TAKE ME TO YOUR LEADER

Having been a loyal Hawkfan for 30 years now, it pains me to hear such a patchy effort after an 8 year wait. This basically sounds like a collection solo tracks cobbled together to pose as a band effort. The remake (again) of "Spirit of the Age" is utterly pointless and some of the best lyrics are even omitted. "Greenback Massacre" is a pallid "Sputnik Stan" rewrite (and Alan, please stop the psuedo Lemmyisms; though we all know you won't...)."To Love a Machine" is probably the highpoint of the CD, an interesting song with real atmosphere and presence. Other than that track, there is precious little energy, innovation, or even faint echoes of past glories. To these ears though, the main problem with this CD is that it has no coherent theme or identity. Not that it needs to be a concept album or anything like that, but this just doesn't sound like a group album. More like "Family Tree" Pt.2, just less interesting. Examples of Richard Chadwick's more techno orientated pieces were done a million times better on the Star Nation "Silver Age" CD, the most underrated space-rock CD of the last 10 years. That was a CD that used ambient and techno musicks hand in hand with spacerock that really ROCKED. This CD pales even besides the likes of Distant Horizons (flawed, but powerful) or It Is The Business... Also, the sax parts are closer to Kenny G than Nik Turner which may be a good thing for some folks, but not for me. Is it time to ground the spaceship once and for all? Sorry but this is pedestrain, uninspired, and unremarkable.