Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Arguably the most seductive of sounds, aside from an engrossing violin being played under a dimly lit street lamp as it serenades a lover from the tender arms of Morpheus, is that of the guitar. The finally polished wood in tune with a good set of fingers and a lung busting pocket of air can sweep a person off their feet and lead them down a road to expectant, gratified glee. In the hands of a master it’s like being kissed by an angel who has just found out that life is meant to be lived and not just waiting on a command, in the hands of Javier Vargas and the Vargas Blues Band it s like finding out that angel has been living next door for years and has had a crush on you forever.
The band’s latest album, From The Dark, is a heady mixture of continental splendour and the loneliness attributed to too many nights out under the moon and her influence on the shifting sands of the desert and of Time. The twin dilemma of praising the forlorn landscape of Earth’s battered near cosmic neighbour and revelling in the passion of the cooling sand beneath the feet.
From The Dark, comes inspiration, whether in the form of mutual nightmares or of sanguine reverence, sometimes the best things happen when the sun has departed from its long visible path and the moon encroaches into its well beaten furrow.
The Vargas Blues Band, Javier Vargas, Gaz Pearson, Luis Mayo and Peter Kunst come together like abandoned, wandering minstrels and their collected sorrow and joy of things that were passed on the way become the sounding board for relief and a party springing out of nowhere. The friendless desert, bathed in moon shadow, suddenly becomes alive with possibilities as the sound created by the band and their special guests travels far and wide as the moon smiles down upon them.
Tracks such as Let It Go, Moon Light Blues, Palace of the King and the exquisite album closer, Esperanto, all glimmer and pulsate with a richness of form that makes perfect isolation an emotion of the past, the songs are too inclusive, to enjoyable to sit round a table and bemoan the state of Blues.
From out of the dark can come ideas that thrill and entertain, shadowy, mysterious creatures take a hold and become something uniquely cool, From The Dark is this year’s very gracious offering.
Ian D. Hall