OCTAVE

In six years, The Moody Blues didn't do any records and people had to wait until 1978 before next release was a fact. Their ninth studio record "Octave" came 1978 with the same line up as before with Justin Hayward, John Lodge, Michael Pinder, Ray Thomas and Graeme Edge.

The first difference with this record is that the cover is terribly boring, if we compare it to the older Moody Blues cover with fascinating paintings. This is just very black and the sign gives us just associations with motorcycle clubs. The glory days of prog was over though and I can't hear any prog on this record, unfortunately.

The Moody Blues nevertheless managed to do decent and quite good songs even on this album. "Steppin' in a slide zoon" which starts the album is captivating and intelligent rock music(7/10) as well as "I'll be level with you" which I think is the album's best song(7/10)- the only on this record which do have advanced instrumental passages and strives a bit further than the others. "The day we meet again"(6/10) also manage to give us a rich and dramatic feeling and i'd also say "Top rank suite"(6/10) is a good song with some connection with early rock music.

The other songs are sometimes too bland and uniform and sometimes too sweet and languorous. At least two tracks are bad in my opinion: "Had to fall in love" and "Survival" but over all is the music still well produced and listenable. 2,7= Three week stars