ISLANDS

The long opener "Formentera Lady" is a dull song (?), with no rythm nor flavour. Here and there some nice piano touch but globally it is boring to death. Sounds avant- garde / improv all the way through.

"Sailor's Tale" is pure jazz-rock essay in its first part. The second half though is far much better : mellotron comes in and the drumming is great. The finale is quite hectic and incoherent again.

To hear a bit of the intro from "The Letters", you have to turn your volume at the maximum. After 1'30", the cacophony wakes you up for about two minutes. Mel is then playing some good sax with a structureless backing band. The insipid vocal section at the end won't do much to save this track from misery I'm afraid.

"Ladies of the Road" is a jazz rock-opera on his own : mellow moments, tempo changes and good sax playing : not too bad a song but not very accessible for non KC fans.

"Prelude Song of the Gulls" is a very symphonic and wonderful track : by far the most melodious and bearable of the album (more in the vein of "In The Court"). Very nice break in this overall chaos and my preferred song here by far. Almost classical and peaceful music. Rather different from KC standards (that's probably why I like it).

The closing and longest number is also a good one : it starts promisingly with a good vocal and quiet intro. The overall ambience is really (too) soft (very much "Moonchild" oriented) and melodious.

I guess this song is perfect when you go to bed at night to fall asleep. The last four minutes are quite nice and symphonic and builts a bit crescendo (time to wake up) for about two minutes. Then you get a blank (for about a minute) then some noises for another minute. This song should have ended after 9'15" : it would have been a great one.

So, here and there some good (but no great) moments on this album, but too scarce. Mel Collins does an overall great job and increase the quality level substantially. Two stars.

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