Sometimes, a very specific component of music triggers a subjective reaction that prohibits full enjoyment, whatever the merits of the whole. The kind of thing I'm talking about here is where one says of a band, "I'd like them fine if I could just stand the guy's voice." Many have no problem with this hypothetical voice-- some may even like it-- but for you, the voice provokes a visceral reaction that can only be overcome with great effort, if at all. Such is the case with my reaction to Gregg Bendian's Interzone, but this being instrumental music, it's not the voice I can't stand; it's the jazz fusion guitar.

The guitar in question belongs to Nels Cline. Now, don't get me wrong. I can separate my gut reaction from my critical faculties enough to tell you that Nels Cline is a fine guitar player, picking his way up and down these complex scales with copious technique and sufficient melodic innovation-- he's easily holding his own with the best of yesteryear's fusion axe-men, the John McLaughlins and Pat Methenys of the world. But I can't hear the jazz tradition in Cline's guitar improvisations; all I can hear is a noodly sound that rubs me the wrong way, like bad Frank Zappa or the Grateful Dead's "Space". Fusion guitar solos just don't do it for me.