AMBROSIA

I got this album when it first came out cuz "Holdin' on to Yesterday" and "Nice, Nice, Very Nice" got a lot of airplay on our local progressive-minded AM radio station. The album has always intrigued me with its complex and diverse song compositions--some quite proggy, others quite poppy. I always thought its high points, its proggiest points, were a bit like quirky and condensed versions of YES. The songs throughout the album are all of excellent musicianship and compositional quality--in places they may be perhaps even a bit too tricky for their own good--and too YES-like, in others a bit too imitative of some of the pop masters of the late 60s and early 70s.

Five star songs: "Time Waits for No One," Holdin' on to Yesterday," the jazzy, GENTLE GIANT-like "Mama Frog," the medieval folk/THE ASSOCIATION-llike "Make Us All Aware," and the beautiful and emotional CARPENTERS/SIMON AND GARFUNKLE-like "Lover Arrive"

Song on the Breech: "Nice, Nice, Very Nice"

Songs that bring the album down a bit: The Beatles/pre-XTC-like "World Leave Me Alone"; the plodding STYX/PROCUL HARUM/URIAH HEEP-like "Drink of Water"

Still, a four star effort that, in my opinion, contributed something positive to the progressive rock world.