IN THE HOT SEAT

Awful. Sad. Who's "In The Hot Seat". Who buys it? The Band? That's a good discussion for the worst ELP record. Actually, I seriously doubt there ever was such a musical decadence in any other progressive band. The day I listened to this CD I got really depressed. How could ELP have an album like this? Yeah, ELP... That band which played Ginastera's music and was praised by himself once... That band which recorded "Brain Salad Surgery". The track "Hand of Truth" from "In The Hot Seat" is an average track, but if you compare it to the others from this album, it just seems to be "Karn Evil 9". The band lost totally its north, its style, its magic and energy. In this album, it's not a progressive band anymore and it's not a pop band, either. It is inbetween worlds. So the old fans got anger and the new generations didn't care for it. Apparently, Lake can't compose a good plain song anymore (does he want to?), Emerson stuck on the "King of Rock Keyboards" flattery and forgot he was once a truly serious musician with truly great compositional talent. In the '70s, Keith was able to do some aggressive stuff, but that happened to be also GREAT music. But "In the Hot Seat" he kept only the noise and those brass patches that are a weak shadow of the GX-1 Keyboard. Palmer, well, he is the only one who is as good (or perhaps better) as in the crazy '70s. Really, I would have preferred they just got together for the gigs and never stepped in the studio together. I say this especially because I love the old ELP. But it's over. Whatever the magic was, it seems unavailable even to themselves.