3

"Round Goes the Gossip": this is a good song, starting this album with a bit of humour, with van Leer repeating "round goes the gossip" several times in the song. Like in the album "Moving Waves", the band starts this album with a song with a bit of humour.

"Love Remembered": the best song in this album, IMO. It has acoustic guitar, flute and synthesizer, with bass and drums in the background. I originally heard this song (with "Sylvia" too) in the first Mexican version of the "Moving Waves" album released here in 1973 (with "Janis" and "Le Clochard" being deleted in favour of "Sylvia" and "Love Remembered", which were their hits in Europe then). This song has some very good atmospheres and it is, with "Focus II" from the previous album, one of my favourites from this band. I remember than before listening to this song on albums, this song was used in a T.V. commercial in my country (but I can`t remember the product announced in the commercial!). Great song!

"Sylvia": another very good song, with the melody played by Akkerman in his electric guitar, plus very good organ arrangements and energetic bass guitar and drums.

"Carnival Fugue": it has several sections, even including a classical piano arrangement, until the "carnival music" is played with a bit of humour, including a flute.

"Focus III" and "Answers? Questions! Questions? Answers!":two instrumental musical pieces which are good, played one after the other, with "Questions..." starting with a melody played several times by the bass guitar. I previously listened to both songs in the "Live at the Rainbow" album. I prefer these studio versions.

"Anonymous Two ": a long instrumental musical piece which in the CD is not divided in two parts. It sounds to me like an extended improvisation which had some parts previously determined before playing it. The best part of this long piece is the drums solo. If other Prog bands did some "excesses" with their music, this is Focus`"excess in Prog music" in this album. The musical piece is too long and not very interesting in comparison to "Eruption" from the "Moving Waves" album. That song has better arrangements than this, and also includes a drums solo.

"Elspeth of Nottingham ": a very good instrumental musical piece played with acoustic guitar and flutes. It is one of the best from this album, very influenced by medieval music, I think.

"House of the King" wasn`t included in the CD, because it was more like a "filler" in the 2 L.P. set, being a song taken from their first album.

In conclusion, this album is good, but IMO, their "Moving Waves" album is better.

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