NOMZAMO

The vinyls of the early IQ albums are becoming increasingly hard to find. After walking for over two hours on the latest record fair I had to settle for 'Nomzamo'. Whereas their most recent release 'Resistance' could be seen as the bands most ambitious and progressive effort, 'Nomzamo' from 1987 stands furthest away from it on those regards. Peter Nicholls had left te band and new vocalist Paul Meno stepped in. Genre spear-header Marillion had pulled off commercial succes with their poppy song 'Keyleigh' and the other neo-progressive groups followed suit. These days bands are harshly criticized for 'turning pop' in the eighties, but I guess it must have been crazy hard to not feel that pull of that particular decade - the eighties.

So how bad is Nomzamo actually, listening to it thirty years later?

Now this album caries the mark of 'average' in all most every discipline. The vocals by Paul Meno are charming in their own way and obviously influenced by 'The Lamb'-era Genesis (most notably on the opening track 'No Love Lost'). My main concerns are with the small pitch imperfections of his vocal performance that bother me a lot, whereas (for instance) my girlfriend didn't even notice them. Otherwise this singer could have easily lead a Genesis tribute band. The sound of the album is another 'average'; the album has this light as a feather feel and could easily use one of those (otherwise so awful) low-end boost remasters. The poppy sounds on songs like 'Promises' and 'Passing Strangers' are really precisely what one would expect from an eighties symphonic poprock song. On the title song IQ opens with some jungle style percussion before finding a nice main instrumental lead. Fuzzing up that lead guitar and pulling it to the front would so much good there. The rest of the song is a bit directionless and the overall atmosphere a bit crude. 'Still Life' is an attempt to make a deep slow synth balled type Genesis popsong. The remaining synth during the song's fade-out are rather nice though. The two extended tracks 'Human Nature' and 'Common Ground' are clearly more advanced in their songwriting, atmospheres and instrumental performance. That light- weight sound doesn't help, but these songs could actually be made to work in a live performance with the band's current sound. 'Human Nature' is your everyday prog mini-epic, whereas 'Common Ground' is more a 'Cinema Show' type of song. Before giving up on this album these songs should be given a fair chance.

Conclusion. Well, my girlfriend instantly liked this album - as she is generally appreciative of eighties pop radio. That in turn forced me to give the album some strong consideration, for its ideally suited for listening together. In the end the vocal glitches of Paul Meno are my main problem with the Nomzamo album, otherwise its an average pop-progressive crossover by a band of which you can pick up at least eight better records (if you are looking for progressive that is). Eighties radio pop has a charm of its own and if you're nog allergic to it - why not give this album a try. Perhaps start with side two. Three stars, because my girlfriend is neither a collector or a fan of IQ and I'm not going to be a dick about it.