EVERY GOOD BOY DESERVES FAVOUR

Like many other Classic 7 Moodies albums, this one is uneven: some boring minor songs but also some absolutely gorgeous classic tracks. And (un)like on some others, the overall theme gets a bit lost on the way. I suppose it's some sort of presentation on the history of man (thus reminding of To Our Children's Children's Children). The near-instrumental opener 'Procession' has only words like creation, annihilation, pollution, which get repeated in 'One more Time to Live'. And 'You Can Never Go Home' is surely a metaphorical notion about the development. If the whole album was on that very creative level, it would be a masterpiece.

'The Story in Your Eyes' is one of the best rockers by Hayward. Ray Thomas offers two really weak songs, 'Our Guessing Game' and 'Nice to Be Here'. The naiive prettiness of the lyrics on the latter would be forgivable but the song is so poor. The drummer Graeme Edge has written a good solid rock song 'After You Came', proving that he can write a mature SONG instead of a pathetic presentation of a poem. John Lodge wrote the tender 'Emily's Song' for his daughter, and it's too sweet for my taste.

Apart from 'Nice to...' the B-side is fantastic. The two songs mentioned in my first paragraph are among my MB favourites. Not any other band in the world could have made them; Barclay James Harvest could have tried... Mike Pinder offers only one song this time, but what a song. 'My Song' is among his best, and the instrumental section starring Mellotron gets the listener deeper, deeper in his inner cosmic visions. If only there weren't so weak tracks too on this fine album...