MUSIC REVIEW : He of Few Words, ‘Tumeni Notes’ Wows Faithful

Minutes before facing a crowd of 300 guitar-mongers Monday night, Steve Morse stood backstage at Sound FX, fixedly practicing on a custom-made, nylon-string guitar. Dave Larue and Van Romaine--bassist and drummer, respectively, in the Steve Morse Band--idled about, conserving energy. At the suggestion that the band’s instrumental “Sleaze Factor” should be dedicated to the Bush reelection campaign, Morse suddenly brightened.

“I saw (Bill) Clinton on C-Span the other day, and he was giving a speech at the Grand Ole Opry,” Morse said. “He talked for a long time about a lot of things and made some really good points--with no note cards or anything! It was pretty impressive.”

It seemed fitting that Morse should be taken with off-the-cuff virtuosity. The product of the University of Miami’s famed music department is a member in good standing of the guitar-god pantheon--a loosely defined clique of electric string-benders whose sacraments are protean technique, impossible speed and idiomatic versatility.

Morse, erstwhile leader of the 1970s-’80s progressive-rock band the Dregs (ne Dixie Dregs), might lack the flash of a Joe Satriani or the disciplined, pristine tunefulness of an Eric Johnson. Nevertheless, his gritty mix of ‘70s-style fusion, speed-metal, neoclassical and Southern rock deservedly has earned Morse an avid following.

The covenant between guitar heroes and their fans is a simple one and rules the concert format: The performer gives a comprehensive exhibition of his wares, and the audience gets a fix of virtuosic string play. No dancers, no elaborate light shows, no flash pots or fog machines. Nothing to distract from that esoteric exchange.

Guitarists with a low hunk quotient, like Morse, generally attract the serious musicos--guys who subscribe to Guitar Player magazine and can tell you the type of strings a player uses. Consequently, it was a mostly male audience that sat in wait for Morse on Monday night. Or, as one wag associated with the club put it, it was “male-bonding night” at Sound FX. In his nearly two-hour set, Morse gave the bonders much to cheer.

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The Morse trio set a no-nonsense pace for the show by opening with “User Friendly” from its current album, “Coast to Coast.” It’s the kind of hyperkinetic tune you want handy when you’re alone on the interstate and feel like hitting the pedal and the volume knob. Morse was already in mid-concert form, and the crowd gave its boisterous blessing.

On the stately “Vista Grande,” from last year’s “Southern Steel” album, Morse deftly alternated between lightly picked, chiming harmonics in the tune’s quiet passages and siren-like melodies in the hotter spots. Tasteful execution made the otherwise dramatic dynamic shifts seem natural and not contrived. “Twiggs Approved,” from the Dregs’ 1980 opus, “Dregs of the Earth,” had Morse fitting visceral riffs and fisted chordings around a stomping, mid-tempo rhythm.

In just three selections, Morse had demonstrated a clear grasp of pacing and context. Even digital wizardry can lose its zip if it isn’t grounded in varying textures and contrasting tempos. Already, Morse had proven himself equal to the challenge of adapting his technical prowess to different modes of expression, and the crowd responded accordingly. It was time for Morse to speak, and he gently poked fun at the music-nerd hipness of his natural constituency.

“We couldn’t get our vocal harmonies right during the mix, so the rest of the show will be all-instrumental,” he joked, eliciting laughs with a reference to a repertoire that is nothing but instrumental. “This is the last gig of our tour,” he continued, “so if you find yourself wondering at some point, ‘Why did he play a G-sharp over G-natural?’ it’s ‘cause it’s our last concert for a while.”

Morse added that this would be his only official oral interaction with the crowd, then proceeded to show why words were superfluous with an engrossing read of “Highland Wedding,” from his 1989 album, “High Tension Wires.” The piece began slow, the plaintiveness of its Celtic-flavored melody subtly augmented by sampled orchestration, courtesy of Morse’s MIDI-equipped guitar. Morse then lifted the quasi-Scottish tune into an exhilarating mountain storm of bagpipe-ish lines and reel-ish rhythms.

The set continued to build in stylistic breadth and intensity. In the middle of the new album’s frenetic “Collateral Damage”--sort of the fusion equivalent of speed-metal--Morse’s solo took off as though launched from a careening vehicle.

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On the ballad “Night Meets Light,” he began with dulcet picking against pastoral harmonies, and later employed a combination of keen touch and a volume pedal to approximate a pedal-steel guitar. He lived up to the tongue-in-cheek title of “Tumeni Notes” by unleashing a prolonged, Uzi-like spray of 32nd-notes.

At a juncture where the electric onslaught might have caused ear weariness in even the staunchest fan, Morse wisely changed course. Playing the nylon-string guitar, he performed two neoclassical duets with bassist Larue. “Little Kids” and the new release’s “Flat Baroque” showcased Morse’s ability to breathe modern life into 18th-Century guitar styles while retaining their elegant complexity.

Resuming speed on electric ax, Morse spit out tough lines between the fitful starts and stops of “Ice Cakes,” raised the roof with tour de force country picking with the Albert Lee-ish “Runaway Train,” and finished with a rush on “Cruise Missile” from his 1984 solo album, “The Introduction.”

The Morse band encored with the new album’s “Morning Rush Hour” and a rapid-fire medley of musical quotes from other artists’ tunes (including “Mississippi Queen,” “Gimme Some Lovin’,” “Summertime Blues,” “My Sharona” and “Free Bird”). It seemed an appropriately playful way to let off any leftover steam, while taking the starch out of what otherwise was a clinic in serious guitar methodology.

But Morse drew the biggest roar of the night with his final announcement: He and the Dregs--including keyboardist T Lavitz, who opened the show--are reuniting for a tour this fall and expect to pass through San Diego sometime in November.