METROMANIA

The first time I listened to this album, some three years ago, I rated it with one star. And I haven't come back to it very often to be honest. So, for the purpose of this review, here we go again with "Metromania".

The same feeling left with their below average previous album "Performance" prevails. Same sort of synth pop; almost cold (but poor) cold wave stuff. "Ultravox !" was great in this genre, but "Eloy" is absolutely not able to produce such catchy music in this particular style even if the opening track is more than acceptable.

"Seeds of Creation" is awful and if one can get some illusion about "All Life is One" for about a minute, as soon as the "vocals" enter the scene it is all ruined. Again, it seems that "Eloy" wants to emulate the "Buggles". A complete misery. For over six minutes ! Actually there will be a good "Floydian" guitar break which will partially rescue the song, but not completely. "The Stranger" is vaguely "Floyd" oriented as well ("The Wall" period).

There will even be a good classic "Eloy" song : "Follow the Light". Space-rock as they have done long ago. The only highlight. One thing is now clear. "Floyd" influence partially dominates this album (three songs out of seven) and these tracks are the best ones. Because when you listen to the closing number and title track, the same poor electronic beats are raging again. Extremely poor.

My first impression was not far from being confirmed, but thanks to these three fully "Floyd" oriented songs, I will rate this effort with two stars.