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Rating: The reaction of 38 Special to the flop of their previous album, “Strength in Numbers,” is surprising and, all things considered, positive. The band says goodbye (for a while) to their most prominent musician so far, Don Barnes, lured away by a solo career that, incidentally, would never actually materialize. In his place—not just his guitar, his voice, his recently watered-down songwriting—a completely different guy steps in… on keyboards! A new entry for the group.
His name is Max Carl and his style is nothing like Southern rock—instead, it leans heavily towards the melodic, almost AOR sound. After all, he comes from Nebraska, a land where meters of snow fall in winter, not cotton fields and crocodiles in rivers like Jacksonville. He’s definitely a tenor, with a remarkable, melodious but strong timbre, reminiscent of Steve Perry (Journey) or Dave Bickler (Survivor), immediately stamping his songwriting credentials by signing, alone or with others, seven of the eleven tracks and singing six of them.
Among them is a shamelessly catchy ballad titled “Second Chance,” which has nothing—absolutely nothing—of the usual 38 Special, but is deliciously cheesy, with its undulating keyboard backdrop and rhythmic sway fit for a first kiss scene in a romantic movie. In fact, it shoots up the U.S. charts, giving the group a second wind, albeit in a musical context and with an audience totally different from their “canonical” one—much to the chagrin of their early fans.
Incidentally, the album opens with the masculine voice of Van Zant, something we hadn’t heard since the group’s first records, a good ten years before. The opening track gives its name to the whole album and is a solid… rock’n’roll number, of course, even if a bit tainted by some synthesizer lines. But the guitars bark when needed and the vocals—though repetitive—are effective and hard-hitting. The sound, style, and drum mix are pretty dreadful, but that only stands out in hindsight; back then, the percussive section had been invaded by electronics and it hardly raised eyebrows. Even the guitar section feels adulterated: chorus, flanger, and phaser effects abound and heavily mar Jeff Carlisi’s usually flawless work on his Gibsons.
So the welcome return of guitar solos stands out—always concise but compact and punchy, with the right tone when it isn’t too processed. In the previous record, they were entirely absent. There lingers, now even more than before, a certain playfulness in the hooks and the choruses. Synthesizers blatantly reinforce the guitars and sometimes overpower them. But it’s still rock after all, though lighter and even less Southern. At least (sometimes, not always) there’s some compositional substance to be found, Max Carl brings his own flair and purpose.
The guitar arpeggio, skillfully soaked in chorus, under the verses of “Never Be Lonely” is striking; too bad it turns generic on the refrain. The best guitar riff, however, comes near the end, kicking off “Innocent Eyes”—what a blast! It fits perfectly, carried by the bass pedal—like cacio e pepe! Crank it up loud, and further along there’s even a call-and-response duel between the two guitarists (the part vacated by Don Barnes is now filled by Danny Chauncey).
It’s a bipolar album: para-Southern rock’n’roll, led by Donnie Van Zant’s slurred Florida accent, alternates regularly with hard-pop numbers delivered by the tenor stylings of the newcomer. The album is hybrid, a bit bastardized like its predecessor, the limp “Strength in Numbers,” but in comparison it’s compositionally stronger. Half the tracks work. The rest are filler, no doubt.
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