Vai blends the most beautiful styles of Rock, Pop, Techno, Classical, and oriental music to create one mind-shattering album. From the first song, (The Blood and Tears), he has you enthralled with his imaculate handling of his guitar. A must have for all guitar finatics, whether it be metal or classical. Steve Vai is definately one of the genius musicians of our time. this student of Frank Zappa is a marvel for all. CHECK IT OUT! most recomended album by Vai is Passion and Warfare, but this has to be a close second.

If you see The Ultra Zone Tour you'll want the CD to remind you where Vai took you. If you miss the tour you'll want know where you could have gone. Track 2 drapes Vai in leather trenchcoat and night vision goggles, which is exactly how you'll find him on tour.Get this one if you want to be stretched =o)

Steve's new effort has no emotion. His tribute to Frank Zappa is favorable, yet his now infamous #7 track (You know, the one that is supposed to be his most passionate and beautifully played?) reflected a talented man going through the motions. Sorry Steve, this album is full of licks I've heard from you many times before. Oh, by the way, you need to ditch the vocals. Jeff Beck can't sing either, but at least he was smart enough to "shut up and play his guitar". You have the talent to become the greatest guitarist ever, now get to work and take your music forward. If someone wants to hear quality Steve Vai, they should try Passion and Warfare, the first half and last song on the second half of Fire Garden, and Alien Love Secrets.

First, I'm a big fan of Steve's music. But this recording makes very little sense. The first five songs range from good to great. Then the last eight songs range from bad to confusing to dreadful. I can't understand how such a fantastic musician, with such great feeling, and depth of emotion can create such a mess. He has the skills!! I have most of Steve's recordings, and this stands out as a near disaster. Mostly disapointing.

The opener "Blood & Tears" is a moving, brilliant piece of music altering between delicate Indian vocals and Steve's masterful chops and - extraordinary enough - restrained play. "I'll Be Around" catches some of the atmosphere of "Sex&Religion" album. It has a pleasant tune but would be performed better by a guy like Devin Townsend on vocals instead of Steve. The rest of the tracks is stuffed with futile gimmicks making it a boasting demontration in musical craftmanship ending in itself. Vai becomes a slave of his own musical talent. Playing at least a dozen different chords in two seconds is no proof for making good rock music. Sorry, Stevie, try again once more. I know you can do MUCH better.

I loved Vai's work twenty years ago, so I decided to pick up a newer album of his to see how it was. Vai had a way of making a guitar really sing in some melody but he could also rip out the metal type jams when he had to. This album seems not like any guitar album I have heard. It is a strange, ambient and oriental type of sound that again, does not sound like a guitar, or Vai himself was even around. Maybe it is just an experimental kind of album, but goodness what happened to some structure? This is not even noodling, some of this is like someone left the answering machine on and then let their five-year-old pound on multiple levels of xylophones with sticks. Some may think this is a masterpiece but my opinion is that it is an experimental album that tries to hard to come up with innovative sounds. In the meantime, where is the guitar?