live version of “The Mystical Potato Head Groove Thing”. The other three songs feel a little bit too fast, comparing to their studio recording.

Comparing with the original G3 Live in Concert, I like the old one better. I found Eric Johnson a much versatile guitar player than Yngwie.

Who else would you like to see in G3?

However, the whole album would probably only score a “not bad” from me when I compare it against his other work that I really like. Many songs are quite ordinary, and they have pretty much the same “tone” and colour of the sound – sometimes you might not even notice that they have changed the track if you are not paying attention! The guitar playing is exceptional, a lot of places are filled with complicated scale work and arrangement. However, I cannot only find a song that has that catchy ringing melody like “Surfing” or “Summer Songs”. Well, “If I Could Fly” comes very close.

Furthermore, Satch sang in this album! In 2 tracks! Sorry, but I prefer much much more his guitar playing than his mono tone vocal.

Well, that’s all the parts that I dislike. However, two songs in particular I really enjoy. Track 6 “If I Could Fly” has a catchy melody and a very nice solo. Well, actually there are two solos – a short one from 1:23 to 2:00, and the bluesy main solo + interlude starts at 3:00. Together with acoustic guitar backing on rhythm, this song really stands out from the whole album.

However, the reason why everyone should buy this album is because of the 10 minutes master piece “Searching” at track 10. This slow moving ballad just sounds, hum, I guess I have ran out of words to properly describe it. The style is quite bluesy, and some slower part reminds me the songs in his self titled album in ’95. You just felt that there are so many stories behind each of the note. When the song progresses to JS’s solo – I am totally overwhelmed. Not only you hear the best of JS in this song, drum and bass are also working very well.

Now I cannot decide which track is my all time favourite, which was previously held by the live version of “Echo” on “Time Machine” CD#2. I can’t wait to listen to the live version of “Searching”.

Clock is ticking pass 7 and it is in complete darkness outside, but I am still stuck at work here, waiting for V to pick me up to go home. It is pretty much the end of today for me, and I don’t think I can squeeze out another line of code. Well, not quite. I think I need to go somewhere to teach someone C++ tonight. Well, never mind.

At the moment I am listening through some MP3′s from my old collection of CD’s. “Alien Love Secrets” has been my favourite Steve Vai album, followed closely by Passion and Warfare. It is actually not a full-album – it has 7 tracks with 30+ minutes worth of electric guitars, and someone would rather call it a mini-album. Anyway. I really enjoy the track at the end of the album, Tender Surrender. It is a 5 minutes instrumental ballet, starts with a nice clean tone, and ends with a slightly overdriven Wah effect. But the climax in between is in that high gain distortion coming out from Evolution with Steve’s signature finger work. I actually saw the studio video of “Alien Love Secrets” back in 1996 at my ex-band member’s place, and I nearly dropped my jaw when I saw how Steve put his right hand in front of left hand when he played “Bad Horsie”. Wow. It is something that I think I will never manage.

And it did bring back a lot of memories. Time flies, and my left hand has become so rusty that it makes me feel shame when I pick up an electric guitar. I used to be able to play most songs from Joe Satriani’s Time Machine album, but right now I cannot even strike a chord properly. I have not been taking guitar seriously since my old Jackson got stolen back in 1999. And there are quite a few priority changes, I guess.

Maybe I will do some blues tomorrow.