YOUTUBE VIDEOS of 27-year-old Montreal guitarist Erik Mongrain, who plays with his acoustic in his lap, two-hand tapping his way through his instrumentals "AirTap!" and "Percusienfa" have made him an overnight sensation among guitarists and non-guitarists alike. But Mongrain is no one-trick pony. "I don't specialize in any particular technique or tuning," he says. "I want to taste everything I can."

Mongrain puts his money where his mouth is on his debut album, Fates (Prophase Music). He recorded most of th album with his guitar in the standard position, showcasing not only his virtuosic tapping but also a fingerpicking style that incorporates funky bass lines and explosive harmonics, and even some feisty flatpicking.
"I can get different textures, different rhytnms, diffrent colors," says Monrain, who uses numerous tunings, many of his own devising. "I even mix techniques within the same song - I'll tap the introduction, fingerpick the erse and then strum the chorus with a flatpick."

Mongrain first became interested in music when, at 14, he saw Nirvana play "Heart-Shaped Box" on television. After learning "every Nirvana, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Metallica and Jimi Hendrix song I could," he moved on, first to classical guitar and then steel-string acoustic. A compilation CD introduced him to contemporary fingerstyle masters Don Ross, Laurence Juber and others but his real epiphany came when he heard the playing of Michael Hedges. "I was busking on the street when somebody told me I had to check him out", say Mongrain. "I got a copy of Oracle, and within the seconds of hearing it I was in love."