just saw Pat Metheny: Antonio Sanchez !!!

[Geoff_G]

this guy Antonio smokes !! if you get the chance...check out Pat Metheny while he is on tour...bang-for-the-buck -- over 3 hours of inspired playing...just beautiful. Richard Bona & Cuong Vu kicked my *** , too...Richard comes out front (after singing, playing perc, guitar) & KILLS "bright size life" on bass with Pat & Antonio !! a real Jaco freak...just amazing.

anyhow, this guy Antonio has really great jazz, ECM, ballad, latin, etc. musicality, great chops, yamaha kits with MUCHO goodies/hardware/2nd snare/electronics/percussion, insane cymbal choices (like 3 flat rides or something)...exciting player & did some NICE solos. the 1st one he started with a street clave pattern on the hi-hat, kept it up w/ great independance, soloing like crazy & rock solid with the clave pattern...then moved it to a floor mounted / bd pedal / cowbell deal...sounded awesome, literally like 2-3 guys for a while. really nice HH chops too: clean 16s stomped out in sections & other nice splashes & stuff...did a solo in the encore where he kept the HH solid & did polyrhythms in a musical way...like 5:2 to 7:2, 5s 7s, etc...eventually sped up back to 16th/8th solo time stuff...really neat.

http://www.patmethenygroup.com/press...io.cfm#antonio (from Mexico City & went thru Berklee Magna *** Laude)

Geoff

[Steve Holmes]

Wow sounds like a great show, thanks for sharing.
I heard from a couple other people about him as well. I should have gone (they were just here at the Universal Ampitheater). I LOVE Metheny and have never seen him.
I've developed a LOT of respect for Paul Wertico too. His cymbal work is just beautiful and colorful. Really adds the right ingredient for the music, and thats saying soemthing when you're talking about the Metheny and Lisle Mayes compositions.
"First Circle" is one of my all time favorite songs.

[Kubla]

I saw Metheny last Friday, and it was a fine show indeed. They played for 3 hours non-stop, except for brief introductions of the band. Antonio was impressive, but the sound wasn't really dialed-in until the second half. Even then, I wasn't impressed at all with the sound of his drums, although his cymbals did sound fantastic (in typical Metheny-drummer fashion). Of course, it didn't help that the snare drum mic was literally behind Antonio (and pointing offstage!) for the first half of the show.

Antonio's first solo was definitely impressive independence-wise, but I thought the clave groove with the left foot was not happening. I would have rather heard a programmed clave which would have allowed him to focus more on what he was doing with the rest of the kit. I felt that Antonio and Steve Rodby were battling a bit for the groove on a few of the newer tunes as well. Antonio was really pushing the time on a some tunes. Corcovado ended way faster than it started.

Cuong Vu was completely superfluous in my opinion. He didn't do anything that Lyle Mays couldn't have easily covered on the keys, and with a better sound.

Bona was a freak, as usual. I kinda felt sorry for Steve Rodby having to play the rest of the show on bass after Bona laid it down on Bright-Size. Sang his *** off too.

[Geoff_G]

yeah -- i agree on the sound of the drums, they sounded dead & boxy. i think 10, 12, 14, 16 wre the sizes...14 & 16 were real dead & 10 & 12 should have been a lot snappier. almost like he was using coated emperors, but the drums weren't at the resonant frequency. amabassadors would have been better if that's the case. i thought he would do the typical ambassador/jazz tuning...but they all seemed flat.

he was definitely on top of the beat, but i don't remember him fighting with Rodby TOO much...they seemed to be nailing the kicks together...but i wasn't paying much attention to start & stop tempos.

i disagree on Cuong Vu...i loved that guy & his singing & trumpet parts were great. it was kinda funny how the entire band except the drummer played guitar at different times, i was expecting Antonio to whip out a mandolin at any moment. [img]wink.gif[/img]

Geoff

[Geoff_G]

yeah -- i agree on the sound of the drums, they sounded dead & boxy. i think 10, 12, 14, 16 wre the sizes...14 & 16 were real dead & 10 & 12 should have been a lot snappier. almost like he was using coated emperors, but the drums weren't at the resonant frequency. amabassadors would have been better if that's the case. i thought he would do the typical ambassador/jazz tuning...but they all seemed flat.

he was definitely on top of the beat, but i don't remember him fighting with Rodby TOO much...they seemed to be nailing the kicks together...but i wasn't paying much attention to start & stop tempos.

i disagree on Cuong Vu...i loved that guy & his singing & trumpet parts were great. it was kinda funny how the entire band except the drummer played guitar at different times, i was expecting Antonio to whip out a mandolin at any moment. [img]wink.gif[/img]

Geoff