Felizardo’s material is the electric guitar, and it is not a fragile substance with which to create. It is malleable but the work exerted to bend its metallic wantonness to surrender is forceful. It reverberates with angry bellows and roars with dragon’s breath behind its demonic noise. Yet it is also gentle, tamed on Felizardo’s inspirations. Though they a kinder breed, theirs was a savagery not unlike Sede e Morte. Akin to Alan Sparhawk’s Solo Guitar (still waiting for a follow-up), Sede e Morte is a solitary breaking in of a bucking guitar. Those kicks to the chest, marked by a stubborn horseshoe into the flesh, is part of the loathing-before-loving. I’m sure it’s all Heathcliff and moors. But where Emily Bronte missed the heart of men, she unveiled the willingness of Men. And that’s Felizardo’s gift, to understand the path of grief into power. In the end we’re all on some sort of spiritual journey through arts and sciences. Once ensconced in glass cases, Felizardo’s sculptured beast has broken free and runs free through an album as powerful and majestic as the scenery it paints. The blank pedestal fresh, not yet covered in grass.
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