For those that feel today’s guitar playing is bland or lacking creativity, born from (perhaps) looking at chart focused music, it’s great to present Mateus Asato. A young guitarist who has embraced exposure through social media, Mateus is the poster boy for many who want a fresh source of inspiration. From a technique perspective he can pretty much do the lot; blues licks, rock riffing and blazing shred lines just for starters. Where he has found the most fame and reverence though is with a clean electric guitar tone and a predominantly chord based vocabulary. While he didn’t invent it, he is a figurehead for the gospel-jazz-soul style of neo-soul that Simon Barnard has been presenting recently. This issue, Mateus is in the spotlight with soulful double-stops, cascading arpeggios and quick picking lines. It’s a rich palette of techniques and, like so much good music, embraces elements and players from the past which are then packaged with modern parameters. It makes for quite a heady brew of guitar brilliance. While he has been pretty quiet for 2021 except for a duo with Marty Friedman, we expect Mateus to return to the world of guitar in 2022. Before then, please enjoy the article on page 66.