THE MOODY BLUES

OK, Track 1...Higher and Higher.... Yeah, I recognize this one. Good track. Energetic opener. Hayward jamming away under the spoken word lyrics. And the ascending chorus of "Higher....and Higher...and Higher!!" is cool.

Track 2.. Eyes of a Child....

Begins VERY softly. Acoustic guitar, mellotron and harmony vocals slowly crescendoing to the chorus. Sounds slightly familiar in the chorus. Would not be surprised to find that this had been a single release.

Goes straight into Track 3... Floating...

More up tempo....lol, would not sound out of place being sung by Peter, Paul and Mary....some of the chord changes really remind me of them. Nice track, some interesting drum accents by Greame Edge in the later portions of the song.

Now into Track 4...Eyes of a Child, 2...

More rocking than the first part...

Track 5...I Never Thought I'd Love to be a Hundred...

A very brief introspective acoustic ballad...nice song, but very short.

Track 6.... Beyond...

Starts out reminding me of "Peak Hour" from Days of Future Passed.... Nice John Lodge bass line....with Ray Thomas's flute...then a very different mellow section before returning to the original feel.... keeps fading in and out between the high tempo sections and the almost ambient Mike Ponder mellotron sections. A bit of an odd arrangement....then directly to...

Track 7....Out and In...

A quintessential mid-tempo Moody Blues track. Very heavy on the mellotron here. By the way, I am in a peaceful setting while listening, and this music fits well (I'll elaborate more later in a separate comment).

Track 8.... Gypsy...

A little harder rocking here, but still heavy on the acoustic guitar and mellotron. Pinder loved his mellotron...lol.... another signature Moody Blues sounding song here.

Track 9... Eternity Road....

I can see why the MBs were often treated almost like gurus who knew all the answers. The songs here have that sense of mysticism and "finding ones true self". This track fits that we'll... Hayward had a nice melodic harmonized guitar break in this one. Nice flute parts on the closing part of the song.

Track 9... Candle of Life....

Continuing the pattern of going from one song straight into the next...right along the same lines as the previous track...I mean the melody is different, but the feel is pretty much the same, along with the thematic lyrics.

Track 10...Sun is Still Shining....

Indian flavors here, some sitar in the mix.... The vocal phrasing reminds me of another MB song... Lovely to See You Again my Friend.... especially in the verses. Building a crescendo before it fades out at the end...into

Track 11...I Never Thought I'd Live to be a Million... Acoustic finger style.... echoing the similar track from earlier in the album...even shorter, I think.

Track 12... Watching and Waiting...

This title sounded familiar.... might have heard it before.... mellow ballad....this is a seriously chill album...

The rhythm and tempo pick up slightly about half way through, before coming back down again.

OVERALL IMPRESSIONS...

A pretty good album, quintessentially Moody Blues all around... however, after the big dramatic intro of Higher and Higher, it kind of settles into a lot of "sameness" as it goes along. No songs I didn't like, but got a slight bit boring towards the end for me...I think I'd give it 3.5 stars out of 5....

1. "Departure" (0:44) here we go again: a spoken word intro to an album means we're probably in for a Days of Future Passed-like adventure.

2. "Ride My See-Saw" (3:38) solid psychedelic rock music with the near-patented Moodies harmonized group vocals over the top. I must say that Justin Hayward's lead guitar is surprisingly good: aggressive and decisive. The vocal melodies are pretty engaging but its the tambourine and bass combination that get my attention. Well played, Graeme Edge. (8.875/10)

3. "Dr. Livingstone, I Presume?" (2:58) another band that feels compelled to imitate the almighty BEATLES, here a melancholy as-if disinterested "Yellow Submarine" like vocal and music. The chorus, at least, is original and highly alluring. Yes, We're all looking for someone. (8.875/10)

4. "House of Four Doors" (4:12) there's the Mellotron! Starting out with the choral vocals and then switching to single lead for part two of the verse is interesting. Graeme Edge's drumming has become very Ringo Starr-like. I love the anachronistic acoustic interlude at the end of the second minute, and then an even further dive into Baroqueness with the introduction of the harpsichord at the end of the third. The classical bombast in the first part of the fourth minute is a bit much--as if Liberace had just walked in. An interesting if ultimately weird and disjointed song. (8.875/10)

5. "Legend of a Mind" (6:36) Timothy Leary's dead? No, he's on the outside looking in! I guess this might tell us where the band might have been getting some of its psychedelic inspiration. The sound palette and engineering here is, fittingly, quite unusual with its partially muted parts. At the two-minute mark the motif shifts into something more trotting for the next installation of the story. Then there is a mediæval pastoral instrumental section with some Indian- like cello slides. An interesting and proggy song but nothing Earth-shattering or worth writing home about. (8.75/10)

