Track Listing

1. My Way Down
2. Letter to My Girlfriend
3. C-Butt Rock
4. Just Kissed My Baby
5. Shiloh
6. Scrawl
7. What Can I Do?
8. Big Legged Woman
9. Borrowed Love

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #56876 in Music
• Released on: 1994-10-11
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .21 pounds

Amazon.com
It may be cruel to dismiss Chris Duarte as just another Stevie Ray Vaughan wannabe, but it's accurate. There's not an original sound or sentiment on this debut album, right from the copped licks of opener "My Way Down" to the environmental cautions of the finale "Borrowed Love." Duarte is technically adept enough to get many of the late Vaughan's guitar mannerisms right, from his rich-but-brittle Stratocaster tone to the turnarounds he uses to set up his solos. He's a pallid vocalist, however, which doesn't help plead his case as an emerging talent. In fact, four years after this debut--which beat both Jonny Lang and Kenny Wayne Shepard to the record stores--Duarte has yet to make his mark. --Ted Drozdowski

Customer Reviews

Blisterin' Texas Blues
The comparsisons to Hendrix and Vaughan abound, but anyone who typecasts Duarte as a simple clone of those two godfathers of acid blues is simply short sighted.

Chris Duarte's first full-length album, *Texas Sugar* is astounding on many levels. Sure, it's hard-rocking blues. However, the funk and jazz influences color nearly all the tracks. Take something like "Big Legged Woman." Certainly, one can hear the blues influences, from the scorching guitar solos to the chordal structure. However, one would have to be tone deaf to miss the scratching, funky rhythm of the song. "Big Legged Woman" shares more in common with Wild Cherry or post-Bitch's Brew Miles than with Stevie Ray Vaughan.

Duarte reminds me of what Jimi Hendrix may have become: a restless experimenter who fuses jazz, funk, rock, blues, and acid rock with a stamp of originality that many, many musicians should envy. His playing is clean, but sometimes hidden behind a wall of effects and distortion. I'd like to hear an acoustic outing from Duarte.

The songs, however, are amazing. I love "My Way Down." It's a blues/rock/funk explosion with a guitar solo that soars above the stratosphere, makes a left at Neptune, and comes back home with alien knowledge of another world.

Buy this album. Also, check out "Tailspin Headwack."

MIGHTY FINE PICKIN'
I love this CD. Sure, at times he does sound like Stevie Ray but labeling him an SRV clone is the easy way out. There's some mighty fine guitar pickin' goin' on here. Great Strat sound throughout. Listen to the funky guitar work on Big-legged Woman, so sweet! Other standouts for me are C-Butt Rock, Letter To My Girlfriend and the super My Way Down. Just super guitar pickin'. Kudos to the band as well, especially the drummer for some tasty playing. I recently caught Chris and his new band at BB King's in New York and Chris was smokin'! Check this guy out, I think you'll dig it.
www.electriceyes.us

Impressive Debut From the Texas Guitarslinger
It's impossible to write a review of Chris Duarte without invocking the name of Stevie Ray Vaughan. Duarte, a fellow Texan, is obviously a disciple of the late, great guitarist. In fact, Duarte dedicates the nearly ten-minute instrumental "Shiloh" to Stevie and his brother Jimmie. But while Duarte may have been influenced by the Vaughan brothers, he is no imitator. Duarte's guitar playing is both fiery and inspired. His vocals are serviceable, but it's his guitar playing that brings me back to this album time and again. I caught him live a couple years ago and his performance was dazzling. This is an impressive debut. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED