Cascade Blues Music Reviews Pat Coast, Don't Touch My Guitar Music Review Index

Music Review Reprint from the
November, 2003 BluesNotes
By Greg Johnson

• I Gotta Drive
• The Dangerous Kind
• Peace And Quiet
• Outside Looking In
• Don't Touch My Guitar
• You're Scarin' Me
• Don't You Play No Rhumba
• Lay Down This Love
• She's So Sharp
• Pro Zack Shuffle
• Trouble
• Pistol Slapper Blues
  

By: Greg Johnson

    Pat Coast has been working the clubs in the greater Spokane area for a number of years, first coming to our attention in the band Café Blue. His latest recording, Don't Touch My Guitar should expand his name far beyond the Eastern Washington club scene, though, as it is a brilliant piece of art. Coast shows songwriting abilities on the album that are matched only by his worthy vocals and exceptional, soaring guitar playing. He is backed by a band of top musicians who seem a lot larger than they actually are. Highlighted by commanding horns and keyboards, this group will leave you in a toe-tapping, finger-snapping state. It's unavoidable. Don't try to fight it.

    There are plenty of unforgettable numbers on the disc. Start out with "The Dangerous Kind" with its interactive riffing between guitars, horns and piano. Then there's "Peace And Quiet," a humorous number with lyrics such as "The trashman's in the alley and he's beating on them cans / I'd like to grab him by his greasy neck, he's driving me insane." "Don't Touch My Guitar" is the powerful centerpiece. A raging, high-octane song that showcases Pat Coast as a welcome member of the Northwest's best guitar heroes. It leaves you exhausted listening to the extreme energy behind it and if it were the only song on the disc, would still make it worth the purchase price alone. But it's not the only song; the album just continues with winning selection after selection. Of the 12 tracks, only three were not written by Coast. And these include a picture-perfect rendition of Kenny Neal's "Outside Looking In" that makes Neal proud to have presented it this way himself, and a tasty take on Rory Gallagher's "Pistol Slapper Blues," the only acoustic number on the CD.

    Pat Coast's "Don't Touch My Guitar" is not only an album worth picking up, it is one of the most deserving to be heard recordings out of the Northwest this year, or any year for that matter. Highly recommended listening.

© 2003 Cascade Blues Association