MOGUL THRASH

COLOSSEUM fans beware , this is for you!!! After Litherland came out of that band , clearly he had not enough of that style of music as this album is quite similar to the first two album , rather a bit more hard-rocking , also a bit brassier but with no keyboards bar Brian Auger's contribution on one track on top of his production work - aside of the sound engineer being Eddy Offord (of Yes fame).

From the first notes of Something Sad (leading to superb bass works from Wetton) to the end of What's this I hear , we deal with a speeded-up Colosseum jazz-rock with loads of energy. The 12 min Going North track is the center piece of the album with searing guitar leads divinely underlined by brass lines, over a superb bass hook. The St-Peter track is somewhat sticking out of the rest of the album, but it was also the B-side of the Sleeping In The Kitchen single that is the featured bonus track on the Blueprint cd version that was released in 1999.

On the down-side if things , however superb (and greatly expanded) the Colosseum track Elegy might be (a good sign that his leaving that band was probably not on a friendly basis), I just wish , he would have written yet another track instead of giving us already heard material. Please note that the horn section of Ball and Duncan will be the foundation of Scotland's Average White Band.

As for Dick's surprising low rated review , his excellent remarks about the future of Litherland points to a wasted talent. The Disconforme re-issue of the album appears not to be of more interest than this version since the bonus tracks are all alternate version/takes.