| Track: | Rating: | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Prime Time | | | | ||
| 2. Let Me Go Home | | | |||
| 3. One Good Reason | | | |||
| 4. Since The Last Goodbye | | | |||
| 5. Don't Answer Me | | | | ||
| 6. Dancing On A High Wire | | | | ||
| 7. You Don't Believe | | | | ||
| 8. Pipeline | | | | ||
| 9. Ammonia Avenue | | | | | |
All songs written by Eric Woolfson and Alan Parsons.
After years of minor successes on the American charts, the APP scored well in 1982 with the Eye In The Sky album. The title track of this release became the first (and only) APP song to enter the American Top 10 reaching #3 in the autumn of the year -- it subsequently became a standard on numerous "classic rock/classic pop" FM stations, and is still the most famous of APP compositions.
That said, it isn't overly surprising that Ammonia Avenue should be strongly influenced by the EitS album, to the extent that many of the songs here seem like attempts to recreate the success of that work. AA doesn't really mark that much of a turning point for the APP's sound, but did establish them firmly in a mid-'80s rut (which would eventually cause the unit's fragmentation, after subsequent albums proved less successful).
Most of the material on AA ranges from tolerable mediocrity to irritating mediocrity. There are hooks in abundance here, but one would look in vain for a deeper level to the songs; even as pop, moreover, most of the songs don't have terribly much going for them. The "assembly line" feel that hinders many APP songs is in attendance here, causing the listener to occasionally wonder how much thought was really but into these little creations.
Some have suggested, in the past, that the APP were always hindered by not having a constant lead singer that the public could easily identify with. Accordingly, it shouldn't be too surprising to discover that Eric Woolfson ("Eye In The Sky") takes a more prominent singing role on this particular album, nor that Lenny Zakatek ("Games People Play") is given the secondary lead singer role. The American market was beckoning, and the APP were more than willing to make a few adjustments.
The album begins with "Prime Time", a blatant attempt at rewriting "Eye In The Sky" for further chart success -- the moody electric piano at the beginning takes on a familiar tone when matched up with the minimalist bass line, and this doesn't seem like a coincidence. The song itself is half-decent, but nothing really special; Woolfson's voice is as "okay" as ever, and the music suffers from the same mix of high grandeur and bland self-parody that plagues much APP material (besides which, Chris Rainbow's backing vocals are a bit irritating). Ian Bairnson's guitar solo at the end might as well have been a leftover take from the "EitS" recording sessions, and the group makes no effort to hide the similarity. Not the best of all openings, this song made #34 in America when released as the third single from the album.
The tracks between the bookends on Side One represent the weakest point of the album. "Let Me Go Home" is a run-of-the-mill corporate rock number, featuring fantasy lyrics at a high-school level, an empty guitar solo, and a mediocre performance by Lenny Zakatek. The track has something of a tune, but that's about it. This one is easily skipped.
Woolfson returns on vocals for "One Good Reason", but it doesn't really help. This is bland, amateur-sounding pop featuring a rudimentary synthesizer line -- I believe that "clinical" may be the proper name for music of this sort. The "Eye In The Sky" guitar solo makes another brief appearance, automatically becoming the best part of the song in the process. The Beatle-esque harmonies at the end don't really help matters much. This isn't so much obnoxious as vacuous, but that hardly counts as a point in its favour.
We then move to "Since The Last Goodbye", the worst track on the album. This is the "ballad" of the release, sung without any hint of irony -- the bass intro isn't too bad, but it only lasts for a few seconds, leading to the banality which follows rather quickly. The lyrics get a bit better in the second verse, then collapse again at the chorus. This is another assembly line track, and could be excised fairly easily. [Incidentally, I'm not certain of the singer on this number. It clearly isn't Zakatek, Woolfson or Blumstone, and I'm not certain that it's Rainbow (if it is, there's little trace of his usual falsetto).]
"Don't Answer Me" isn't such a bad idea for a song, but the execution leaves a bit to be desired. Woolfson actually does a fairly decent job of singing on this one, the percussion effects are fairly interesting, and Mel Collins's saxophone solo is fairly good (certainly better than his performance on "Old And Wise", in any event). And yet. And yet the song still has a strong element of blandness to it, in spite of all of its better points. Not a terrible number, this still fails to be even as much as the sum of its parts. This made #15 when it was released as the second single from the album.
"Dancing On A High Wire" is a bit of a disgrace, saddling Colin Blumstone's distinctive voice with possibly the worst lyrics on the album (without which the track would certainly receive a higher rating). The guitar intro is half-decent, as is the rhythm behind it ... and Paton's bass feature is fairly good as well ... but these just don't add up to terribly much. The solo fades out just as a somewhat interesting guitar solo is developing, further adding to my impressions of the work as a whole.
The last three songs on the album are better, though not necessarily by that much. "You Don't Believe" is the best of the "pop songs" on the album, and is accordingly somewhat unusual for featuring Lenny Zakatek. The bass line seems to be "Sirius" played faster, and some aspects of the song have a banal edge to them -- for some reason, though, this one fits together better than the related tracks seem to. The lyrics, moreover, are somewhat intriguing -- a line like "They're my songs, but they're your compositions" might not mean much in and of itself, but, when taken in conjunction with several other lines of this sort, is enough to make one wonder if Woolfson was ironically commenting on his role in the band. This, oddly enough, was the first single from the album -- reaching only #54.
"Pipeline" is the album's instrumental track, featuring a mildly spacey theme (comme toujours). This isn't a terribly developed number, and doesn't go anywhere terribly interesting at its end, but it works fairly well as an ambient, vaguely lush design. Mel Collins makes a few more appearances, to the benefit of the song.
Finally, the album concludes with "Ammonia Avenue", its sole "epic". The structure of this track seems strongly based on "Silence And I" from the previous album, and would end up losing if a direct comparison were to be made. Woolfson uses the better range of his voice here, with acoustic guitar accompaniments at the beginning working fairly well. The middle section of this song is the most "progressive" section of the album, with keyboard and acoustic guitar passages that would probably have improved the rest of the work -- electric effects follow as well. This is obviously a token inclusion, and may be mostly bluff, but it's still the best thing here. [By the way, I have no idea what the lyrics are about.]
This is hardly an essential album. Those curious in the APP would be better advised to check out one of their earliest releases.
(review originally posted to alt.music.yes on 14 April 1998)