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Rating: There's no denying it: although not very original, the instrumental "Armenia" is truly evocative, lunar, and that echoing guitar even has some Steve Howe-like passages. A perfect ending for an album as truly awful as this!
Unlike the first volume, "Archiva 2" highlights all the shortcomings of a band without ideas and lacking even the most casual innovations, whose keyboardist is trapped in a time-space bubble where it's always May 12, 1984. As in the much richer first volume, however, it is when they break away from the typical Asia production norms that they do better, and it's possible to fully endorse the unoriginal yet carefree rock vibe of "Love Like The Video" and bluesy-rock vibe of "Satellite Blues".
Beyond that, when Downes and company attempt to step away from the most basic easy listening, they create almost enormous gaps in the water. The FM rock tracks fail to captivate this time, and in "The Higher You Climb" the decent choruses are killed by those insulting Bon Jovi-esque "wooh-oh" between verses.
On the much more crowded ballad front, there's even more to worry about. The only half-decent one is "Moon Under Water", whose evocative atmospheres are nullified by the Play-Doh-like sounds typical of Geoff Downes. For the rest, bland power ballads, boring-slow tracks, a song that sounds like Venditti, and another that resembles Michael Bolton.
Everything good in the first volume disappears in the second chapter, where Asia simply revert to being Asia. Maybe in Armenia it became a platinum album, though!
Tracklist and Lyrics
08 That Season (04:52)
I told her, I'd hold her
All through that first cold winter
Defend her, protect her
From our darkest demons
Then spring came, our world changed
We found a different corner
Still heading, still searching
For what we had that season
I thought I was so strong, a man on a blue mountain
The sword in my hand, but my thoughts in the clouds then
See them
Hear them
I would never change another day
If that season was the one to stay
I swear I'd never change another day
Ten years now, I've waited
For that coldest winter
No whiter, no wiser
And all we hear is thunder
I thought I was so strong, a father on a mountain
The sword in my hand, but my thoughts in the clouds then
See them
Hear them
I would never change another day
If that season was the one to stay
I swear I'd never change another day
(repeat)
Ten years now, I've waited
For that coldest winter
No wiser, no whiter
Oh how I miss that season
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