Gimme 5 - Dan Patlansky spills the beans

Gimme 5 is a new Blues Enthused feature in which guests name five songs that interest them, five key influences on their work, and five people they’d like to get together with.  The first Gimme 5 contributor is South African guitarist and singer Dan Patlansky, who recently released Shelter Of Bones, his first album in four years.  As the Blues Enthused review of the album put it, "He can do blues-rock guitar-wrangling.  No problemo.  But there's more to Dan Patlansky than that."  

Dan Patlansky tunes up for lunch with five guitar legends

Pic by Johan Coetsee

Dan kicks off his latest British tour on Thursday, 31 March in Southampton.

 

Gimme 5 songs, old or new, that have been on your radar recently.  [Check out the links to hear all Dan’s selections.]

 

‘Texas Flood’ by Stevie Ray Vaughan: “I know this might seem like an obvious choice but I’ve recently rediscovered this song and performance, and it rekindled my love for the Blues and what it means.”  'Texas Flood' is the title track of the debut album by Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble, released in 1983.

 

‘Maydell’ by John Mayall: “I’ve also recently rediscovered this song. It’s one of the best examples of where a blues track can be taken.”   'Maydell' is taken from John Mayall's 1993 album Wake Up Call, featuring Coco Montoya on guitar.

 

‘Morning’ by Beck: “This blew my hair back when I first heard it. The production is breath-taking.”

‘Insurgentes’ by Steven Wilson: “I only heard this song fairly recently. I absolutely love the song and feeling it gives me when I listen to it.”  'Insurgentes' is the title track of Steven Wilson's first solo album, released in 2008.

‘Shine A Little Light’ by The Black Keys: “This one of the best-feeling tunes I’ve heard in years.”  'Shine A Little Light' is the opening on track on the 2019 album from The Black Keys, 'Let's Rock', reviewed here.

 

Dan was evidently so excited by the exercise that he didn't just pick five songs, he shared a sixth, from the ubiquitous Joe Bonamassa.

 

‘Mind’s Eye’ by Joe Bonamassa: “This is the most recent single from Joe Bonamassa’s latest

Stevie Ray Vaughan - the biggest influence of all

album, Time Clocks. It sounds like an epic modern-day blues track mixed with the soul of Pink Floyd. Timeless.”

Gimme 5 artists or bands who have had a big influence on your work.

 

Pink Floyd: “Their album covers always intrigued me growing up. I felt I had to know what their music sounded like, and if the music would match the artwork.”

 

Stevie Ray Vaughan: “Like most artists I like, I discovered him through my parents’ extensive music collection. SRV still remains my biggest musical influence. 

 

Led Zeppelin: “Again, discovered through my parents’ music collection. Still one of the coolest sounds I’ve ever heard.”

 

Jimi Hendrix: “As a kid I would pretend to play guitar on an old tennis racket while my father played ‘Purple Haze’. Jimi had a massive impact on my playing.”

 

Jimmy Page chuffed with Dan's lunch invite

Audio Slave: “In my eyes they’re the best 'modern' rock and roll band. The power in the riffs is
second to none, plus Chris Cornell remains my favourite rock vocalist.”

Gimme 5 living people you’d love to invite to a long lunch - musicians, actors, writers,  movie directors, sports people, or whoever!

 

Given the chance to pick lunch guests from all walks of life, Dan goes for a regular guitarists' convention.  It might get loud!

Joe Bonamassa: “He is, without a doubt, the frontrunner in the blues world today. We owe him a lot for elevating the blues. And his guitar collection is second to none!”

 

Steven Wilson: “A musical genius with a very fresh and interesting view on music.” 

 

David Gilmour: “This choice speaks for itself.”

 

Eric Gales: “Eric is possibly the greatest player alive today, and a guy I’ve been a fan of since the early 90s.”

 

Jimmy Page: “Jimmy Page is the man behind so many of my favourite songs - and I’m sure he can share a tale or two as well!”

 

 

Finally, just one track – Pick just one of your own songs that you’d share with a new listener to introduce them to your music.

 

“I’d go for my latest single ‘Bad Soul’, taken from my album Shelter Of Bones.  It’s all about how some people are just born bad ass, without having to try or be influenced in any way.”

Dan Patlansky’s UK tour with special guest Arielle runs from March 31^st to April 12^th.

Tickets available from thegigcartel.com here.

If you want to play all of Dan's selected tracks at once, then check out the playlist on the Blues Enthused YouTube channel, here.

