Reviewed by Rob Slater
Released: August 1981 John Miles Miles High Genre: Foreign Survivors Of The Kiss Starship (Hard Pop Rock with a little too many other less well-played genres to prove how eclectic he is) Rating: 3 out of 5 (I didn’t mind listening to this one. Mostly.) HighMediumlights: (the first 2-3 songs) Peaceful Waters One Step Closer To Paradise The album that Paul Stanley would have made backed by Survivor or Starship. On the next song he sounds like Lou Gramm fronting Chicago. Sex (TYVR, I’m leaving that one intact) and horns and lots of keyboards. And a pretty fine guitar player. Not as bombastic as Meatloaf, but could be Roy Bittan on the keys. If it’s John Miles, I’m impressed. Maybe we can call it grenadastic. Also has kind of a "John Parr St Elmo's Fire" feel. I can hear why Turn You Loose was a single, despite sounding like it was from the late seventies. I guess we're only a few years out from that here. Foolin' - another lost Ferengi, uh, I mean Foreigner song. I think I may have heard it on the radio, but it could also just be that it's so spot on representative of the late 70s early 80s that I can’t tell. I can tell you it’s not, “Fu, fu, fu, foolin’!” Don't Want The Same Thing. Kind of Bee Gees. "Don't want to change things." This pretty much sums up the song. Almost the same as the last one. Out Of The Cradle. Pretty nice Motown, jazz, old time rock and roll blend. Listenable. Definitely good musicians. And it's only 3 minutes and 49 seconds. As opposed to the same thing he didn’t want above, which was the same thing for 5 minutes and 35 seconds. Hold On. This song is 32 lines long. 10 of those lines are verses. Cute. They’re actually in the Limerick rhyme scheme, AAbbA. Enjoy the last 17 lines, with "Hold on" as BLAB BA and “don't let go” replaced with DonLego! Won't you BLAB BA darlin' BLAB BA? Nights are so long Now I know Won't you BLAB BA, can't you BLAB BA? I was so wrong, DONLEGO, DONLEGO, DONLEGO Won't you BLAB BA darlin' BLAB BA? Nights are so long Now I know Won't you BLAB BA, can't you BLAB BA? I was so wrong, DONLEGO, DONLEGO BLAB BA, darlin' BLAB BA Nights are so long Now I know Won't you BLAB BA, can't you BLAB BA? I was so wrong, DONLEGO Won't you BLAB BA, darlin' BLAB BA? Nights are so long…….. Notice how creative he is. The number of times he sings DON’T LET GO varies each chorus: 1x, 3x, 2x, 1x… Hhhmmmm… I wonder what that means? I assume that the double ellipses (or triple [Nope 2 ⅔ ellipses]) might mean that he repeats BLAB BA DONLEGO even more times than Genius Lyrics (a site that this set of lyrics should NOT be on) represented with words. I will not go back and listen to verify. Peaceful Waters. Nice ballad, a bit Steinman-y, but without a whit of wit. I see what Miles is doing… for Miles and Miles. It's kind of like an Irish folk song. Four lines of verse which are only actually two lines repeated twice. Then sing four bars of doobie lala, then the chorus, two new lines repeated twice, lather, rinse, and repeat, if you need the song longer, sing the first verse again. Finish with two times through the chorus. Yes, 2x2x2=8 Dancing for Joy. Too much Motown flavored disco. Can I have some green Kool-Aid instead? One Step Closer to Paradise. Another not too bad Foreigner cut. But, I think I'd only listen to it parked at night with the company of someone I wanted to see partially disrobed with the dashboard light. More good guitar work. But, like I noted above, if you're near paradise, but not by the dashboard light, you are probably just wanking by yourself. Reggae Man. Hey, Mon, you wrote the most average Lou Gramm reggae song in history. Reggae BOAT (Blandest of All Time). Or it could be Reggae BLOAT (Blandest Lyrics of All Time). Oh, this is almost interesting. Have Devo sing the monotonous, "The reggae man good for you..." counterpoint. Closer To You. Okay, Mr. Miles, you really shouldn't have stolen cutting floor songs from the Bee Gees. I think you even stole the backup singer tracks, or their backup singers. I didn't actually skip some of these songs because I was trying to get the review down while music was still playing. :-) Some of them probably coulda, woulda, shoulds been DNFs. All the musicians, especially Mr. Miles, seem very talented, but the songs are pretty mediocre. This is great as long as you're happy listening to a cross between Chris stuffer (TYVR Christopher) Cross and Ferengi Starship. John, eclectic attempts don't really suit you. You should have stuck to what you do well, Cruise Rock (slightly more fiery than Yacht Rock. Many of the musicians mentioned above have probably done at least one of those Rock & Roll cruises for former Rock “Stars” who can’t afford to go on cruises any other way.)
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