TO OUR CHILDREN'S CHILDREN'S CHILDREN

I'm delighted to see how many reviewers have given this album five stars. Don't know yet which way I'll round my 4½ stars... I won't speculate how progressive The Moody Blues were, and for the large number of reviews I'll try to be short. This album is, at least to some degree, a conceptual one inspired by space exploration and the technical evolution of mankind. On the sharply rocking opener 'Higher and Higher' the band made up their own sound effect for a rocket, unsatisfied with the real thing by NASA. The song was written by Graeme Edge and the narrator's voice belongs to Mike Pinder. John Lodge's 'Eyes of a Child' has a very beautiful melody and the vocal harmonies are lovely as usual. Ray Thomas looks at space age from a more naive perspective in his sympathetic 'Floating', foillowed by the brief and edgier Pt. 2 of 'Eyes of a Child'. The instrumental 'Beyoand' is IMHO the worst track, it sounds terribly outdated in its psychedelia.

The B side is notably more coherent; each song, with the exception of Mike Pinder's average 'Sun Is Still Shining', is marvelous, full of the best Moody Blues magic. 'Gypsy', 'Eternity Road', 'Candle of Life', 'Watching and Waiting'.... Wow! This is a lovely album indeed, and so I'll give the full rate, despite some little marks of imperfection.