RA

This album should be bought for Side 2 alone! "Hiroshima" and "The Glass Guitar" are both progressive/art rock classics, with immensely poetic, creative lyrics, and incredible vocal and instrumental works. Sure, it's not as symphonic as Todd Rundgen's Utopia, the premire album of Utopia, since they only have one keyboardist, but it is incredibly entertaining nonetheless. The concept of this album is quite clear - every song has something to do with the sun. Whether it be Japan or a communion to the sun - Ra has it all connected with the essential theme being the Sun.

Some may not appreciate Todd Rundgren as much as me -- he was quite a odd fellow, and many saw him as just being "silly" as another reviewer put it. On Drugs or not, with Utopia or not, Todd Rundgren was always a wierd, "out there" kind of guy. I actually like this characteristic, and it shows strongly in his music - he has a more playful side to all of his music, which is a nice change with all of the cliched seriousness surrounding most of the other Prog/Art groups of Utopia's time, such as Yes, Jethro Tull, and Emerson Lake and Palmer (even though ELP has now aged so poorly in some cases that people find it funny).

I have been a huge fan of Todd Rundgren's from the beginning - and he has done everything from Pop to Prog, from Rock to Rap - he's done an album with everything in it - and very few of them are short of masterpieces. Todd Rundgren, whether he be solo or with his group directing the band members, is comparative to Frank Zappa in his ability to compose, innovate, and change the world of music with each work of art he produces, and this album does not fail to live up to this fact. This album is HIGHLY recommended for fans of progressive or fans of Todd Rundgren in general.