MASQUE - SONGS AND PLANETS

Masque is a very unnoticed and unfairly underrated Manfred Mann's Earh Band album, realy, at least for me. Released in 1987 as 13th studio album, Masque got the reputation over the years as the worst MMEB album they ever done, a thing that I'm not agree at all. Ok I understand that they embrace the pop elements for somne couple of years back, but Masque is not a bad album at all. If anyone will search on their official web site, they will see that Masque is considered a continuation or It represents the completion of the original project started back in 1973 with Solar fire album. These two album are hardly compare to each other even by die hard fans, I'm a big fan of MM and I got to say that this is indeed a continuation of Solar fire but in diffren manner, ok the atmosphere , the songs, arrangements are diffrent and more on pop side because between the albums almost 15 years, musicaly the direction is changed , is a natural thing after all. Some cover versions again featuring here, but this time no Dylan or Spreingsteen, among other the best to me is Cream's - We're going wrong - very fone and well done cover version. The pieces that are written by the members are ok, even great, pop elements interluded very ok with some jazzy and spacey keybords the define MM sound, quite progressive moves apper here and there , I like the keybords how run on the scale, very fine moments for me. I considered Masque better then Criminal tango, both had same atmosphere almost, is more diverse and has some moments of greatness, realy I don't find anything unpleasent here only maybe Masque is more a collection of songs then Solar fire who has a very solid concept behind, diffrent decades diffrent musical views by the musicians. 3 stars for sure, to me was a pleasent ride this album, realy.