BEFORE I FORGET

Jon Lord's Before I Forget is definitely not an album that shows Jon Lord's great songwriting neither his amazing Hammond-Organ playing. This seems more of a side-project of Whitesnake members excluding David Coverdale and Micky Moody, which unfortunately was head-lined saying it was a Jon Lord solo record.

In 1982, Jon Lord was working with Whitesnake with their 5th release, Saints & Sinners, a very un-inspired record, which by the way Jon Lord's presence in Whitesnake had diminished with each release. He would leave 2 years laters after recording the semi-metal record, Slide It In, which there he would re-join with the classic MK 2 of Deep Purple for their ''come-back'' album, Perfect Strangers.

In Whitesnake, Jon Lord had like a ''guest'' role rather than an actual contributor to the band like he was in Deep Purple. Also, his Organ use was less frequent, experimenting with varied keyboards, specially the synths. Well this album, is like a Whitesnake one of the 70's, just that this time the main contributor is Jon Lord, rather than Micky Moody, Bernie Marsden and David Coverdale, which by the way, Bernie Marsden, Neil Murray and Ian Paice which were playing with Jon in Whitesnake, participate here. The tunes:

'Whitesnake-cliche': The opener, Chance on a Feeling, is definitely in the style of 70's Whitesnake. It's similar to the song Walkin' in the Shadow of the Blues, just a bit more up-lifting and more poppy, which is certainly not something Jon Lord fans would like, nonetheless I'm a big fan of 70's Whitesnake, thus I find this song worthwhile, with it's hammond-organ solo and great power.

Hollywood Rock & Roll is another one in the style of Whitesnake, with it's groovy rythm and soulful mood. The female backing vocals are a bit cheesy which shouldn't have been necessary, but nevermind, it's catchy and features the classic Bernie Marsden guitar-style.

Going Home is the last of the Whitesnake-style series. A extremely cheerful song, with a similar riff to the opener, but this one is instrumental and features a wonderful melodic synth leading the whole up-lifting mood. The track also features a typical organ solo, which was missing in this album, quite good in the style of Time to Kill in The Battle Rages On. The track is probably the highlight from this record, which it's not saying much.

'Classical inspired': Tender Babes is one of them, which reminds me A LOT of ELP classical adaptions, which are really not my cup-of-tea at all! Still the instrumental features a great organ solo, but to be sincere I really skip this one. Classical adaptions that are too tied up to the classical leanings, like Toccatta by ELP, really annoy me. Though you may enjoy it, if you're one of those Prog fans who enjoy these type of adaptions.

Bach on to This besides featuring the name Bach in the track, there's a lot classical leanings through the organ. But the playing is really interesting in this one compared to Tener Babes, there's a lot of time changes, in which the organ is the one constantly changing of mood and tempo, which is really excellent. Alongside Going Home, this is the other worthy track from Before I Forget.

The rest of the songs are gentle piano tunes, which really don't feature any interest, unless you're a slow-tempo song lover led by a simple piano, this is really boredom. With the possible exception of the title track which features a nice mood and some development, rather than a dull piano playing.

To finalise this review, I must say that this is definitely not for fans of Jon's fierceful hammond playing, nor for fans of his jaw-dropping classical mixed with rock compositions. This is a SIMPLE record for Jon Lord standards, it's enjoyable to some extent, featuring only two well accomplished compositions. The rest is playful music, but NOT Jon Lord style of compositions nor playing. Also, the combination of AOR, then classical sort-of ''adaptions'', and gentle piano tunes, is badly connected, which makes this album feel like a compilation of a bit of all.

2 stars. Fans of early Whitesnake, like me, will find some worthy stuff.

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