THE JEWEL

In one of my former reviews of Pendragon (one of the nineties albums) I stated that the road Nick Barrett took in the nineties with The World was the right one. I said that because I like Pendragon in that decade a lot more than what the band did in the eighties. That goes for most eighties albums I have to say because I believe this one, The Jewel, is an exception. Not that it is a true masterpiece to me but it can keep up with the standard of The World and Window of Life in my opinion.

But in fact I have to be more specific about that because it's not the entire album that is truly impressive to me. There is quite a bit of quality difference between the songs on this album and therefore I will give ratings for each song.

1) Higher Circles: 3 stars 2) The Pleasure of Hope: 3 stars 3) Leviathan: 4 stars 4) Alaska: 4,5 stars 5) Circus: 3,5 stars 6) Oh Divineo: 4 stars 7) The Black Knight: 4,5 stars 8) Fly high fall far: 3 stars 9) Victims of life: 3,5 stars.

This means this is a combination of what Pendragon was like in the eighties on average and then we are talking about the 3 and 3,5 star tracks. Good but not significant at all. Alaska and The Black Knight however are the first signs that Pendragon (read: Barretts songwriting) is a band with great potential. I love these two tracks up till now for almost 15 years now so that means they stand the test of time and still belong to the better songs Pendragon has ever produced. The others are far less but still good enough to keep up the high rating of 4 stars for this album.