Review:

on 2011-05-06 CharlesMartel Said:

Good to see Al Stewart continuing with his historical themes in this album. I have always found that to be his forte and therefore I find this album lacking a bit because it does not have the same degree of historical depth as "Past, Present And Future", for example. Nevertheless, Al Stewart is a well-read and cogent songwriter and this has stood him in good stead for many a release. However, this was probably his last great release. Coming after "Year of the Cat" which many (though not I) regard as his finest, he seemed unable to sustain it after the release of this.

His style may not be to everybody's taste. If you want to hear guitars being played at 100 miles an hour while being growled at in Swedish about how to sacrifice virgins on the altar of Satan, go elsewhere. If your lyrical style stretches no further than "I'm a crack-pushing n***a gone smack up my bitch" then go join the previous person. Stewart is an intelligent man who comes across as something a loner. He sings of wistful, sad love and many of his songs, such as "Almost Lucy" have that forlorn feeling of opportunities missed and moments remembered with regret. Yet he manages this without slipping either into the maudlin or else lacing his songs with feelings of bitterness. To be able to do that consistently is a pretty fine accomplishment.

However, the combination of these themes with historical subject matter was something which was too erudite for the world which was breaking around him when this album was released. The formula which had served him so well was beginning to become a bit tired and although he tried to experiment, it did not work so well on this album and even less afterwards. As punk broke upon the UK music scene, Al Stewart would have found his particular style of music very much out of place.

"Life in Dark Water", a song about the life of a submariner, "The Palace of Versailles" and especially "A Man For All Seasons" (about Sir Thomas More) are both historically themed and among the stronger tracks. "Valentina Way" and "Almost Lucy" are more traditional love songs of sadness and unrequited feelings. These are the stock-in-trade of Al Stewart. Other than that, the rest of the album is somewhat unremarkable and is unable to hold the listener's attention the way many of his previous albums did. One of the reasons for this is that the production was just too slick. Stewart's earlier albums had that feeling that they had been pretty much recorded live in the studio, with a few overdubs added later. Perhaps that is due to the fact that Alan Parsons of the Project fame was the producer for this album.

Stewart himself seems to have recognised this for he is often critical these days of the quality of the sound on this and other albums produced in collaboration with Alan Parsons. Nevertheless, this album continued his relative commercial success, particularly in the United States. However, by the eighties, he had been dropped by Arista and his popularity was on the wane. Despite this, he remains a figure of some stature from the seventies when he produced his best work. Sadly, there has been no one really to take up the mantle of the sort of work he produced.
Rating: 6/10