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| Reviews
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 Inside
(1973)
This is as far back as I go with
Eloy, Inside being their second studio album, while being
much more highly regarded than the self-titled debt. This album,
along well as its companion piece, the subsequent Floating,
is very different from the later spacey-symphonic style that
the band would become known for. Instead, this period
of Eloy's existence is characterized by extremely intense jamming
and an all around hard rock sound with heavy progressive and
psychedelic tendencies.
"Land of No Body"
is a massive 17 minute track that serves as a fitting introduction
to this period of Eloy's existence. It features tremendously
intense interplay, with some very tasty Hammond organ
and ripping guitar work from Frank Bornemann. All of the tracks
have their share of great moments, and largely chock full of
shredding guitar solos and mind-blowing Hammond organ. Closer
"Up and Down" is a very nice track, and being rather spacey,
sort of foreshadows the band's future in the space-rock/symphonic
vein.
The English lyrics
are generally bad, with Frank Bornemann's vocals heavily colored
by an unintentionally silly sounding German accent. As with
most Eloy albums, this is a major problem, and the most striking
drawback. The follow-up album, the classic Floating,
is primarily instrumentally based, thankfully, which is among
the reasons it manages to trump Inside.
This album, as
well as Floating, is often compared to early Jethro Tull.
I didn't really notice this myself, but after hearing this music
in light of those comments I can sort of hear it; there
is a bluesy, hard rock tendency to the music, and Frank does
sound slightly like Ian Anderson. Inside is closer to
Tull, probably because of the larger vocal presence, but Floating
at least is pretty dissimilar. Personally, I don't
find the comparison particularly useful in that Eloy's sound
at this point is pretty free, organic, and instrumentally based,
they also tend to rock a lot harder with a much looser vibe.
In other words, to suggest that Tull fans would necessarily
enjoy this is probably misleading. In contrast to their later
albums, Inside and Floating represent a much fresher,
less contrived and raw sounding incarnation of Eloy, and both
are worth acquiring. If you're interested in early Eloy, check
out Floating first, then this one. - Greg Northrup
[2001]
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 Floating
(1974)
This is
probably my favorite Eloy album, and ultimately one of the better
albums released through the German symphonic progressive rock
scene. Floating is a big improvement over Inside,
in that it takes everything that was great about that album,
the intense jamming, the Hammond pyrotechnics and Frank's soaring
guitar solos and raises everything a notch. One of the main
attributes of Floating is that it is not based around
the rather mediocre vocals at all. Here the band is given free
reign to stretch out and create some fantastic, powerful instrumental
workouts. The playing here is generally heavy and ferocious,
but Eloy are able to lay off the intensity every once in a while,
in order to build back up to it, displaying an excellent penchant
for dynamic playing.
The lyrics
and vocals are, as is typical with all Eloy albums, poor.
Thankfully, they are sparsely distributed, and one's ear is
more drawn to the blinding instrumental interplay. This
album and Inside have frequently been compared to early
Jethro Tull, but I don't hear the influence much on this album.
This is much more drawn-out and loosely structured, and is actually
heavier. In fact, parts of this album are the closest
Eloy ever came to emulating their countrymen like Amon Duul
II and the Krautrock scene. Although this is probably Eloy's
best album, it is not particularly representative of their overall
style. - Greg Northrup [2001]
Click
Here for Tracklist and Lineup Info
 Dawn
(1976)
Dawn
is actually one
of the better of the symphonic-era Eloy albums, perhaps even
the best. Like most mid-period Eloy, the album carries
an overbearing concept with poor narration, but on the other
hand sees the band at a symphonic peak, going so far as to
employ an orchestra to better deliver their vision.
Listening to this album, I realize that I'm really quite on
the fence with this group. On one hand, some of this
stuff is unbelievably clichéd, dated and pretentious, and
Frank Bornemann's horrendous German accent certainly doesn't
help things. On the other hand, these are musicians who clearly
know what they're doing, and some of this stuff is fucking
magnificent. Musically, this is symphonic prog at its
most grandiose and over-the-top. Organ, moog and gorgeous
synthesizer themes weave exquisite melodies around Matziol's
fluid basslines, a trademark of middle Eloy albums.
Keeping in mind that this came out in 1976, after the English
prog bands had all been tarred and feathered by the press
for stuff that was far less ridiculous than this, and you'd
think it must have taken some real balls on Bornemann's part
to pull out all the stops and bring in the string section.