 

Dan Patlansky - Shelter Of Bones

Dan Patlansky plays some pretty damned head-turning guitar.  I mean, that Eric Gales fella may introduce himself and then say “Any questions?”, but a legitimate answer to that would be: “Yes dude – have you heard this guy Dan Patlansky?”
This is pretty blues-rockingly obvious from tracks like ‘Soul Parasite’ and ‘Selfish Lover’, both of which feature scalding guitar solos.  ‘Soul Parasite’ also comes decked out in lead-heavy riffing supplemented by explosive drums from Andy Maritz, while on ‘Selfish Lover’ there’s even more
of a trademark Patlansky riff – thumpingly hard-edged, with a lop-sided funk element.  And if that’s not enough there’s the stabbing, trampling underfoot riff on ‘Presence’, underlined by his exclamation of “Wheurgh!” along the way, though here both the chorus and the guitar solo are more fluid.

Smile for the camera Dan, c'mon!

Pic by Tobias Johan Coetsee

So yeah, Dan Patlansky can do blues-rock guitar-wrangling.  No problemo.  But there’s more to him than that.  Vocally he can range from Jimi-like rhythmic vocals to more delicate and thoughtful singing, often double-tracked and very nicely done.  And lyrically he’s a world away from wine, women and song.  He’s big on social commentary for example, as on ‘Soul Parasite’ and the rock-funky ‘Devil’s Dopamine’, the latter a critique of social media and its controversialists.  He gets even more philosophical on ‘Presence’, contemplating the importance of living in the present.
But he’s at his most interesting, methinks, when he invokes the personal.  ‘Lost’ is a wistful slow tune about fear of losing a loved one, the mood underscored by washes of organ from Dean Barrett and his own flickering guitar.  The sensitivity is even more powerful on ‘I’ll Keep Trying’, a plangent reflection on personal failings that opens in muted fashion, with delicate falsetto vocals, before gradually finding its feet.  It also features an ethereal solo that floats and flutters in sublime fashion before rising into more anthemic mode.
‘Shelter Of Bones’ combines the personal and the philosophical with similar conviction, starting with minimalist percussion and piano notes, and gentle, haunting vocals as Patlansky considers the perilous future awaiting his children.  A vaguely prog-inclined ballad, it develops simple, hesitant guitar licks into a patient solo, which could be even better if for once he were to resist his penchant for twirling phrases, and maintain more Gilmour-like suspense.  But with this, and the meditation on lockdown positives of ‘Sweet Memoirs’, it seems to me Patlansky makes common cause with Wille & The Bandits in producing rock music of substance for the 21st century, even if their sounds diverge in some respects.
If all that sounds a bit deep, there’s a more laid-back musical touch on both ‘Snake Oil City’ and ‘Hounds Loose’, the former a swinging, bluesy track on which our Dan lays out some jazzy guitar chops, and the latter a lighter and brighter burst of rock – ironic, given it’s about dealing with the devil – with a spangly bridge and a stiletto-sharp solo.
Reviewing 2018’s Perfection Kills, I suggested Dan Patlansky still had untapped potential.  I think that’s still true.  Shelter Of Bones is another damn good album from him, but one or two songs feel a bit slight, there’s the occasional sense of him repeating himself from earlier work, and I’m convinced there are still new horizons he could explore.  Oh yeah, and it would be nice if he cheered up a bit, on the lyric front.  Just turn and face the sun now and then Dan, y’know?
All the same, it’s good to have Dan Patlansky back, four years down the line from his last album.  The guy is a thoroughly modern guitar hero, and one with things to say.
 
Shelter Of Bones is released on 25 February by Virgin Music Label and Artist Services, and can be ordered here.
Dan Patlansky is touring Britain from 31 March to 13 April, details and tickets available here.

Dan Patlansky - The Cluny, Newcastle, 16 March 2018

Supposedly The Cluny isn’t sold out for this visit by Dan Patlansky.  You could have fooled me.  Arriving a bit later than intended, I find myself perching on a step at the back of the room to get a decent view.  Evidently Dan Patlansky is creating some expectations, and tonight he does an impressive job of meeting them.

Dapper in a double-breasted waistcoat and white shirt, he gets out of the starting blocks with the punchy and rhythmic ‘Johnny’, followed up by ‘Never Long Enough’, both from new album Perfection Kills.  It’s testament to his live performance, and the tightness of the band he’s recruited in Hamburg for this tour, that the latter packs a good deal more oomph than on the album.  Keyboard player Tom Gatza then underlines his contribution with sparkling piano and organ solos on ‘Heartbeat’, from 2016’s Introvertigo album.

