Rodrigo y Gabriela -with Bonus DVD-

Wow, excellent album.
I got into this band when I saw a couple youtube videos of them playing live. Even though the first 2 songs are the more popular ones, the entire CD is excellent and worth every penny.

Amazing
It's truly amazing what these two guitarists can accomplish by themselves. It's really takes seeing to believe it because just by listening, one would think that there is an entire precussion section or band backing them up. That's why the bonus DVD is so important because it actually shows the Rodrigo y Gabriela performing. While Rodrigo provides the melody and lead, Gabriela, in my opinion, is actually the more talented of the two, provides both support and all of the precussion without anything but her guitar. Whenever I play this CD for anyone, I always say that this is a duet and leave it at that. The question that always follows is: "But there are two guitars, aren't there?" The implication is that everyone assumes that a duet is between a guitarist and a precussionist, not realizing that there are just two guitarists providing all the rhythms (I think only one song includes a violin as well).

It takes two...
to make a thing go right. It takes two to make it outta sight. Rodrigo and Gabriela will blow your mind with what they can do with just two guitars! Rodrigo can shred with the best of em, and Gab is no slouch either, plus she's the main percussionist and really good at it. The dvd was really good and insightful. The best part was the tutortorial section of the dvd, they try and teach you their tricks... like any fool can grab a guitar and do what they do. Yeah right! Plus its kool to listen to Gab's mexican/irish accent, though more irish it sounds like at times, which would make sense (they spent a lot of time over there) and they didnt know english very well when they went! Awesome music, not full on rock, but not flamenco either. Totally worth the investment with the dvd.

Passionate Play
A friend sent me a link to a youtube of Rodrigo y Gabriela, and I bought this cd the same night. Passionate, precise playing, pulsating rhythm... A powerful union of two guitars... Just look at a video from one of their shows.

Ridiculously sublime
Rodrigo Y Gabriela are two guitarists hailing from Mexico who play acoustic music with fire and beauty. Having honed their skills in various former bands the two of them have here created a beautiful album of music that is gentle enough to play on those lazy Sunday afternoonswhen you can just let the music wash over you and yet spirited enough to play in your car as you are cruising along. And that is a rare combination in this age of bands being pigeon holed into about ten million sub sub genres. The real meat and potatoes on offer here is the fact that this music is just based on the guitars, there is no backing stuff yet the sound achieved is full blooded. Each and every song is an instrumental which for someone such as myself who rarely listens to such music made for a lovely change. And given the two players have backgrounds in actual bands they understand the concept of song, rather than just recording a catalogue of skills which is a trap some instrumentalists tend to fall into. Apart from a slew of originals the duo have also rendered versions of the Zeppelin staple Stairway to Heaven and Metallica beast Orion onto the disc and both cover versions are very useful artistically and great fun for those who know the originals. This release is available as a version with a bonus DVD disc which really imparts a lot of the philosophical visions of the pair and also imparts stories that directly relate to some of the songs on the album as well as giving a bit of a history lesson about their early musical influences and some live footage and guitar tutorial stuff. All of which makes for a pretty value packed release when other groups out there put a second disc in with their album and all you get is the video clip from the lead single and some backstage idiocy. All up a release where I feel myself about to fall into hyperbole trying to describe it, all I can say is that five stars isn't really enough to truly infer the quality, the freshness and the personality of this release. Nobody I've played it to has had a bad word to say about it. Seriously, why are you still reading this, you should be putting this into your shopping cart NOW!