ACQUIRING THE TASTE

Well, as the tabloids would say : "Phew, What A Scorcher!". I was totally astonished by, and besotted with, this album though I resisted the temptation to buy another GG album for 2 years - so I'm obviously not very bright! The love affair begins with that first four-note motif in "Pantagruel's Nativity" and then becomes more torrid, ( Ohh!, the harmonies! ) - it's another one of those Gentle Giant songs ( alongside "I Lost My Head", "Peel the Paint", "His Last Voyage" ) that I could happily listen to a 72-hour remix of. "The Edge of Twilight" and it's companion piece, "The Moon Is Down" are simply stunning, affecting, other-wordly ... while "Plain Truth" is a good rocker, crowned by Ray's wah-wah violin solo. I mean, people say this album is pretentious. Well, all art is pretentious isn't it? But does anybody heckle Leonardo over that pretentious chiaroscuro gimmick in the Mona Lisa?! Did anyone niggle Bach about why there had to be so many Golberg Variations?! This is, for me, the apotheosis of prog rock.