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The highlight is of course their excellent hit "Hold Your Head Up", which features a fantastic and heavy keyboards solo which is just fabulous. This extended version is on par with the greatest "Heep" or "Atomic Rooster" ones.

The funky rhythms are back with "Tragedy": it could have been featured on their second opus. Great bass and organ play, but vocals are quite annoying. It is a pity because if you'd take "I Am The Dance Of Ages" vocals here are quite decent and the hypnotic beat is a real killer. One of my fave.

Of course, some songs from a band like "Argent" were just milk and honey for me, since I was quite keen on such music (and alike) in those days. The band had of course much less exposure than the big ones (or legendary ones), but it is really worth investigating for younger generations. If you enjoy these heavy organ sounds, "Argent" is for you (as "Atomic Rooster" of course).

Good old rock'n'roll is not forgotten. No less than two revival tracks are available: "Keep On Rollin" (indeed) and "He's A Dynamo". Maybe not the best songs from the album though.

The central part of this work is the epic "Pure Love". Some imposing church oriented keys to start with, more bombastic ones to follow. The world of Emerson is wide opened. But Rod Argent is rather alone to entertain us. I would have hoped some more contribution from his band mates. This prog intro is followed with some bluesy and vocal parts later on during the "Pure love" section which sounds rather flat to be honest.

Even if he wasn't a member of "Argent" (he used to play in "The Zombies"), the work of Chris White is truly fundamental in the song writing: five out of seven tracks are co-written with Rod Argent (he is also mostly influent on other "Argent" releases).

The last CD version (1997) features no less than seven bonus tracks (good for thirty minutes of music). Some tracks being from earlier releases ("Celebration" or "Rejoice") other ones being released later on ("God Gave Rock'n'Roll" or "Christmas For Free").

Some unreleased studio album tracks like the psychedelic "Kingdom", the profoundly "Free" oriented "Closer To Heaven" (written by Ballard) or the second part of "It's Only Money" are worthwhile and welcome. They don't raise the level of this album which I would rate with three stars. A solid heavy rock album.

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