RHINOS, WINOS AND LUNATICS

By the time of Man's seventh album, the musical chairs were in full gear, with prodigal guitarist Roger "Deke" Leonard returning to join co-founder Micky Jones and drummer Terry Williams in the Man band. Deke also brought two members of his solo project Iceberg with him ... incidentally keyboardist Malcolm Morley and bassist Ken Whaley had earlier been part of cult band Help Yourself ... and this must have changed the band's sound. I'd heard a lot of good things about this album beforehand, but the fact is, that after giving it many, many chances I've come to the inescapable conclusion that it's a fairly ordinary boogie-rock album.

That's right ... whether it's totally forgettable like the opener Taking The Easy Way Out Again or shows a little bit of character like The Thunder And Lightning Kid and the epic concluding ramble Scotch Corner, this record rarely moves away from plodding boogie rock jams with too strong a Southern rock influence for my taste. The languid California Silks And Satins boasts some nice acoustic guitar work and the brief keyboard-led outro Exit may both a nice change of pace but the general impression I get is of an unceasingly bland, middle of the road pop/rock album that betrays its lofty reputation. If you want to hear this sort of thing done well, check out Boston's first album.

Possibly the only reason I've still got this record is Kerosene, which actually has some nice synth and electric piano from Morley that breaks the monotony, but it's really a case of too little, too late for me. In fact, while many hardcore Manfans will recommend this record, I'm going to direct you to the Jones quote on the liner notes of my copy of the album "With this album we were heading towards American AOR, though that's a horrible thing to say."

It isn't that great a thing to hear either! ... 32% on the MPV scale