IN THE CAN

With ''Small beginnings'' reaching Billoboard No.28 and ''Flash'' selling over 100,000 copies, Flash lived the momentum and visited Holland, Belgium and Germany, while they even traveled to North America for some gigs.They returned to the De Lane Lea Studios to record their second album, again with Derek Lawrence as the producer, but without Tony Kaye, this time the only keyboards to be heard in the album was Banks' ARP synthesizer.''In the can'' was released on Sovereign in November 1972.

With three long tracks clocking at over 10 minutes each and two longer pieces, Flash sounded even more progressive than on their debut.A keyboard-less version of YES actually, the music is based on Banks' relentless guitar efforts with the satisfying solos and tireless rhythm changes, backed up by a solid bass/drum duo and an irritating vocalist.As YES dit at the time, Flash'es material was based on shifting climates, unexpected breaks, polyphonic harmonies and a mixture of smoky and more laid-back rock executions, of course the absence of keyboards affects the album's limited dimensions at some point.But the biggest flaw of this new work was that music did not sound as inspired as on their debut, the quartet seems a bit lost in the labyrinth of instrumental tricks and the chaotic thematic variations, certainly some synth leaks and interesting, jazzy-spiced moves are of great interest, but the final result is not particularly memorable.No doubt the band was pretty talented, each isolated section is trully superb in terms of technique and skills, but the combination of all these ideas doesn't seem to work very well.Still Banks' plays reach a mginificent level at times, a true magician of the guitar.

Not as good as ''Flash''.It's complex, guitar-driven Prog Rock with minor jazzy colors, maybe too chaotic for its own good.If you love YES, and I am sure there are millions of people who do, this is still a decent album of adventurous musicianship.