MASQUE - SONGS AND PLANETS

This album was certainly not a return to form or even a new direction for the Earth Band, coming as it did near the end of the active recording period of the group's existence. And really this wasn't much of a band anymore. Even though Mick Rogers had returned to the fold with the prior year's 'Criminal Tango' release, there were no other remaining original members save Manfred Mann himself. Drummer John Lingwood was still around since joining the band in the late seventies, but otherwise the lineup consists almost exclusively of friends, acquaintances and studio musicians.

On the positive side the sound here is at least somewhat different than the bland 80s tripe Mann had been pushing out for the past decade. There is a recurring jazz theme interwoven with Holst-inspired space themed tunes that hearken back to the band's excellent 'Solar Fire' release from the early seventies, and even the more staid numbers are at least bolstered by professional and sometimes even mildly interesting musicianship. Vocalist Maggie Ryder and a host of brass players give some depth and range to what would otherwise have been little more than another synth/guitar dominated album.

There are a few different track listings depending on which release of the album you get your hands on. The most common is the original CD issue which opens with a redone version of the old Earth Band tune "Joybringer", one of the original 'Solar Fire' Holst- inspired songs and the closest the album would come to anything resembling classic Earth Band. The instrumental "Hymn" provides another example of the sort of spacey, keyboard-driven sound that made 'Solar Fire' so appealing, although the overall mood is much more subdued here and this is actually one of the shorter songs on the album.

Other than "Joybringer" and the Charlie Parker jazz tunes the other songs worth noting include a nostalgic and moody remake of the Cream song "We're Going Wrong" and another Paul Weller tune "What You Give is What you Get (Start)", originally titled simply "Start!" when Weller wrote it for the Jam in the late seventies. The only other interesting oddity is a decent but somewhat out-of-place version of the Michael Murphy Native American tribute "Geronimo's Cadillac", made famous by Cher (Bono) but interestingly enough also resurrected by the Europop band Modern Talking who turned it into Top-10 single throughout much of Europe around the same time 'Masque' was recorded.

This isn't much of an improvement over the three previous Earth Band albums but at least it was a bit more interesting and the three remaining members do appear to have at least tried to do something more than crank out yet another glossy soft-rock album. For that I'm going to be a bit generous and slap three (out of five) stars on this one, but expectations should be tempered for anyone who is familiar with the band from their seventies heyday. Worth a listen but certainly not something that reflects a Renaissance of the Earth Band sound.

peace