THE POET, THE PIPER AND THE FOOL

When the first Grace period was over around 1981, Mac Austin and Harry Davies along with Harry's brother John formed the Synth Pop band White Door.The short-lived trio produced one album and several singles before disbanding in 1984.But in 1988 an accidental meeting between Mac Austin and Dave Rushton gave rise to discussions about reforming Grace.Eventually this took place in Christmas 88' with a succesful reunion concert with original members Harry Davies and Dave Edge in the line-up along with new drummer Tony Hall and John Davies from White Door on keys.In 1992 Grace returned with a new album,a self-produced release entitled ''The Poet, the Piper and the Fool''.

Good thing is the band did not stuck on the heavy GENESIS-influenced style of their past and Grace had now a more refined and less raw sound akin to ABEL GANZ and VISIBLE WIND, with strong vocal performances by Austin and accesible tunes.The album contains more demanding compositions along with some light commercial tracks, where keyboard breaks, smooth guitar playing and a clear production play the basic role.However it suffers from a killer track or a trully catchy and memorable tune to be regarded as a trully essential release.But the arrangements are decent with plenty of keyboard breaks, the lyrical moments are top notch, there are some great guitar parts, while Grace put on their own trademark on this Neo Progressive approach, adding a fair amount of organs and flutes along with whistles and bagpipes to make their sound a bit more nostalgic and colorful.Another positive credit comes from the extended compositions, where instrumental parts are well-played and far from difficult, though the pair of weaker compositions have more in common with White Door than with the 80's New Wave of British Prog.

Decent return by this legend of the Neo Prog movement.Grace offer a lot of enjoyable, pleasant and well-executed material on this album, always linked with the familiar sound of the 80's British Prog school.Warmly recommended.