STATIONARY TRAVELLER

It took me a long while to listen to this album, since it came after a disaster called The Single Factor. But I´ve decided to give Camel another shot since their 90´s output was good enough to restore my faith in the band (or should I say faith in Andrew Latimer, the sole original member and owner of the whole project since 1982). 1981´s Nude was a fairly nice surprise and Stationary Traveller was not bad at all either, although, again, it is quite different from most of what Camel was doing in the 70´s.

If you like good pop/new wave/techno stuff, you´ll love this album from start to finish. The songwriting here is everything that The Single Factor collection lacks: good melodies, good hooks, interesting lyrics. Vapors for exemple is a very dark and powerful track that would fit nice on any of the best Depeche Mode LPs. The rocking Cloak And dagger (with APP´s Chris Rainbow on vocals) would make a strong Alan Parsons Project tune. And so it goes: Fingerprints and West Berlin are also very good.

On the other hand, if you´re looking for prog stuff, then you´ll find at least 3 fine instrumentals like the excellent title track (the CD´s best, IMO), Pressure Points and, in a lesser extent, Missing. The ending solo of The Long Goodbye is also very good, but I found the tune itself a bit too mellow (again the shadow of the Alan Parsons Project is quite obvious).

Stationary Traveller would be Camel´s final studio album for the rest of the 80´s. Latimer would be fighting a bitter legal battle against the band´s former manager( which, fortunatly, he won) and could not concentrate enough into his music. But eventually he came back with a string of very good albums in the next decade. But this album hinted some of the fine stuff that would appear in future releases. My rating? this is definitly a good album, charming, but a bit uncharacteristic. Unlike some of CAmel´s late 70´s/early 80´s output. Stationary Traveller has no bad tracks. Even if the majority is more pop than prog, they are still very good songs. Maybe not enough to make it essential, but still above average. 3,5 stars.