RA

There are two Todd Rundgren albums that I find essential to my collection and would have no hesitation recommending to any prog rock fan. The first being of course Utopia and the second RA with Initiation coming in a close third.

You may know Todd from his hits, but when he decided to dabble in progressive rock music, he jumped in whole heartedly.

As you might guess from the cover art and album title, there is a bit of a sun theme going on here. It gets off to dramatic start with Mountaintop And Sunrise / Communion With The Sun. "love is one" dedicated to Ra, of course. Has all of the blazing guitar and synthesizers that endeared the first Utopia album to me.

Magic Dragon Theater breaks off from the sun theme and introduces a little humor. Reasonably complex short tune.

The next two have more commercial potential and are sort of polar opposites: Jealously and Eternal Love. I don't know if the former charted, but if not it should have.

Side one of the original album returns to the Egyptian/sun theme fininishing it up with a Sunburst Finish. Back into solid prog territory with this one.

Side two kicks off with a different type of sun: Hiroshima. A remeberance of an event that wasn't the U.S.'s best moments. "God God is on our side, he placed the power in our hands to teach the yellow peril how to make an oven."

Singring And The Glass Guitar wraps up the album clocking in at whopping 18 plus minutes (hey look, it's a fairytale.) Sort of a tongue in cheek fun epic.