LAST FLIGHT

This is not the best album of the band and the transition towards the pop-rock world is perceptible at several levels; the line-up is different than on the two previous albums, the first sign of the fracture being guitarist, singer and keyboardist Tai Sihn leaving the band (and with him a part of the group's name, Taï, maybe even a part of the musical vision?); the egos are exacerbed, both Khanh Mai and Jean-Jacques Goldman seeming to fight for becoming the lead(er) singer of the band; then, each in turn was not present at the recording sessions, therefore absent on some tracks; all this contributing to a real lack of musical unity! Goldman finally made it later as a pop star! Last sign of the commercial thoughts: an ugly and uninspiring cover! But what about the music? Well, it finds itself trapped between the dreams of the past and the seek for fame of the future; there are still at times longer instrumental passages where the musicians stretch it out but the song structures and clichés weigh more and actually wear out the prog aspects, bringing the album closer to some kind of americanized pop music with nice vocal harmonies; in fact if you have the Japanese papersleeve release of this album, you'll find three bonus tracks taken from singles, two of them from 78 leaving no more doubt about the musical direction wished by the band! Last Flight is an unequal album showing a band on the way to desagregation; unfortunately for them, the audience didn't react to their change of style and they called it a day in 1980! Followed a long crossing of the desert that lasted until 2000, where a new album (Sun) was released, with only Khanh Mai and drummer Stéphan Caussarieu remaining from the original line-up.