BREATHLESS

When by the second part of the seventies the worn out progressive genre was being checked by the new wave and disco, the ductility of Andy Latimer and his band mates to cope with the change of musical paradigms was something to be admired. Already "Rain Dances" heralded a shift in Camel's style, and "Breathless" (1978), their sixth album, confirms it. Moving away from the lengthy instrumental developments and few vocal participations in favour of more accessible melodies and in which the lyrical component had a greater incidence, 'Breathless' flows between the incorporated pop sonorities seasoned with ingredients taken from light jazz and the progressive vein of the band's first works.

And those embryonic reminiscences are what give the album its greatest value, especially in moments like the intricate elaboration of the progressive "Echoes", which, beyond sharing the same title as the famous Floydian song, is surely the best track on the album, or the dreamy, baroque gait of "Starlight Ride", or the jazzy vibes of "The Sleeper" with the very accomplished saxophone of guest Mel Collins, Pete Bardens' keyboards and Latimer's guitar solo (an unjustly underrated quality of the British band's leader).

But the poppy and more conventional waves that were coming on the way to the eighties are the ones that noticeably influence and end up marking the character of the album, with tracks like the light-hearted "Breathless", the mellow "Wing and Prayer", the dull and bland "Summer Lightening" (despite another excellent guitar solo by Latimer), or the self-indulgent beat melody 'You Make Me Smile'. And it was precisely this change of direction that was no longer unanimously shared by the band, leading to Bardens' departure once the recording of the album was finished, and he said goodbye with the orchestrated "Rainbow's End", a delicate and melodic ballad.

"Breathless" brought Camel one of their biggest commercial successes, as well as the questioning of many of their early supporters who took a dim view of the band's metamorphosis.

Acceptable.

2.5/3 stars