Global Resonances - Reviews

Matthew Forrs (Inside World Music)

 
"The new work of Gino Foti's musical creations shines through in new age, experimental, and bass-infused melodies and rhythms on Global Resonances. Gino's strictly instrumental songs are poignant, contemplative, ambulatory, and engaging. The diverse bass guitar stylings are partly due to MIDI, but there are also loops and samples that fill in the melodies. There are fourteen different tracks in all that span over one hour. Some of the bass sounds are rather light and represent an East Asian flair. However, Gino's music is steeped in avant-garde and experimental styles with a world fusion element rarely seen in contemporary releases in new age genres. There are not only East Asian sounds and influences here, but African elements exist to some extent. The jazzy leanings are truly impressive on "Umoja." Global Resonances is aptly-titled, because it represents a worldly connection that brings together various cultural components that seem to mesh very well. Whatever inspires Gino, we can be sure he will make it his own and evoke a sense of magnificence and entrancement in all who listen. Play it today!"

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Eric Johnson (Independent reviewer)

 
"Global Resonances, Foti's sixth world music fusion release, is somewhat of a departure from his previous efforts. Inspired by the low resonant frequencies generated by our planet, he abandons keyboards & synths on this album to feature his bass guitars in various musical situations. Which is not to say that this is a solo bass project like you would hear from a Victor Wooten or Michael Manring, although he has the chops to rival these monsters. This album is more in line with releases like Kings of Sleep & Radio Free Albemuth by Stuart Hamm, or some of Jeff Berlin's catalog, but with more prominent world music elements. The all-instrumental tracks feature the ensemble, with a balance of power among all the instruments. In addition to different basses, dulcimers and guitars, including a guest spot by Electrum bandmate Dave Kulju who radiates on the Arabian spiced "Courageous Convictions", Foti uses saxophones, vibraphone, and a slew of ethnic instruments & percussion via MIDI bass guitar and software sampling.

Throughout the album, Foti is like a fine-tuned high-end sports car from his native Italy. His timing is precise, he sounds impressive in any gear, but really shines when he opens it up on tracks like "Seishinryoku", an intricate & energetic duet with shamisen, "Mountain Pass", a vigorous hike through a rocky sonic landscape, "Dwelling In Enchantment", where he turns into a polyrhythmic perpetual motion machine & the high-octane closer "Prismatic Rays". His ability to shift effortlessly between melody, support and lead, as well as fretted and fretless bass on the "Triune Aspect" trilogy, recalls both jazz fusion players like Mark Egan & the iconic Jaco Pastorius, and prog rockers like Chris Squire & Geddy Lee, who Foti cites as his main influence.

Besides "Seishinryoku", there are three other duets that are well-conceived and executed: "Ten Thousand Dharmas", with the bass producing what sounds like ten thousand harmonics alongside a gu zheng, the tightly woven flamenco of "Amor Fati" & "Wandering Over Withered Fields", an earnest complement to Seishinryoku that is dedicated to the Japanese people who died during the earthquake and tsunami a few years ago.

In addition to the thirteen original tracks, there is a version of Bach's "Little" Fugue for four bass guitars that feels a bit out of place, but is wonderful to listen to nonetheless. Hamm & Berlin come to mind again, with their own arrangements of Bach pieces over the years.

Highly recommended to all fusion fans, especially if you enjoy any or all of the bassists mentioned above."

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Joseph Shingler (ProgNaut.com)

 
"For his sixth solo release "Global Resonances", Sicilian born composer Gino Foti has set aside all manner of keyboards creating an album featuring bass guitar as the primary instrument. But don't let that fool you into thinking you'll be bored to tears listening to some ego inflated bassist laying down a thumping bottom end bass track then simply riff away with multiple bass guitar overdubs. If that were the case this would be the shortest review in Prognaut's CD Review Archive. But Foti's midi bass is capable of simulating any number of musical instruments, adding musical textures that the bass guitar alone could never achieve. What you can expect is a wide array of middle eastern stringed instruments as well as sax and horns. Any acoustic instrument or unearthly sound a keyboard player can emulate with a midi or sampling keyboard is available to Foti's midi bass. I learned long ago after listening to albums from guitarists like Allan Holdsworth and Mark Dwane who incorporate the SynthAxe into their repertoire, that faux-Mellotron string washes and otherworldly Moog synthesizer sounds weren’t restricted solely to instruments with black and white keys - but stringed and wind instruments as well. And talented artists like Gino Foti have tapped into that technology.

Following in the footsteps of innovative musicians like Mark Egan (fretless bass), Chris Squire (Rickenbacker 4001), Tony Levin (Chapman Stick), and Trey Gunn (Warr Guitar), Foti has taken his bass playing to that next level, giving prominence and new voice to an instrument, which by design as part of the rhythm section, is normally relegated to the background.

Once again as on his last album “Xenosonic Journeys” Foti experiments with a variety of Arabic, Middle Eastern, Asian, Latin, European, tribal, and Afro-Cuban rhythmic patterns, as well as an impressive four bass guitar arrangement of J.S. Bach's "Fugue in G Minor".

With the exception of a guest appearance by fellow Electrum band mate Dave Kulju (Electric Guitar) on the track "Courageous Convictions" this is all the work of Gino Foti - performed, arranged, produced, engineered, mixed, and mastered.

Unlike the music of his previous band Electrum - an energetic instrumental progressive rock trio in the vein of King Crimson and Rush, producing the albums "Frames Of Mind" (1998) and "Standard Deviation" (2002) - his post-Electrum solo career sees Gino Foti embracing the World Music genre, incorporating elements of ambient new age, jazz and ethnic fusion, down tempo, electronica, techno, trance and European classical into his compositions.

"Global Resonances" is an aural travelogue of the imagination, crisscrossing the globe to exotic locales like the mysterious orient or a world of Turkish delights. The music transcends time itself, transporting the listener to ancient Persia when Scheherazade delighted and distracted her husband Shahryah with heroic and romantic tales of "One Thousand And One Nights".

Though these may not be the exact destinations Foti intended when composing each track ... none-the-less his music sparked my imagination, whisking me airborne on a magic carpet ride far from my Indiana ranch house.

Although not necessarily progressive rock, I would highly recommended "Global Resonances" to fans of new age, Smooth Jazz, and World Music. As well as his previous albums “Xenosonic Journeys", “Vedic Mantras”, “Bhavachakra”, “Sphere Of Influence”, and “Orbis Terrarum”."

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Steve Roberts (ZNR Records) [Amazon.com Editorial review]

 
"The sixth solo album from the bassist of the group Electrum. Further explores his love of various world music cultures incorporating Arabic, Latin & Asian scales & grooves. Masterfully played by Foti who performs on various bass guitars and uses samplers to great effect. Dave Kulju - also from Electrum - guests on one track on electric guitar, but everything else is played & programmed by Gino, including an arrangement of J.S. Bach's "Fugue in G minor" for 4 bass guitars! Beautiful stuff."

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Thomas Breuss (ElectricBass.ch)

 
"Auf seinem sechsten Album Global Resonances verbindet Gino Foti verschiedene ethnische Musikstile mit modernem Fusion-Jazz. Seine Einflüsse aus der Weltmusik umfassen Arabische, Lateinamerikanische und Asiatische Skalen und Rhythmen. Entstanden ist ein hybrides Werk, eine Legierung aus Mystik, Religiosität und poppiger Zugänglichkeit. Für Freunde von Jaco Pastorius, Jonas Hellborg oder Mark Egan."

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