Picked this up recently on vinyl and spinning it today. It's an excellent, well balanced album that wraps Morse's incredible guitar playing into more approachable compositions. This is actually my favorite Steve Morse solo record and it's extremely tasty and varied from start to finish. There are some excellent performances from guest stars including Peter Frampton and ex-Santana vocalist Alex Ligertwood on "Stand Up", Eric Johnson on "Distant Star" and Albert Lee on "Rockin' Guitars". I really like the vocal tracks and wish Morse had explored this vein a little more on his own with another "name" vocalist who could do his tunes justice. This is less of a guitarfest than his first album, but there are still some incendiary solos and plenty of wicked guitar tones throughout.
I picked up a mint original pressing on Elecktra for $4.99 and it's definitely worth it. Sounds better than the CD IMO with very crisp and clear production on most songs. A couple of the tunes seem more compressed than the others so I am guessing they were recorded at another [lower budget] studio.
Stand Up (1985)
1. Book Of Dreams
2. English Rancher
3. Rockin' Guitars
4. Distant Star
5. Pick Your Poison
6. Stand Up
7. Travels Of Marco Polo
8. Golden Quest
9. Unity Gain
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