Asia
Aria

THE REVIEW

Anyone familiar with this band knows perfectly well that with every album, they need to note the line-up changes... Once they returned with the solid "Aqua," in 1994 Steve Howe leaves (for the second time) as well as that bunch of A-list session men who were attached to the band... Like saying "come take a ride with us, but at the end of the line, you get off"... Carl Palmer also leaves, and the supergroup that was has definitively gone to ruin. Now, at least, if their records flop, one can console themselves with the fact that not a single big name, not a single 'infallible' remains. The regained vocation towards the (bottom-of-the-glass-flavored) prog of "Aqua" disappears once again along with Steve Howe, sacrificed yet again on the altar of 80s rock... And we are in 1994!

The writer here has no problem at all if the record is out of fashion, as long as it pleases them, and to be fair this "Aria" isn't really ugly. Particularly thanks to the choruses, mostly graceful and spot-on. To this is added the powerful vocals of John Payne, truly an excellent vocalist. Sure, there are tracks that, in my opinion, just don't work, like "Are You Big Enough?," a song that sounds as if it was recorded by Simon Le Bon Jovi, or "Sad Situation," space pop rock a bit too predictable, with keyboard parts that in '94 sound like they did in '82. Or again in "Remembrance Day," almost unlistenable solemn pomp rock, and "Military Man" (the titles already say it all), a return to the schemes and clichés of their early (and certainly not better) records.

As is usual for Asia, the opening track is the best, and "Anytime" fully respects the tradition; "Summer" has a delicate and semi-acoustic approach, but inevitably becomes pomp. Pitrelli tries to imitate Howe in the solo. Weakish verses and a nice chorus for "Don't Cut The Wire," noted for the fine final stretch where keyboard and guitar blend their sounds. As dark as the verse is, the chorus is that sunny, even with hands clapping in time, for "Enough's Enough." Sure, the keyboard solo in style of "The Final Countdown" fits just like a dive into a glass of sodium-free water...

For the epic rides, in search of 'prog sensations,' the interstellar journeys and the FM rock of a decade ago, in two episodes Asia prefer to offer something classical, lyrical. In the very shouted "Desire" Payne and his operatic choirs make the song. Geoffrey Downes instead attempts it by inserting keyboards that recall the strings of the Rondò Veneziano; "Feels Like Love" seems like an excerpt from a rock opera. Effective. I would rename this genre - considering my penchant for "pointless" names - "Arena di Verona Rock." The concluding title track is a 'piano and voice' on which are grafted the keyboards of the Rondò Veneziano and the choirs of "Desire" reappear, a track on which evidently Downes and company had high hopes.

Nice record that doesn't extend the breath of a band that, if it doesn't change its genre, or at least its intellectual approach to its music, if it continues to like itself as it is, without ever going too deep, will never be able to hope to reach-return to success. And for once, things went as they had to go.