"Here we go again!" says Dan Patlansky's Strat

Patlansky underlines his blues roots with a driving version of BB King’s ‘You Upset Me Baby’.  His own approach is decidedly different from the ‘single note’ playing style of BB however.  When he lays back, as on ‘Mayday’, with its gentle, considered guitar work, he can become almost hypnotically fluid in a manner that reminds me of Hendrix in ‘The Wind Cries Mary’ mode.  Later, on ‘Still Wanna Be Your Man’, he comes up with a lovely intro that suggests David Gilmour – another avowed influence – and his subsequent solo, delicately shimmering, is a piece of pin drop precision.  And then when they plunge into ‘Bite Back’, with its tumbling riff, he conjures up echoes of Jimi’s playfulness.

There’s plenty of all action stuff going on around this too, with the funky ‘Stop The Messing’ featuring clavinet from Gatza and a heavy groove from Jonathan Murphy on bass and Felix Dehmel on drums, before they expertly take it down in synch to a cooler segment.  They execute some subtle key changes on the jagged ‘Dog Days’ too, while Patlansky’s solo does a great job of serving the song – not a principle guitar honchos always respect.  Cranking out a Led-heavy riff on ‘Bring The World To Its Knees’ they make the song live up to its title, and Patlansky doubles down by getting well and truly tore in on his solo.

‘My Chana’ is becoming a celebrated set closer, and it’s not for the showcasing of the band on a tricksy funk workout, nor for the jazzy scales he throws into the mix.  This is the moment for Patlansky’s personal brand of guitar hocus pocus, standing his beat up old Strat on end and wrenching sounds of it in weird and wonderful ways, even tinkering with its innards via the back of the body.  It’s the sort of thing that can descend into noodling and noise in the wrong hands, but he manages it with control as well as flair, and maintains the focus right to the end.

The whole set, in fact, is a well-designed rollercoaster, with plenty of twists and turns and changes of pace.  And Patlansky, not naturally the most extrovert of characters, engages energetically between songs too.  I might have liked to hear more from his excellent 2014 album Dear Silence Thieves, but I had a damn good night regardless, thank you very much.  Dan Patlansky didn’t just meet my expectations with this show, he exceeded them.

Dan Patlansky - Perfection Kills

“Whuh!” grunts Dan Patlansky at the start of ‘Too Far Gone’.  It’s like a statement of intent for one of his trademarks – when Dan Patlansky decides to get gritty on Perfection Kills, he gets real gritty.

For me Patlansky’s last album Introvertigo never really found the weight of punch that was evident on its predecessor Dear Silence Thieves.  But this time around ‘Too Far Gone’ is just one example of him getting back to his edgy best, its big descending riff trading off against some squeaky funkiness before he slots in a strong solo that also incorporates some stylish dynamics.

Hit' em high, hit 'em low, hit 'em hard!

Pic by Laurence Harvey

The album opens and closes with similarly convincing combinations.  ‘Johnny’ has an attack that lives up to its chorus of “Hit ‘em high, hit ‘em low, hit ‘em hard”.  It’s a tale of the impact of growing up in a difficult environment, but Patlansky still manages to add light to the shade with some twinkling guitar and smooth vocal “oohs” in contrast to the rasp of his vocal elsewhere.  At the other end of the set comes ‘Dog Day’, which ponders whether our hard day’s night is as bad as the plight of others, to the accompaniment of a neck-snapping chorus, and sand-blasted guitar underscored by organ oomph, before Patlansky rounds it out with a brief, squalling rollercoaster of a solo.

In between those two bookends the aforementioned ‘Too Far Gone’ bolsters the middle of the album, along with the offbeat funky undercurrent of ‘Junket Man’ and the staccato edginess of ‘iEyes’.  The former contrasts relaxed verses with a tense chorus, while Patlansky dashes off a – technical term coming up – widdly guitar solo with ease.  The latter casts a withering eye on the phenomenon of people taking in the world through their phone screens, the distorted vocals suggesting the unnatural filter they’re surrendering to.

But Patlansky is just as good when taking a breather from the hard-hitting approach of these tracks.  ‘Mayday’ is slower, more mellow, with keys contributions that add delicacy.  Patlansky’s guitar sparkles, and the verses have a dreamy quality that call to mind his Floyd influences.  Maybe it could be leavened with a middle eight of some kind, but it’s indicative of the different shots he could have in his locker.

