What music inspires me?

Ask this question to any musician and signs of uncertainty surely mark their expression. Me being no exception, here I try to round up in a nutshell the artists which in a way or another I feel to have influenced me over all these years of constantly discovering new sounds.

Past my early days of VENOM and DESTRUCTION, a band which then stole my soul and has since never let loose of its grip was MORBID ANGEL. With mainman/ guitarist Trey Azagtoth having been featured in popular guitar magazines when death metal was very under-rated, the cubistic rifferama and twisted solos of this act is remarkably singular!!!

Having experienced them live many times since has only intensified the feeling of listening to their music. On one occasion in New York, I also had the chance to personally meet Trey, and there we shared our love for DEAD CAN DANCE and LISA GERRARD’s voice, another act which I like a lot. Purely sirene music that takes you to other worlds! Listen in a dark room with one candle lit on in a corner!

While on non-metal, another worth mention is AL DI MEOLA. His latin background fused with jazz has not only offered me hours of listening pleasure, but also helped improve my string-skipping techniques through his educational books and video available on the market.

Another man into ethnic sounds, arranger/ composer of different world music releases is EGBERTO GISMONTI. Known to go living in that particular area of the world which aura he would want to capture on record, what else might be said about this man other than that he treats his 8- and 10-string classic guitars and piano as if they were nothing else but percussion or wood-boxes speaking for their habitat.

Back to metal and my RANCID SOUP years of editing a mag and presenting a radio show, a time in my life where I certainly was constantly being introduced to many new talentful ideas. So much in fact that to avoid further words, I decided to here list some titles I would recommend anytime, and which I think might have influenced me one way or another. For some artists I have chosen my fave releases of theirs, while some stuff here might not be metal at all, but as long as it’s good music it’s in my books, so please find some time to check these titles to follow.

Artist	Title		Artist	Title
AL DI MEOLA	Land of the Midnight Sun		ANATHEMA	Judgement
ANCIENT RITES	Fatherland		ARCTURUS	La Masquerade Infernale
ATHEIST	Piece of Time		ATROX	Contentum
BEYOND DAWN	Longing for Scarlet Days		CATHEDRAL	Forest of Equilibrium
CORONER	No More Color		DEAD CAN DANCE	Toward the Within
DEATH	Spiritual Healing		DEATHROW	Deception Ignored
DEPECHE MODE	Ultra		DESTRUCTION	Release from Agony
EGBERTO GISMONTI	Sol Do Meia Dia		IN THE WOODS	Strange in Stereo
INTO THE ABYSS	Cosmogonia		JAMIROQUAI	Travelling without Moving
KATATONIA	Brave Murder Day		LISA GERRARD	Duality
MICK KARN	The Tooth Mother		MISANTHROPE	1666… Theatre Bizarre
MONUMENTUM	In Absentia Christi		MOONSPELL	Under the Moonspell
MORBID ANGEL	Blessed are the Sick		MY DYING BRIDE	Turn Loose the Swans
NECROMANTIA (split w/VARATHRON)	The Black Arts		NECROPHAGIST	Onset of Putrefaction
NOCTURNUS	The Science of Horror (Demo)		PESTILENCE	Consuming Impulse
RENAISSANCE	The Death of Art		SADNESS	Ames de Marbre
TACTILLE GEMMA	Promo 98		VENOM	Black Metal