6. "House of Four Doors, Pt. 2" (1:47) great orchestral opening with Mellotron and timpani and bass. Then the vocal choir returns to recant the main melody of song #4. (4.5/5)

7. "Voices in the Sky" (3:25) a very pleasant acoustic-oriented song that feels/sounds like a song from Justin Hayward's great 1975 BLUE JAYS release with John Lodge. Though nothing groundbreaking, this would make a good John Denver or Dave Mason song. (8.75/10)

8. "The Best Way to Travel" (3:14) fading in with multiple strumming acoustic guitars, once the bass, drums, and vocals arrive it feels all BEATLES. Again Graeme Edge's drumming is so Ringo Starr-like. At 1:04 the music suddenly cuts out leaving space for some doppler effect rapid pitch descents repeated over and over, spaciously, until the third minute when everybody returns to what they were doing before the "break"--with the slight addition of a rather annoying squeak repeating itself every second. (8.66667/10)

9. "Visions of Paradise" (4:15) flute and acoustic guitar picking open this one with some very pleasant chords and melodies. "Distant" voices join in at the 0:30 mark with sitar and banjo, singing its lyrics in another very pleasant melody that weaves harmonically with the other instruments. I like this very much; it sounds mature and sophisticated yet expresses itself with nice delicacy. Also, I love the growing confidence Justin Hayward exudes on the sitar as the song progresses. Exquisite flute playing, Ray Thomas. A top three song for me. (9.25/10)

10. "The Actor" (4:39) using flute and acoustic guitar picking again, the melodies here are ver yfamiliar as if they come from/were left over from their previous album, the classic Days of Future Passed. I especially like the fullness of the Mellotron-drenched choruses. Another top three song. (8.875/10)

11. "The Word" (0:48) a standard Moody Blues poetry reading, here by Mike Pinder, this time introducing a song. Powerful.

12. "Om" (5:44) Indian instrumentation here dominate as the band members take turns singing BEATLES-esque from different vantage points in the sonic field sounding a bit like "A Day in the Life." I love the sound of Indian instruments- -especially when played by native Indian musicians. 'Nuff said. Still, not many Western bands/musicians in the 1960s did as nice a job without the help/presence of Indian musicians as these guys do here. Great finish to this album. (9/10)

Total Time 42:00

B/four stars; an excellent addition of psychedelic acoustic-dominant early prog that rises above its tendencies toward Beatles imitation.

The sounds are a bit fuller, but their choice of fading in and out the songs into each other is appalling, because some songs sound abruptly cut. The sound of the album is a bit dense as well, and there is a recent "remix" version that tries to improve some things, but also loses some things, just to show how convoluted the sound of the album is. As for the songs, there is the mix of rockers, folkier, experimental, ballads. The album features a bit better songwriting than the predecessor, but the experimental and epic features are tamer (the surprise coming from Beyond, a experimental instrumental with amazing mellotron sounds composed surprisingly by Edge, who didn't compose anything but the poems before). The "core" of the album is Beyond, Out and In, Gypsy and Eternity Road. There are amazing mellotron sounds in all of these songs and they are all very strong, solid (Gypsy is even a minor success of the band) and Eternity Road shows a brief moment of the band jamming, which is very, very rare and interesting. The closing song, Watching and Waiting, is a superb ballad, one of the most beautiful Hayward performances, and finishes the album in a high note. It is also a bit nice to have a song with sitars and oriental influences, although the mellotron and cello make the song a forerunner of the distorted loudness wars songs.

Too bad that despite being a very pleasant album, it is less daring than the predecessors, and the convoluted and blurry sound with too many elements make the listening experience less interesting. Above all, the albums more or less puts Moodies back in the progressive rock evolution. They got too comfortable with the formula and never tried to push many boundaries.

A collection of run-of-the-mill tunes, with a mix of everything that was fashionable in the late sixties except from prog and not much psychedelic. We have some bits of blues, folk, beat, country, garage rock, soul. The flute and mellotron give a little flair for some tunes, but most of the arrangements are a bit shy even compared to Moody Blues standards. One of the best things in those songs is to see the talents of the underrated guitarist Justin Hayward moving between the most different styles with flawless execution.

Of course, it is not only that, because there is the latest suite, which is a great song with spoken word poem, this time over electronic sounds, a beautiful ballad and the amazing The Voyage, which is the most grandiose thing done by a band not augmented by orchestral arrangements. It is ironic that such amazing song is in one of their less daring albums. That would be a feature that would kinda repeat itself in all their latter albums, unfortunately.

WIth its ups and downs, it is still a great late 60s album.