THE LIGHT

This was my second SB ablum that I heard, and the first one that caused me to actually start to appreciate this band (Beware Of Darkness I didn't like the first several times I heard it, though now I consider it their best along with "V"). I've never been a huge fan of this band, and it took quite a while to really truely appreciate their talent. In fact, the album "V" was really the beginning and end of my true appreciation for them.

Getting back to this album, the title track hit me on the very first listen and to this day is one of my all time favorites from them. It has everything I like about the band and nothing I don't. It is a brilliant display of everything they would ever do well musically and vocally. It flows well, is not overlong and doesn't dwell on the more pop sensibiliites that they would expand on in later albums (and which is the main aspect about this band that I simply can't enjoy). With a single listent to this one brilliant track, I understood what this band was about for the first time.

The following track, "Go the Way you Go" is nearly as good, with only a slightly cheesy chorus to bring it down a bit. But it does contain some outstanding solo and instrumental sections.

"The Water", however, is an overlong, disjointed and IMO failed attempt at a truely epic song. It just doesn't gell for me at all really. Oddly enough, one of the best parts for me is the "FU" section followed by the "I'm sorry" section. A great transition and some great Morse vocals (the gritty, angry sound that would dissapear after the next album.........but a style that I really liked and think works well with the music). Overall though, I find this track pretty tedious and poorly written and concieved.

Finally, "Out On The Edge" finishes off the album and is a decent song, if sounding a bit too much like Yes (the music, not really the vocals or vocal lines though). My copy actually has a couple of minutes of the Gentle Giant like acoustic guitar duet the Morse brothers used to do in concert in the middle of the song The Doorway from the next album. A nice addition, but something better heard in the context of the entire song.

All in all, I give it 3 stars, mainly for being one of the first true American prog albums of the "3rd wave" in the mid 90's. And the first track is good enough to pull it up from 2.5 stars.