BLUE ANGEL

The eleven minute title track opens this album. This song is a remake of a song that was originally featured on Dave Cousins' first solo album Two Weeks Last Summer (on which Rick Wakeman played, among many others). This is an excellent song and reminds in style of such great Strawbs classics as Autumn and Ghosts. This is an excellent version of this somewhat forgotten epic. If you don't have Two Weeks Last Summer, and can't find it, this album is worth it for this song alone.

The majority of the songs here were previously featured on an album by Dave Cousins and Brian Willoughby called The Bridge. I have never heard that album, and it seems to be hard to find. It is, of course, all the more likely that you will get to hear something if it is put out under the Strawbs name than if it remains in the discographies of obscure solo and side-projects. These songs are mostly quite good, but nothing too remarkable and not particularly progressive. According to the bands website, Oh, So Sleepy was not even an original when it was featured on that The Bridge album, but was a leftover from the Deep Cuts sessions. A remake of a remake, that is. Hence, the inspiration cannot have been flowing as it should have in the band during the 80's, 90's, and early 2000's. But this time the end result is actually very good and you are not that likely to have heard all of these songs before.

The three last tracks, Sealed With a Traitor's Kiss, Lay Down and The King have also been previously released on Deadlines, Bursting At The Seams and Ringing Down The Years respectively. Again, for people who don't have those albums, Blue Angel might be well worth the effort. But these albums are much more likely to be in the collections of Strawbs fans than the rare The Bridge. As far as I understand, There Will Come The Day is the only song on this whole album that is not a remake of some previously recorded song.

I find this a quite good and mostly enjoyable album, even if not very progressive. It certainly was at the time of its release the best new Strawbs studio album since Ghosts from 1975!

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