One on hand, I just have to love the sheer pomposity of the
whole thing. Actually, from a musical standpoint, the
string section is enormously effective, and in light of that,
why it was something that wasn't implemented on later albums
like Ocean and Silent Cries is a mystery to
me. The orchestration is excellent, and mixes well into
the keyboard based arrangements of the group. Some absolutely
gorgeous moments on here folks, but the usual caveats with
Eloy still hold true, poor vocals and poorer lyrics.
All in all, certainly on par with Eloy's best symphonic stuff,
but the slight nod goes to Ocean for a better representation
of this style. -
Greg Northrup [August 2001]
Click
Here for Tracklist and Lineup Info
 Ocean
(1977)
This
is generally regarded as Eloy's magnum opus and their all-time
classic album. Ocean is an ambitious, and yes,
very pretentious, album long concept work. It's
certainly very good, and perfectly epitomizes the symphonic/space-rock
style that they are so well known for. The music here
is generally excellent, and has often been compared to Pink
Floyd, though I find the comparison slightly misleading.
Ocean definitely has a Floydian sense of grandeur
about it, and lead guitarist Frank Bornemann has a tendency
to incorporate majestic, flighty David Gilmour-esque guitar
passages here and there, but overall the album sits comfortably
in the general symphonic progressive genre, with equal notes
taken from Yes or even late-70s contemporaries Camel.
The
sound is very melodic and keyboard based. The drums
keep fairly simple rhythms while beautifully intricate,
melodic bass lines weave in and out of the collage of synthesizer
and guitar work. There is a great concern here with
atmosphere and delivering the appropriate moods of the story,
which has something to do with the fall of Atlantis. Musically
this is impeccable. In addition, the production is excellent,
as everything sounds extremely crisp and lush.
That
said, the faults of the album are sizable. First off,
German bands who try to deliver grand concept albums in
English run a significant risk of falling flat on their
face. If brilliant concept albums like The Lamb...
or A Passion Play, with all their lyrical beauty,
and their mastery of symbolism and metaphor were critically
reviled, then an attempt to create a like-minded narrative
in one's second language is very risky. The
lyrics here are pretty poor, and Frank Bornemann's vocals
take alot of getting used to, because of his heavy German
accent. Also, the concept kind of overextends itself
by the finale "Atlantis' Agony", which is overdrawn and
can get dull. A significant portion of the piece is taken
up by pure narrative; essentially atrocious and incomprehensible
babbling in a German accented voice. Perhaps the concept
and narrative won't totally fail when regarded by a lover
of progressive rock, but is probably laughable to a listener
that is unfamiliar with the idiosyncrasies of our beloved
genre.
This
could be an absolute classic if only the lyrics were in
German. It's tough for me to harp so much on this,
because the music here is for the most part phenomenal,
and the plusses definitely outweigh the faults by a long
shot. That said, Frank's vocals can be gotten used
to after some repeated listening. Ocean is certainly
one of the pillar albums of the German symphonic scene,
and certainly worth checking out.
- Greg Northrup [2001]
 Silent
Cries and Mighty Echoes (1979)
This
is the follow-up studio album to Eloy's beloved Ocean,
and continues in pretty much the same style. Although Silent
Cries... really takes the Pink Floyd influence circa Wish
You Were Here up a notch, I don't think it dominates Eloy's
approach. With that said, this album really deserves the comparison
more than any other Eloy album I've heard. For starters,
the opener "Astral Entrance" totally rips off Pink Floyd's
"Shine on you Crazy Diamond" by having an extended guitar
solo over droning keyboard chords, which gives off an extremely
similar impression. The rest of the album mixes some
very beautiful symphonic tendencies in with the grand, sweeping
Floydian atmospherics. The sound once again is excellent
and overall the music is more rhythmic, complex and focused
than the grand ambitions of its predecessor, Ocean.
Unfortunately, the songs are also heavily based in the Frank
Bornemann's mediocre lyricism and his heavily accented and
distracting vocals, which, as I said in the other Eloy reviews,
are a major drawback.
Though
the music here is impeccably performed and has some very beautiful
moments, it is a tad derivative of Pink Floyd, though perhaps
not as much as people claim. Eloy are unfortunately incapable
of carrying over some of the magical intangibles that Pink
Floyd had, particularly in the realm of biting cynicism and
overwrought, emotional weight. The lyrics here are for the
most part inane, not to mention that they totally take away
from some of the beautiful music. Silent Cries is a
good album that I really enjoy from time to time, but is not
as good as Ocean. If you liked Ocean in
spite of the vocals, you will definitely enjoy this album,
as most of the music is as good.
- Greg Northrup [2001]
Click
Here for Tracklist and Lineup Info
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