MILAN POLAK – Dreamscapes

Ask any Guitar Head about his or her top ten guitarists, and 99% will probably have Yngwie Malmsteen, Steve Vai, and Joe Satriani in the top three, or at least in the top five -– this is a given and is beyond reproach! Now, the other seven positions will be the cause of many heated debates, with such greats as Angus Young, Randy Rhodes, Joe Stump, Dushan Petrossi, Eric Johnson, Marty Friedman, Gary Moore, Paul Gilbert, Eric Clapton, Alexi Laiho, Eddie Van Halen, ‘Dimebag’ Darrell, and a boatload of others, vigorously championed by whatever genre of music drives each debating Guitar Head. However, if you are driven by a wide ranging variety of musical persuasions, then you may have (or should have) Guitar Virtuoso Milan Polak in your top ten list.

With the aforementioned guitar greats, you can usually figure out who is playing because of their own particular and distinctive playing style. For Milan Polak’s style, that will be difficult -– he can play like all of the above, and then some! His expansive repertoire of musical styles can be heard on his album Dreamscapes, a smorgasbord of guitar-led instrumentals. Listening to the albums from other guitar greats, because they mainly play the entire album in the same musical style, you may start to get jaded; your mind begins to wander until what you’re listening to fades into background music. There isn’t much chance of this happening when listening to Dreamscapes, because there is a different style of music being played within each track. From the Progressiveness of “Panic Room,” through the Flamenco of “Spanish Romance,” the light and floaty “Slowgold,” “4am,” and “Ground Zero,” to the Rock Heavy “Shadowdance,” and all points in-between, Milan takes guitar playing to a new level, yet without it sounding like a self-indulgent ‘Hey Dudes, see what I can do!’ guitar-fest.

Other tracks of note are “Quicksilver,” which if ever they record another Ultimate Driving Songs CD (y’know the ones that always seem to include “Radar Love” and “Bat Out Of Hell” etc.) this song should definitely be on the tracklist, and, “Contrapunctus III,” a travelling, lute-playing, Minstrel-sounding track that will take your mind back to Medieval Times and the Court of King Arthur.

Dreamscapes is an album that will probably only really appeal to the Hardcore Guitar Heads, mainly because of what makes it stand out from all the others in this genre; and that is its variety of musical content. All the other Guitar Heroes may throw in a twist of various styles here and there into their creations, but they almost invariably stick to a certain distinguishing framework that they have mastered. Milan Polak hasn’t picked a certain style or technique to master, preferring to set himself the challenge of perfecting multiple guitar playing styles, and in doing this, Dreamscapes doesn’t come across as a self-indulgent album that was recorded to stroke his own ego.

In all probability, Dreamscapes is a continuance of Milan Polak’s 1995 debut solo album Guitar 2001, which was re-released on Lion Records as Guitar Odyssey in 2005; which was reviewed by Metal Express Radio HERE. So, if you have listened to Guitar 2001/Guitar Odyssey and have craved for more, then Dreamscapes will hit the spot. If you like AOR albums, or guitar-led instrumentals, then Milan Polak albums should definitely be in your collection.

Tracklist

1. Panic Room
2. Girlfriends
3. Dreamscapes
4. Spanish Romance
5. Quicksilver
6. Slowgold
7. Joyride
8. Contrapunctus III
9. 4 am
10. Shadowdance
11. Ground Zero
12. Straight Ahead
13. Sometimes I Still Miss You