If ‘Mayday’ has a hint of prog about it, ‘Judge A Man’ gets back to basics, with a patient slow blues on which Patlansky goes all Albert King on an excellent extended solo.  Better still though is ‘My Dear Boy’, on which he contemplates his young son’s future in a manner that’s both reflective and positive, carrying an openness to possibility.  It’s a simple and lovely tune, propelled by some breezy strumming of an effortlessly Hendrixy variety.

The scary thing is that I reckon Patlansky still has untapped potential.  I find myself pondering where he could take the proggier influences he’s described in interview.  If he had someone like Steven Wilson in the producer’s chair, what far horizons could he explore with a couple of tricky time signatures and a sinuous rhythm section?

But never mind my leaps of whimsy.  Perfection Kills confirms that Dan Patlansky is a big hitter.  He can deliver big riffs with a modern twist to them.  He’s as expressive a lead player as you could find, when he puts his mind to it.  And while a couple of tracks here may lag behind the rest, more and more he shows capability as an imaginative songwriter, whether with the challenging social commentary of ‘Too Far Gone’ or the delicacy of songs like ‘Mayday’ and ‘My Dear Boy’.  If there’s a New Wave of Classic Rock rolling in, then Dan Patlansky is surfing it.

Read the exclusive interview with Dan Patlansky here.

Perfection Kills is released on 2 February.

Dan Patlansky tours the UK in March, supported by Mollie Marriott.

Man On Fire - Dan Patlansky talks to Blues Enthused

For a guy whose songs sometimes encompass stiletto-like social commentary, and who has just endured a roadwork-prolonged journey from Glasgow to Bristol when we catch up with each other on the phone, Dan Patlansky is sounding remarkably chipper.

Just as well it’s a night off in the course of his autumn UK tour supporting Joanne Shaw Taylor though.  Welcome to Britain, the land of the traffic cone, I observe.

“It was a wee bit of a drive,” the South African blues rocker chuckles.  “But we got here in one piece, and that’s all that counts.”

The purpose of this call isn’t to have a very British conversation about road works and traffic though, but to look ahead. On February 2 Patlansky releases his latest album, Perfection Kills, to be followed by a 6 date headlining tour of the UK in March.

Dan Patlansky - he likes that Strat you know!

Pic by Allan Jones

Patlansky has a habit of coming with intriguing album titles – Dear Silence Thieves, Introvertigo, and now Perfection Kills.  So where did the latest one come from?

“Well you know, I’ve done quite a few albums, and sometimes I find that pursuit of perfection in the studio, in the recording, sometimes you engineer the magic out of it,” he says, “because you polish the magic out a little bit too much. So I’ve always kind of tried to stay away from that, and keep that live spark and energy that always exists in the live performance, and try and capture that on the album.  And you know sometimes, leaving mistakes on the record, and glitches, that’s often sometimes where the magic is – there’s something special about that.”

After the Wish You Were Here-like burning man on the cover of Introvertigo, the cover of Perfection Kills is similarly thought-provoking, featuring a family sitting in a dowdy sitting room – but dad is an old-fashioned pipe smoker, mum is a bald mannekin, and the young girl is wearing a gas mask.  What was the thinking with that, I ask. 

“Well I think that’s a different take on ‘perfection kills’,” Dan responds.  “It’s almost like a family where the mother’s like, too perfect, and strives for perfection, and the little girl can’t breathe, that’s why she’s got the gas mask on.  And you know, the old man is just bleak as hell!” he says with a laugh.  “He’s kind of lost the will to live a little bit.”

As I noted at the start of this piece, lyrically Patlansky sometimes tackles quite hard-hitting subjects, as with ‘Sonova Faith’ and ‘Western Decay’ on Introvertigo.  On this album ‘Johnny’ talks about the impact of a difficult childhood on the grown man, and ‘Too Far Gone’ is a rather dystopian state-of-the-world piece.  So does Patlansky deliberately like to

Perfection Kills - it's never like this in the sofa ads

bring some edge to what he writes, or is it just what bubbles to the surface?

“Yeah, I mean it’s kinda like social commentary, or things I’ve seen.  Often what I write about is the stuff that, like, just annoys me at that moment, I suppose!” he laughs.  “And what better platform to moan than a song?  But yeah, I used to write lyrics that were far more, I suppose, clichéd blues type of things, and I always thought that was a bit disingenuous because, you know, I don’t work in a cotton field like those old guys used to.  That was their life.  So I thought I had to write stuff that was more relevant to my life, and social commentary’s one of my favourite things to write about – about stuff that annoys me!”

