PERFORMANCE

I guess I´m one of the few reviewers here who really enjoyed Perfomance since the very first day I heard it. But since I did it in 2003, it sounded just different, not bad. I do understand, however, who did not like it, especially at the time the album was released. After all, Perfomance was the follow up of two of Eloy´s best CDs ever: Planets and Time To Turn. Compared to those two it really pales. But I still think it is far better than a lot of things that were coming out at the time, prog or otherwise.

Side one of the old vinyl LP starts very well with songs like In Disguise, Shadow And Light and Mirador. They all sound like the previous stuff on Time To Turn, although not really as strong as. In fact, I wouldn´t be too surprised if those would be Planets/Time... leftovers. But most critics were not amused by the last track on this side, Surrender. This a quite different track and its popish tendencies did not favor them much either. Still, I like it, for it´s far from bad. It´s just a matter of taste, I guess. The synthesizers on it are again much more elaborated, elegant and sophisticated than the usual cheese, repetitive patterns used for most pop records on the 80´s.

Side two follows the same pattern: a tune that could have been another rejected track from Planets (Heartbeat), a kind of prog-pop song (Fools) and the real gem of the record, the magnificent A Broken Frame. This latter song is the most inspired and progressive of all in its almost 8 minute duration and should be regarded as one of their best stuff, deserving to be on any best of compilation.

As usual, the perfomances of all musicians are great. I just love Hannes Folberth´s keyboards. They sound fresh, creative and exciting even after all these years. The rest of the band members are not far behind, although the drums sound a bit subdue here. Production is also very good.

Conclusion: all in all, a highly enjoyable album, specially if you like nice melodies. It is ok that the songwriting here is not as powerful and convincing as on previous effords (except for the aforementioned A Broken Frame), but again this is far from being bad. Personally I´d give this CD four stars, since is one of those records I hear from start to end with the same pleasure, but if I have to compare it to their former work, that would be unfair. Three star is much more fitting. Good, but not really essential.