Todd Rundgren
2nd Wind

If it had been a jazz rock album like the title track, "2nd Wind" would have been another masterpiece... But it was not. If it had been an album of pop songs like the last two or three with Utopia, there would be nothing to do but appreciate the usual beautiful songs, perhaps lacking flair, not at all surprised to find oneself dealing with the funky of "Love Science" in the middle...

Of course, when listening to a track like "The Smell Of Money," perfect vaudeville in its typical style, then you can't help but feel a bit nostalgic for the seventies and its best works. But here we are in 1991...

Sure, "Change Myself" is an excellent soul pop, a style in which Mr. Runt excels, and good are the super ballad "If I Had To Be Alone," which in some passages crosses over into jazz, and the soul of "Who's Sorry Now," which in turn deviates into something undeciphered, only to triumphantly return to the main road.

Yet, Rundgren gets lost in the magniloquence of tracks perhaps born for a rock opera or better for a more "simple" musical; thus "Love In Disguise" and "Kindness" are extremely boring and fruitless. And the superlative rock opera track "Public Servant" serves little if its grit gets dampened by "Gaya's Eyes," a subdued soul without a single note that sounds new.

In the midst of a crossroads where the soul pop of the first decade of his career, the theatricality of the musical (a few years later he wrote one), the "Utopian" pop of the early '80s, and the not marked presumption, as was with the previous album "Nearly Human," to put out a sort of semi-concept album, this work offers nothing new, though the average quality, as well as the number of tracks deserving a passing grade, are notably higher than the last attempts.

And then, since by now the wind has changed, and whether you like it or not you've become a cult artist (in the sense that you don't sell much?), why not try to dare a bit more? Maybe even exaggerate?

Exaggeration will be exactly what he does a couple of years later. And for the reviewer, it will be tough. And also for those who usually read his little pages.