CIRCUS

Russ Ballard's departure would prove a difficult task to overcome for Argent, as the group had not only lost a bonafide hit-maker, but their lead singer as well as their guitarist. So Rod Argent's solution came in hiring not one but two guitarists. Indeed John Verity came on as the vocalist and (second) guitarist, while John Grimaldi took over lead guitar. This would of course change considerably Argent's sound and direction. Graced with a good spacey tightrope drawing artwork from the band's own Grimaldi, being appropriate to the album's theme/concept, the rather overused and not original subject of the circus world. The album came out a few months after Ballard 's swan song, the double live album Encore, it could've not possibly have lived up to Nexus' standard, but over the years this one and its successor would get unfairly dismissed.

Emerging from the opening mellotron wash, a furious funky jazz-rock with Rod's Rhodes (I know! Too easy ;-) leading the way to a strange fusion of styles. Later then his piano and organ amid further tron washes give the title track a great presence, vocals appearing only the in the closing section. The 9-mins Highwire is quite a bit different, relying again on jazz-rock, but there are many elements not clicking very smoothly in placen with weak vocals, but the odd searing guitar solo. The closing Clowns is an atrocious multi-vocals cheesy AOR track with uninspired Moog overstaying its welcome by at least three minutes.

The almost 9-mins Trapeze is an excellent opener for the flipside, again relying on a funky jazz-rock reminiscent (of sorts) of Brain Auger's Oblivion with added mellotron. While again hardly perfect (Grimaldi again putting in some good guitar solos), this Rodford-penned track shows a j-r side of the band that was most likely impossible to expand upon with Ballard in the line-up. However the remaining Argent-penned shorter track fail to follow suit. Falling back on the faulty Clown on the other side, Sunshine is another atrocious AOR-ish ballad that probably gave this album its bad reputation. The Ring is a boring instrumental and Jester is a cracky RnR track but again questionable vocal harmonies.

To summarize this jazz-rock concept album (who would've thought this combination possible?) in a few lines is a bit short, but hopefully this review will help shedding a different light on it. You'd never have thought of argent as a jazz-rock group, right. Guess again. Definitely worth most proghead's reappraisal.