THE SINGLE FACTOR

The Single Factor is the ninth studio album from symphonic prog act Camel. Their previous album called Nude was a quite an enjoyable album IMO even though it´s definitely not my favorite from the band. The Single Factor unfortunately puts emphasis on some of the more doubtful sides of the music on Nude and as a consequence it´s the weakest effort I have heard from Camel yet ( of the nine first albums).

The music has become much more commercial pop/ rock influenced and in some of the worst songs like the opener No Easy Answer and You Are the One Camel almost sounds like an AOR band. There are some songs that are partially enjoyable like Heroes and Camelogue but the songs are generally very weak and not something I want to use my time on. Camel has made so much better music that this album seems a bit superfluos.

The musicianship is good as always. It´s noteworthy that The Single Factor is the first Camel album with only Andy Latimer left from the original lineup. Andy Ward was unable to record the drum parts as a result of a bad hand injury but was still a part of the band at this time ( Even though he was suffering severe problems with alcohol and drugs in those days too).

The production is thin and very much in eighties style. It doesn´t bother me but I´m not too thrilled either.

As I stated above this one probably won´t even satisfy the fans, but as I do enjoy some parts of the album I´ll rate it 2 stars. It´s pretty Superfluos though and it´s the last album I would purchase from Camel ( out of the first nine).