No More Obscurity is the debut release from 33 year-old German guitarist Rolf Munkes. He is accompanied by Gerald Kloos on drums, as well as several guests including drummer Anders Johansson (Yngwie Malmsteen/Hammerfall) and vocalist Lance King (Balance of Power). Impressive guests to have on one's debut album, indeed. But Munkes' guitar is what takes center stage, as it should.

Munkes has a distinctive guitar-playing style characterized by clean, fast legato lines. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the shred-packed track 'Legatomizer'. Other highlights from this 14 track CD are: 'Message In A Bottle', a guitar-heavy cover of the tune by The Police; 'The Man Who Learned To Fly', an acoustic ballad featuring some nice vocal harmonies and reminiscent of something Night Ranger might have done; 'That's New', another legato-type track which showcases Munkes fast, clean playing; 'Tap That Thing', an instrumental rock shred-fest that reveals a bit of the jazz influence Munkes received from some of his guitar instructors over the years; 'Confuse Them All', which has some of the best soloing on the disc; and 'Up And Down', an absolutely beautiful acoustic instrumental ballad.

Shred fans will also appreciate a track called 'Mystic Overture' whic is basically a one minute, 16 second guitar solo, and a track called 'Drumatic' which is a killer drum solo. However, Munkes makes a point of saying on the back of the CD case that "There is no techno drum-machine anywhere on this album!" And I can tell you that the drumming is very good and very real on this disc.

For the guitar players out there, on this disc Rolf uses a Gibson ES-335TD (y.o.c.1972) and a Fender Stratocaster, equipped with an OBL pick-up in the bridge position and two DiMarzio pick-ups in the middle and neck positions, combined with a Rath-Amp (one of the first amps of the Retro 50 series). Thanks to Lion Music for that info.

I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't talk about a minor negative for a moment. Munkes' soloing can start to sound the same after a while. He'd do well to experiment with some different techniques a bit more to achieve a bigger "bag of tricks," as it were. But he is fast and clean, and for the most part the songs are well-written and that helps out tremendously.

No More Obscurity is worth picking up if you are a fan of fast, clean guitar playing and/or albums that feature a mix of instrumental and vocal material. Rolf Munkes shows a lot of promise as a guitarist and songwriter. It will be interesting to see what he comes up with next.

Reviewed by Kevin Ryan

Visit the Official Rolf Munkes Website.

Check out the Lion Music Website.

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