THE SINGLE FACTOR

The Single Factor is an extraordinary album in the way that it starts off with easily the worst song of the bunch, No Easy Answer, which is a below-mediocre pop workout. Things start getting better after that in the form of You Are the One, which is a nice rock song, and Heroes, a very good ballady kind of thing that is one of the highlights of the album. I like the melodies on that one. Selva is a nice mellow piece for keyboards and guitar, nothing extremely memorable though. The short interlude type of thing called Lullabye continues in the lighter vein before Sasquatch, which is apparently the only song the band likes to remember from this album. A cheerful instrumental piece with some really nice guitar work, a clear choice to join Heroes in the highlights group. Manic is an urgent rock song, a pretty nice one as such, but Camel isn't really at their best with urgent rock songs. Camelogue isn't the most exciting Camel piece ever either, rather a mediocre one, though with some fitting lyrics for the situation of the band at the time. Today's Goodbye isn't much better, but the album is brought to a close with A Heart's Desire and End Peace, a very very beautiful composition with great vocals by Chris Rainbow and some very good guitar work by mr. Latimer. An underrated gem, no doubt about that.

Knowing that the album was made under really difficult circumstances with the inspiration level close to zero, this is a surprisingly good one. Heroes, Sasquatch, A Heart's Desire and End Peace are the definite bright spots, there are some good pieces as well, but then again too many fall into the mediocre category. A good effort given the circumstances.

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