BEST LOCAL ROCK BAND

There exists art that stretches the descriptive reach of ink and paper. (Someone even came up with a saying, "Writing about music is like trying to dance to architecture.") John Salton has had the heart, soul, and gift to form incarnations under the Psycho moniker since 1984, releasing a number of killer recordings with various personnel, and serving as guitarist for singer-guitarist Charlie Pickett in other groups. Lately, life has hardly been coming up roses for the legendary guitar genius, a description not offered without deep consideration. The contretemps include severe illness that has the axe master (and, unknown to most, musicologist of extreme intellect) hanging on to survival. Also a rock legend, Pickett, who's jammed off-and-on with Salton for a quarter of a century, says his friend's six-string thaumaturgy can levitate an audience. Band managers, talent scouts, fellow musicians, and others have been witnessed atop bars and tables fighting for space in jam-packed clubs as Salton (accompanied by keyboard whiz Bill Ritchie, bassist Jill Kahn, and whatever drummer is working the beat at the time) scorches heaven and earth with his indelible and unique stylings. He'll shatter your freakin' skull and stick dead flowers in the empty eye sockets while flooding your ears with magisterial blood. You can smell the supremacy by listening to the latest Psycho CD, Snowflakes Falling on the International Dateline, but until you've seen John Salton play guitar live with his smashing sidepeople, you will continue to deny the existence of the supernatural.