ILLUSION

This album wastes no time displaying its inferiority from the debut with the really weak and ordinary folk song 'Love Goes On.' Luckily it picks up on the next track which should have been the opener 'Golden Thread,' however I can't say i'm into Keith Reif's vocals this time around and even though this is probably the best song on this album it pales in comparison. Even the release of this album was confusing. It was only released in Germany at first in 1971 and then in 1973 in other parts of the world. Ironically in their native UK it wasn't released until 1977!!! Of course there are also two album covers.

The fact is that what we have here is what a band sounds like in the middle of total meltdown. Due to the fact that they hated touring the two founding members Jim McCarty and Keith Reiff jumped ship leaving the rest of the band to fend for themselves. That didn't last long as Louis Cennamo left next and John Hawken was left on his own to keep the band going by recruiting members from his previous band The Nashville Teens. Jane Reif is still here but she sounds lackluster and hardly any songs have the same musicians.

The fact is this sounds like one of those albums that's released years later as a leftovers package. This is just a mess and it sounds like various members just popping by the studio to record a few parts of their uninspired contributions on their own time and left for the producer to piece it all together after all the parts were on the table. Some of these tunes have potential but they all seem underdeveloped especially compared with the brilliant debut album that only came out two years before. Luckily after this turbulent time which is for forever documented as this album the band known as RENAISSANCE would continue the sound of the debut album without any of the original members and create more coherent albums. Definitely not the place to start exploring this bands discography.