While this is mostly on the AOR side of the equation, it’s progressive rock. It’s a vintage recording reissued, so it is based in the classic era of prog. You might hear things ranging from Uriah Heep to Deep Purple, Vangelis, Vanilla Fudge and more on this. It’s a great example of Krautrock, really.
This review is available in book format (hardcover and paperback) in Music Street Journal: 2015 Volume 3 at lulu.com/strangesound.
Track by Track Review
Intro
The bulk of this instrumental is in the form of a keyboard solo. It reminds me of Vangelis and Kraftwerk at the same time. Percussion powers in further down the road and then the piece gets quite fast paced. This essentially moves into the next piece.
Welcome Continuing the same basic musical concepts at the start, eventually this works out to more powered up music. It reminds me of a proggier version of Uriah Heep from a musical point of view. The vocals are more rock oriented. There are some cool changes on this track. There is some killer guitar soloing in the instrumental section later in the piece. Then the keyboards take it on a killer journey, too. The two instruments counter each other in almost an extended call and response pattern.
Sunny Queen The first sections of this are alternating between mellower classic rock styled music and more rocking AOR stuff. After that all works through, though, it shifts out to a powered up jam with some great instrumental work. It’s melodic, soaring and explorative. Then, it shifts out a mellower instrumental movement from there.
Lovers I love the duet of male and female vocals on this. I’m also very much enamored with the mellow, vintage prog meets psychedelia sound here. As it powers out later into a killer organ solo, I’m reminded of acts like Deep Purple, Uriah Heep, Vanilla Fudge and more. This is definitely one of my favorite cuts here.
Drifting This is another highlight. It starts with folk prog, not far removed from the kind of thing Renaissance might do. It eventually it works out to more powered up stuff that has bits of fusion and more. The resolution movement is just so tasty and melodic. I absolutely love this song, too.
Disco Dry Eventhough this does have elements of disco, it’s also got plenty of proggy elements, too. There’s a percussion work out on this.
Watch Out More of an AOR prog meets soul and hippie music sound pervades this. This does have some tasty keyboard soloing.
