RATING: 12 / 13 – 4 W4RM 4ND COMFY B4THROB3 M4D3 OF FL4VOR 4ND M3LODY
This is another one of the albums that I happened to buy later than most. There’s not really any Flash tunes on it, and, being unfamiliar with the catalog, I had naturally gravitated towards stuff I recognized at first.
I had no particular expectations, good or bad, with regards to this album. Because of this, my first listen-through of the album, months ago, was all the more gratifying.
Most of the songs on this album feature just a handful of instruments. But there’s a deceptive complexity to the music, and layers of counter-melody are scattered throughout. The interplay between the synth lead and the strings in Sunrise… the skittery piano set against natural woodwinds in Firefly Cloud… it’s taken to an extreme in The Scratch with improvisational piano and sampled musique-concrete. The simplicity of the orchestration only serves to highlight the quality of the melodies.
This is my favorite of all the solo albums (and there have been some excellent solo albums). Erik Scheele has a very significant talent for songwriting.