Another example is the song ‘iEyes’, which talks about people living their lives through screens nowadays.  I ask him if he’s aware of that at gigs – of people filming the band on their phones for minutes on end rather than watching them live, as it were?

“Yeah,” he confirms.  “Actually the first thing that came to mind when I wrote that song was, we went to play at a venue in London, and it was a sold out venue, and I actually looked up at one point in the middle of a song, and it was like 200 cell phones in the air.  And I thought to myself, you know, the definition is way better with your eyes than with your cell phone!  It was a very, very strange thing to see.”

Even stranger in a way to an old codger like me, as it’s a completely about turn from when I was young and going to gigs, and you weren’t allowed cameras into the venue.

Patlansky is something of an oddity on the British and European scene, with his South African background.  But maybe that helps him to offer something distinctive.

Does being based in South Africa give him a perspective that helps him to find a fresh take on things, I wonder?  I imagine even in terms of metaphors and slang there might be a different vocabulary for him to tap into.

“It definitely does,” he says.  “South Africa is quite westernised these days, and also at one point was a British colony.  So there are a lot of similarities between South Africa and the UK, in certain aspects.  But obviously it’s a very different world now, and a very different place to live, with different problems and a different lifestyle.  So I definitely think it lends itself to a unique kind of songwriting if you’re basing your songs off stuff from back there.”

Patlansky has spoken about trying to make this album sound more akin to how the songs will come across live, and it sounds to me that’s he’s brought more of an edge to his vocals on some tracks, like ‘Dog Day’ and ‘Too Far Gone’.   Was that something he was conscious of?

“I don’t know if it was necessarily conscious, I think it was more like the song suggested a certain thing, and you kind of automatically or naturally go in that direction.  So I must say, it wasn’t a conscious thing, but it kind of definitely ended up that way.”

Patlansky goes for the Rage Against The Machine vibe

Pic by Anthony May

Patlansky doesn’t strike me as being your typical, mainstream blues rock guy, I suggest, so I’m intrigued to hear who really influenced your musical direction.

“I mean obviously a big portion of those guys are the blues rock guys,” he says, starting off with the more obvious names.  “Like Hendrix was a big influence, Stevie Ray Vaughan was a big influence.  But you know, all the old blues guys like BB King and Albert King and all those guys.”  Then he starts to get into different territory.  “But also, on the other hand, one of my biggest influences is David Gilmour from Pink Floyd, and Pink Floyd in general has been a massive influence and still probably remains one of my favourite bands.”  And never mind the guitar work, it occurs to me later, but maybe the Floyd’s penchant for angsty social commentary seeped into his consciousness.

“But you know,” he continues, “I’m influenced also by guys like Steven Wilson, who’s a modern kinda prog guy I’m a big fan of.  Even guys like Beck, who are completely outside the blues genre, but I think he’s a fantastic songwriter more than anything.  Then there’s all sorts of soul guys, like Ray Charles, and jazz guys like Jaco Pastorius, and Charlie Parker, and Oscar Peterson.  So I think it’s quite a wide range of influences, that I always try and kind of mix together to try and get something slightly more unique in the world of blues rock, song wise that is.”

That doesn’t strike me as the whole caboodle though.  I note that when he starts to get heavy, as on ‘Backbite’ from Dear Silence Thieves, or ‘Dog Day’ from the new album, there’s a seriously hard-edged funk undertow to things.

“Yeah, that’s like, I’m a big Audioslave fan, and a Rage Against The Machine fan, and I just thought they were fantastic riff writers.”  He ponders for a second.  “And also, you know, Zeppelin – I know that’s nowhere near as heavy as those bands, but Zeppelin were the original rock’n’roll riff writer guys for me, and that was a massive influence too.  So maybe a bit of that kind of influence came through on those slightly harder songs.”

Patlansky first made a serious impact in Britain and Europe with the release of Dear Silence Thieves in 2015.  But he’d released six albums before that, going back to 1999.  How was he developing during that period?

“Well I started out as a very traditional blues artist, like doing straight down the line blues, 12 bar blues type of stuff, which I still love listening to and still love playing on occasion.  And you know over the years I kind of really wanted to get into the songwriting side of things, and try to not just express through guitar playing and singing, but also writing music and trying to express through the song itself.  So the focus shifted far more to the songs, and try to get the song right first and then worry about the playing and the performance of it.  So I think that’s been the biggest shift and change.”

