* The two 1990's albums are by Michael Dunford's Renaissance, with Stephanie Adlington on vocals.

Forget the first two in the list.

Yes, I'd rather forget the first two albums in the list too.

— i.e. the ones nobody cares about. 

At least I cared about Michael Dunford's Renaissance enough  to include their albums in the poll and I also have "The Other Woman" album on CD.

I actually prefer "The Other Woman" to "tuscany". 

 

I'm not a fan of the 1980's Camera Camera or Time-Line though. I'd much rather listen to the 1990's version of Renaissance with Michael Dunford and Stephanie Adlington.

The song "Somewhere West of Here" which closes "The Other Woman" is absolutely brilliant.  It could have been a song by ILLUSION with Jane Relf singing

 

I'm the same. The first two are terrible. I don't know what people find in Camera Camera. Timeline is even worse.

The rest are listenable though not wonderful compared to their 70's stuff. 

 

Thanks. I'll give Camera Camera another listen to see whether it's really a professional Hasselblad camera amongst prog albums, or whether it's just a budget-priced Polaroid Instamatic camera.

 

They are two Renaissance albums I definitely need to check out after seeing the results from this poll.

I think Grandine is a slam dunk for you.  Several songs are in the classic Renaissance tradition while a few, the title cut in particular, offer something new yet familiar.  I still don't place it on the level of the 1970s classics but it's probably as good as we will get

Re Camera Camera, it helps to approach it without expecting a rehash of the 1970s glories, though 2 of the tracks are truly every bit as good.  I think the album deserved better than the thrashing it got in the press, though in Ottawa where I lived at the time it was fully embraced by the local FM station and I converted several classmates at college to the group, culminating in a packed concert at a local club.  It was 1982 and people weren't clamoring for prog rock, even those who liked it a few years earlier.  We appreciated that the band was still making good music in the new environment, but we did appreciate the Ashes are Burning encore!  Of course, some of my mates were converted because of Annie 

Shame they didn't have a hit like Yes did around that time or they may have been able to stick around.

 

This may well be the last Live performance of Ashes Are Burning at the Union Chapel, London, in 2015.

 

to help Annie out with the coda, Mark Lambert has been playing a sizzling lead guitar

 

I'll have an Annie Haslam tribute thread coming up soon.

 

Side One

 

1. Camera Camera

 

 

2. Faeries (Living at the Bottom of the Garden)

 

 

3. Remember

 

3.

 

4. Bonjour Swansong (not included in the British 1981 release)

 

 

5. Tyrant-Tula

 

 

 

 

6. Okichi San

 

 

7. Jigsaw (the missing piece of the album)

 

8. Running Away from You

 

 

9. Ukraine Ways

 

 

8.

 

Bonjour Swansong is my favourite song from the album, even though I only heard it for the very first time yesterday.  I'm sure it had the potential to be a minor hit if the song had ever been released as a single in the U.K. 

 

Of the other songs on the album, I also like Faeries Living at the Bottom of My Garden.

 

1. Symphony of Light

 

 

2. Waterfall

 

 

3. Grandine il Vento

 

 

4. Porcelain

 

 

5. Cry to the World

 

 

6. Air of Drama

 

 

7. Blood Silver Like Moonlight

 

 

8. The Mystic and the Muse

 

 

9. Tonight

 

 

10. Immortal Beloved

 

 

11. Renaissance Man

 

 

I've always liked Procol Harum, and I have a couple of 2-CD compilation albums by them, although I've never quite gotten around to listening to any of their studio albums, but based on your recommendation, I'm really looking forward to hearing Procol Harum's Novum album. I'm pretty sure there's a Procol Harum tribute thread on here somewhere, so I'll take a look at that too, if I can find it.

 

Tom Ozric wrote: The 80’s slbums were not a disappointment, just going with the times. At least for me, it’s (mostly) about Annie’s voice and Camp’s bass playing. They both deliver on Camera Camera and Time Line. And I do treasure their 70’s run all the way.

I love Camera Camera to pieces but was seriously disappointed by Time Line. Not quite sure what went wrong there. You don't seem to see such a big gap between the two!?

Annie is also connecting notes rather than just hitting them tonk-tonk-tonk staccato as Stephanie does here (as in fact lots of singers seem to do for some reason when they cover Renaissance songs).  And when Annie does that with her beautiful tone, any slightly off note gets magnified.  

Also, and this is a quirk of Annie that I have never worked out but she sang Carpet far better live a couple of years down the line compared to the AAB recordings in 1973.  And that has been the case right until GDV.  I guess she records before she has had enough time to really soak in the song. 

Back to Stephanie, as I am listening again, the way she sings "See everything on its own/And you'll find you know the way" is particularly wooden.  

This is how the melody is supposed to sound.

Annie's breath control is also terrific.  She just sings through the "Owe everything to the day" stretch with a steady sustain on "day" while Stephanie catches a breath before that word.

 

I totally agree, and I'm surprised that Camera Camera did so well in this poll, although it has to be said,  I don't have a good past  record in predicting the outcome of my polls.

 

You won't have to go far to find it. The album's on Page 2 of this thread.

You misunderstood. I did listen to the album long ago, but I rarely listen to post 70s Renaissance. So I will try and re-listen to the album and see if it's worth a vote. OK?