IN THE CAN

The Flash debut seems to be their preferred album. Why? I don't see how anyone can fail to be moved by In the Can. In the several years I've known the band's second release, it's been a favorite. It opens with a bang in Colin Carter's "Lifetime." The ace singer is quite expressionful here. Guitar star Peter Banks wows with instrumental pirouettes from the outset, always at the outer limits of his instrument's reach. At over ten minutes, "Lifetime" and "Black and White" travel through various musical territories but always stay cohesive. Bands of today would be wise to look here when their "epics" instead turn out hodge-podges of coldly placed elements.

Songwriting is a Flash forte. The richness of "Monday Morning Blues" or "Black and White" just sweep you off your feet. To be sure, these two songs have their Yes-like moments. After all, Banks was Yes' guitarist for two albums. Yet, each Flash band member made major compositional contributions to the album. Does that strategy keep things interesting? The listener gets so lost in side one that's it's over before she even knows it. Alright, alright, that side is more EP-style at only 15 minutes. Yet, how many like musical minutes of lesser caliber are spent glancing at one's watch?

Flash's command of jazz very well may lend the band its allure. Jazz building blocks are more extensive than rock ones. Granted rock is a limited idiom, but this reviewer's far preferred one. Rock has my heart. It is one in a million jazzier bands like Flash that can pierce that heart-space.

In the Can is a quintessential old-school gem when giving 1000% was all in a day's work. Lyrics were poetry as in "Black and White." Tempos effortlessly shift from a gallop to a standstill. Members seamlessly cycle through a gamut of styles from jazz to straight ahead rock. I can't think of another band that flows naturally to jazz idioms without self-consciousness and emotional loss. One of my favorite moments is in the middle of "Black and White" in a vocal passage where Banks in the background starts strumming a banjo. When the vocal tapers off, the instrumental timbre carries and then glides through wah-wah and other flavors, wisely receding for a brief drum solo. No "Inna-Gadda-Davita" here. Flash clearly grasp moderation, in fact a guiding principle

Banks is a guitar player extraordinaire with volumes to impart here. Only a band of Yes' rank can throw out a guitarist of this stature and have one slightly more useful waiting in the wings. If Banks had only fronted a lesser ensemble, he would have received the acclaim he deserved.

Admittedly the verses of album closer "There no More" reprise Flash's catalog up to that point. Enough is changed, however, to avoid the impression of repetition. Then things quiet to a hush to emerge in a sea of vocal harmony, looming larger than life. That's exactly what prog rock is all about.