VERLORENE WELT

Press and public received warmly ''Tanz der Goetter'' and six months after its release the album had sold about 36,000 copies.Propably not enough for Peter Wahle, who decided to part ways with the band (and record the solo album ''Happy bananas'' in 1980).His departure did not slow down Flaming Bess, the remaining duo of Wende and Jansen hired Hans Schweiss on drums and Barry Peeler on guitar, heading for a contract with Polydor.They recorded their next album ''Verlorene welt'' in September/October 1980 at Dierks Tonstudio and released it in 1981.Many guest musicians/singers participated in this work, among them was guitarist Achim Wierschem, who would later reach the main core of the band.

Flaming Bess was always a heavily CAMEL-influenced band and with ''Verlorene welt'' they seem to walk parrallel ways with the British legends.The strong organ and the light symphonic flavors of their debut were replaced by a smoother and extremely melodic approach with a deep, jazzy sound, while the poppy sensibilities are present as well, they appear to do what CAMEL were creating during the same period.The tracks are now passing through Lounge Jazz aesthetics with soft piano lines to acoustic crescendos with a period sound and from melodic rockers with some sort of ANDY LATIMER-like sensitive guitar touch to 80's Fusion with piano, synths and guitar in evidence.Among or within the pieces there are plenty of narrations with German lyrics.Not among the tasteful works one should expect from a band, that created a nice, progressive album a couple of years ago.The atmosphere is dreamy and ethereal, the melodies are mostly nice but the lack of some adventurous twists or deep instrumentation make the album sound a bit pale.Of course there are also a pair of exceptions, the opening ''Mythos'' with the mellow electric piano and the beautiful acoustic/electric melodies hold some of the band's previous inspiration, while the 7-min. title-track is even better, a nice combination of melodic, jazzy and Fusion stylings with a couple of great melodies and notable work on clavinet, acoustic guitar and synthesizers.

The CD reissue contains only reworkings of the album's tracks, so there is no big deal of prefering it.''Verlorene welt'' ends up to be some sort of smooth Jazz Rock combined with CAMEL-esque melodies, not entirely convincing or satisfying, suffering from some bland 80's tunes.CAMEL fans are propably the ones to reach this album...2.5 stars.