CRIME OF THE CENTURY

This is keyboard-driven prog. This is also a prog-masterpiece in every sense of the word. The music here is exciting, innovative, beautiful, and awesome. Even though I love every one of their albums from the debut through "Brother Were You Bound" I still consider this their pinnacle. Ever changing tempos, rhythms, moods throughout this album. And believe it or not, with all of these wonderful elements, the album and the band were still amazingly popular in the late 70s and early 80s. Through those disco years, popular music still had promise in this band. Rodger Hodgson and Rick Davies pretty much shared the controls here, both of them alternating vocals and backing up for each other when they weren't leading vocally. Rodger's voice was probably the most radio friendly, but all of the music was excellent even if it was attractive to the public masses. Their songs usually had a very uplifting feeling, not in a spiritual way, but in a feel good way like "Dreamer" and "Rudy" and some were effectively dark like "Asylum" and "Crime of the Century". But the songs were always heart-felt, dramatic and beautifully put together. And talk about powerful, there aren't many artists that can do a piano-based ballad and make it sound as powerful as these guys did as in the beautiful vocals in the song "If Everyone was Listening" and also in the heavy, crashing and almost droning instrumental section of "Crime of the Century". This band proved that, even though they could use a guitar effectively from time to time, a piano-driven band can be just as powerful as any guitar-driven band. If you haven't really listened to this album yet, then it's time to do so. Definately a masterpiece of progressive rock music in every sense of the word!