We have a bit of a laugh as I observe that his website, and some of his PR material, give the erroneous impression that these earlier albums were largely acoustic in style, even though the cover pictures generally feature him wielding an electric guitar.  Speaking of which, the guitar he’s always pictured with is a pretty beat-up looking Strat – it’s almost worthy of Rory Gallagher.

“Yeah, I’ve had that guitar since the year 2000.  The guitar is a 1962 Strat, so pretty much the same year as Rory’s – I think Rory’s guitar was a ’61.  And yeah, I’ve played that guitar almost exclusively for the last 17 years, and it’s really taken a beating on the road.  And it’s been everywhere with me, it’s virtually done every live show I’ve ever played.  It’s been to every country I’ve ever been to, it’s been thrown around in airports, and on the stage, and dropped - it really has taken a beating.  But it’s a Strat, and fortunately they’re quite strong.”

Dan Patlansky gets ready to cast a spell

Even so, I’m thinking, I’ve seen numerous stories of guitarists retrieving their instruments after flights and finding them damaged.  Does he worry about baggage handlers getting their mitts on it?

“Very worried.  I’ve actually got a super strength flight case for it, and even with that I still kind of have heart attacks every time I arrive on the other side, hoping that my guitar is going to come out in one piece.”

No Bonamassa-like guitar nerd, the Stratocaster is Patlansky’s essential weapon of choice.

“Yes, definitely,” he agrees.  “I use that in the studio, I use that live.  I’m the type of person that’ll really relax with one guitar, and really know the guitar, know the way it sounds, know the way it plays, and it really feels kind of second nature.  So that’s really why I love the ‘one guitar’ kind of thing.”

Now this is interesting, I think, because Patlansky has gained a reputation as a bit of a guitar sorcerer.  Does that mean he has to use effects to stretch himself and bring variety to his sound?  He demurs a bit, saying that he’s actually got a fairly small effects board.

“But for me,” he explains, “if you know a guitar well enough, there’s ways of getting different textures and tones out of a guitar without using effects pedals – more like the way you play the guitar, the techniques you use on the guitar that I’m trying to work on.  So that’s pretty much the way that I try to keep things interesting, tone-wise and texture-wise.  It’s just try and experiment with the guitar, and play it differently, and set it a little bit differently, and then see what happens.  And it’s crazy how some unique stuff can come through."

From previous comments he’s made, and even the notion of Introvertigo, Patlansky has given the impression that he’s something of a reflective guy, happy in his own company.

“Definitely, at heart I think I’m an introvert,” he agrees, before anticipating the next question.  “In a way I know it seems like a silly career choice being a musician if you don’t like crowds of people, but I think performing on stage and being in a shopping mall is a very different thing!”  Or as he puts it later, “Having to make conversations about the weather with strange

"Don't talk to me about the weather!"

family members, or something like that – that really kind of kills me.  I tend to recharge when I’m on my own, and there’s a little bit of peace and quiet.  So I guess I do really shy away from, like, chaos.”

Nowadays though, artists like Patlansky are very much expected to be accessible to their audience offstage.  I recall seeing him supporting King King in Glasgow back in 2016, and talking to a long queue of people after his set.  It must be demanding, coming off stage and having to do all that chat, I imagine.

“It is in a way,” he admits.  “But at the same time it’s – if I feel like I’ve had a difficult show, or a bad show, then it’s like a lot of hard work.  But if you’ve had an alright show I actually find it alright, because it’s not for too long, it’s half an hour or 40 minutes, and you get generally honest feedback on what people thought of the show, and that’s always good to hear and take to heart.”

Well, I suggest, if they’re bothering to speak to you it’s probably because they’ve liked you.  And Dan Patlansky laughs, as he often does.

For all that he likes to write edgy songs, and is also capable of striking awe into axe worshippers, Patlansky comes across as a rather self-deprecating guy.  That picture on the cover of Introvertigo, of a burning man sticking his head in the ground, may just be an exotic way laughing at himself banging his head against the wall on occasions.

There’s a Facebook group out there nowadays dedicated to the ‘New Wave Of Classic Rock’.  With his innovative guitar playing, punchy and distinctive sound, and intelligent lyrics, Dan Patlansky has got all the tools to surf that wave.  Perfection may kill, but class will tell.

Read the Blues Enthused review of Perfection Kills here.