Artist: Asia
Label: Frontiers Records
Released: 2010
Running time: 61:50
Rating: 3/5
After the album “Phoenix”, which marked the return of the classic lineup of John Wetton (vocals, bass), Steve Howe (guitar), Geoff Downes (keyboards) and Carl Plamer (drums), Asia decided to keep going. The guys figured it was worth it, that they feel good together and, last but not least, the main thing: they felt they could still write material together. The kind of material the classic Asia is known for. Let me drop a hint for anyone who might still be living under the illusion that there’s another Asia out there today. That’s Asia FJP (read: Asia featuring John Payne). It inherited the legacy of all the Asia albums released between 1992 and 2004. During that period Geoff Downes was the only original member left in the lineup. Since John Payne wrote practically all the material in that era, the authorship rights belong to him. Downes, meanwhile, along with his three buddies from the eighties Asia, has finally delivered a new album from the classic Asia, titled “Omega”. That makes it the fifth Asia album from the classic lineup. Let me list them quickly: “Asia”, “Alpha”, “Astra”, “Phoenix”, “Omega”.
“Phoenix” left us with pretty mixed feelings, a sense of unoriginality and self-repetition, of hiding behind the glory of past eighties hits, and artistically it didn’t fully convince. If I want to stay nasty, it even raised the question of why a new album was needed at all. “Omega” fixes that bitter aftertaste. For the first time in their career the band brought a producer into the studio. Up to “Phoenix” they had always produced their albums themselves. So at the producer’s helm we find Mike Paxman, who is responsible, for example, for the sound of Uriah Heep’s latest studio effort “Wake The Sleeper” (2008).
Paxman brought out a warm, live sound in the songs, which is a novelty compared to the band’s deliberately inflated (arena-sized) production sound of old. That way he managed to squeeze even more compactness out of the songs, more cohesion between the building blocks of the otherwise unique Asia sound, and to highlight the bond between the four musicians, you could say a kind of studio chemistry. The new album sounds far more organic and real. That helps boost the dynamics and intensity, especially of the mid-tempo songs, which once again lead the way on the album. This production suits songs like Still The Same or Don’t Wanna Loose You Now best. Both carry a pinch of The Beatles’ charm, inherited and engraved into their polished melodicism.
The album’s second track, Through My Veins, also builds a phenomenal theatrical atmosphere with this kind of production. The song is based on a dramatic guitar motif leaning on a mid-tempo groove. The guitar motif blends perfectly with the curtain of keyboards in the background, which deepen the dramatic ambience of the song. It’s one of the most dramatic songs on the album, I’d even say dark, and the melancholy we’re used to from Asia is capitalized on to the max. Not a trace of pathos. The same goes for the ballad There Was A Time. This song, with a whiff of Celtic melos, gradually builds its atmosphere, round after round. Here Asia show they’re masters of “bending” motifs and weaving them together, adding new instrumental ornaments to the core of the leading motifs with every round. Wetton’s unmistakable voice also comes through most intensely at moments like There Was A Time. With emotion, of course. These two songs are dressed to perfection and pull the best out of the quartet on the new album. Sadly, there are fewer moments on “Omega” that win you over completely.
Finger On The Trigger is a cover of a song from the album “Rubicon” by the project Icon. Predictably, it chases the way the other Asia albums by this lineup open. In a run of chorus lines like “You have your finger on the trigger,…” and then “You know this thing is getting bigger…” it signals that the quartet’s bloodstream and nervous system still have youthful potency in 2010, whenever they feel like standing to attention. The song has it all. A big, demanding chorus melody loaded with multi-vocal harmonies, partly run through Downes’s vocoder, Wetton’s recognizable singing style that proves how confident and well preserved he still is, and of course, in a small but necessary dose, Howe’s “noodling” up and down the guitar neck. The main change the song went through is of course the guitar arrangements. They directly prove that Howe isn’t a rocker type of guitarist, but a jazzer. But if you want Finger On The Trigger on an Asia album, then Howe must (!) play it.
From there on, here’s what happens. The melancholy isn’t always capitalized on to the max, so we get moments that can come across as cheesy for 2010, and also childish and long outlived. What’s most interesting about these songs is that their most convincing parts are either the instrumental middle sections, the intro and outro motifs, or shorter instrumental passages. You can get a totally cheerful, childish verse motif, and then the solid drama of the chorus fixes that sugar-overdose feeling (Holy War, I Believe). That feeling is hard to shake when Listen Children and/or Emily (a bonus track on the European edition of the album) roll by, and once again an instrumental trick saves it, when Steve Howe picks up the steel pedal guitar in its outro.
Ever Yours, the album’s first ballad, is a “stolen” piece from the Wetton/Downes project Icon. It has nothing special going for it and you could easily skip it with no great loss. In its place, the ballad There Was A Time would fit perfectly right at position no. 4. That way we’d get rid of a “filler” track, and the album would be nicely shortened too. Over 61 minutes of music on “Omega” is decidedly too much for the predictable template of Asia songwriting.
End Of The World is a moment of typical Wetton and Downes collaboration, where the band, through the calm of the song, squeezes out the essence once more, and the melancholy in it brings back the typical feelings you get from listening to Asia. Still, it’s the kind of song that could have found a home on the Icon project without any trouble.
Only Light The Way is a song where Asia pulled off what they were looking for in the cheerful motifs and the predictable (already heard) arrangements of the new songs. From head to tail. Without trivially smelling like the Icon project. The track is led by a keyboard motif that’s atypical for Asia and so far unheard. All in all, it’s a different kind of Asia song, even though the guys remain devoted to following the lines of John Wetton’s typical vocal arrangements.
So how do I wrap this up? The feeling remains split. A few songs are excellent, a few solid, and some lack more confidence. A rocker or two would have fit in nicely. But you can’t expect miracles from jazz purist Steve Howe. Even Finger On The Trigger, which is an Icon song after all, had to be served up to him on a plate by Wetton and Downes before Dr. Owl remembered what a “roaring” guitar riff is. “Omega” is a better album than the rather “sterile” “Phoenix”. But it’s nothing to jump up and down to heaven with joy about (if heaven exists, which I doubt). Above all, the album sounds much more consistent, compact and well-rounded. Mostly thanks to the excellent choice of producer. Above all, the trivially predictable design of some songs, the ones wearing that “childish eighties” face of songwriting, is carefully masked behind excellent production cosmetics. These songs get the lively, dynamic character they need, which keeps “Omega” in the quality zone throughout. Definitely, “Omega” isn’t the best Asia have got in them, but we finally have an album that can boast the real punch of Asia’s trademark consistency. Let’s put it this way too. With “Omega”, Asia have satisfactorily “revitalized” those aspects of their music that fans of the band kind of expect in their bones. For the “satisfactorily” to grow into a true superlative, though, we’ll have to wait for the next album. The wise ones say the third time’s the charm.
Lineup
John Wetton – vocals, bass
Steve Howe – guitar
Geoff Downes – keyboards
Carl Palmer – drums
Production
Mike Paxman
Track list
1. Finger on the Trigger
2. Through My Veins
3. Holy War
4. Ever Yours
5. Listen Children
6. End of the World
7. Light The Way
8. Emily (*)
9. Still The Same
10. There Was a Time
11. I Believe
12. Don’t Wanna Lose You Now
(*)… bonus track
