THE GREAT KAT and Beethoven – as I first heard of that by a newsletter I simply deleted the e-mail. I did so the next 7 times, until I took some time and visited the homepage. Honestly, the homepage is very ugly and totally overloaded with content. I really didn’t have a clue about this was about. But I kept on going and after a while I noticed that THE GREAT KAT is a female violinist who also plays guitar.
But she is more than a guitarist. Based on Paginis (*1742, died 1840) techniques she managed it to play both, violin and guitar on a very, very high speed level. And now she banned her talent on a DVD.
And its good that she did. The whole DVD is very short, maybe 20 minutes. I put the DVD in and – up and down, up and down – the great Kat is completly insane. She is penetrating her guitar like a true maniac. I never saw such a guitar play before and I think I will never see it again. Incredible technique!
When listening a bit more in detail, you can hear not only one guitar, but also violin (besides drums, bass of course). The great Kat managed to play guitar at the highest speed possible (at least for now) AND playing the second voice in violin. I really thought that nothing else that guitar shredding will be heard, but actually these are complete songs in a complete line-up. And she is precise like a clock (I mean an atom-clock here). That beeing said, the great kat is maybe one of the best guitar plays on this globe. Her technique is incredible, shows years of practicing and cannot be copied by most of the guitarist out there.
I enjoyed the technical shredding very much. But there are also contras for this music. The stuff on this DVD feels more like a presentation of finger techniques than a real release in the “metal sense”. Thats a pretty good minus, because songs like BLOOD or ISLAMOFASCIST are definitly worth hearing. Those songs are not partitures from classical componist (well, maybe I don’t know them, but I am pretty sure) but come from the feather of Kat herself. The two could be a mix of hardcore and grindcore with unbeatable guitarwork. Kat would really have the chance to give grindcore a totally different face.
But honestly – I would prefer to have a complete album in the way of speed metal. Think on a faster riffing than on EXODUS – BONDED BY BLOOD. Wouldn’t that be great? Please Kat, go on and build up a real band! A bit less shredding and you are into play. Probably every professional band on this planet would like to have you as a lead guitarist.
But back to the DVD. For my taste, there is too much cliche. So much inverted crosses, blood, insects, brutality and so on. It obvious that one need a good sense of humour, because it doesn’t feel “serious”. To be honest, this cliche is maybe one of her trademarks, but would have prevented me from buying this. The days of VENOM are over, but THE GREAT KAT is the perfect continuation to that band.
I am also not sure if the drums and the bass guitar you are hearing on the video are really played by humans. The instruments are more than usual mixed into the background which gives more space to the (still incredible) guitars. Its good to hear the fine work of master Kat. But it also makes one feel that drums are a bit dry and mechanic. The small parts on the video showed me, that the man on the video is playing other stuff than the actuall drummer did – but that might be because of the synchronisation. I will pass this through because I think its very difficult to get a perfect sync at this extreme speed.
All the videos look like done with stage actors, not musicians. The “band” is usually totally hidden behind masks and obviously does only have some kind of siderole. As already said, I really would like to see Kat in a true band. Or live in a classical orchestra.
Whereever Kat develops, I will have an eye on her now. What she did is of interest for each metal-guitarist out there. Every guitar hero fan can enjoy watching this. But this is – in my eyes – some kind of demo and now I am waiting for the real release with real songs and a real band. And finally – if that is possible with that speed – a real tour. If she does that, she probalby doesn’t need all that cliche stuff 
However: one of the best guitarist on this planet. Recommend buy for guitar fetishists.
Offical The great Kat Website
