Reviewed by Rob Slater
Released: November 1981 Neal Schon & Jan Hammer Untold Passion Genre: Decent Keytar Music With Homages To A Lot Of Other Bands Rating: 3.5 out of 5 Mediumlights: I'm Talking To You I'm writing this after listening to it twice while working on wiring electrical outlets. So, all the skips are on the third listen. This album is much better as moderately loud background music. It would drive my partner, Elena, nuts! After about 30 seconds, she'd skip ahead and say something about wanking. Wasting Time - What you would expect, lots of wanking. Neil Schon's voice is better than one would expect. Lyrics/rhymes are on the mundane/obvious side. I'm Talking To You - This one’s a little more accessible, with the wanking a little more backgroundy. Some nice keyboards from Jan. The Ride - The opening is inauspicious. Then a little nice guitar. Then more goofy 80s synth. Then a little nice guitar. Finally, after about 3:00 annoying keyboard breaks, there's a nice one that sounds like Rhodes piano. The bass is nice, sounds like Geddy Lee's Rick. I made it 1:35 out of. 4:41 (instrumental) I'm Down - Nice vocals from Neil. Not sure how to define this, but I don't really appreciate it, other than the skill of the players. Some aspects of Alex [wife's and] Lifeson guitar that sounds like a RUSH song that I wouldn't actually like. Arc - The opening to this Jan Hammer instrumental is good; it sounds like Judas Priest, I made it 1:12 out of 3:58. (3rd time) It's Alright - some more Judas Priest-like guitar. The bass player has limited opportunities to show off. Repetitive and boring. 55 seconds. Hooked On Love - 33 seconds in and it gets decent, but I actually skipped forward and then went back a few seconds to nail this timing. More stupid, obvious rhymes. Skipped about halfway through. On The Beach - Nice opening. I could hear this as a live Journey song. Definitely. The keys are understated, and not too 80s. Still became a little repetitious, but at least we don't have any lyrics to make it worse. About halfway through a little annoying Hammer, not Max's Silver one, however, which might not be a bad idea. Just a little tap. All in all, a decent song. Hammers interludes that are annoying happen rarely enough to not ruin the song. Actually listen to it all the way through, all 5 minutes 27 seconds. Untold Passion - I actually like this Hammer instrumental, though clocking in at 7:02 tells me I probably will want to skip ahead to the bonus track. Nice guitar solo about halfway through. I believe there hasn't been much, if any guitar up to this point in the song. It's at least interesting. There's more guitar as it goes on and that's nice. But it's repetitious. It would be a quite nice song at about 4:44. Planet Empathy - It sounds like Styx, one of Dennis DeYoung's less interesting songs. Putting this on as a bonus track instead of on the original album was probably a good idea. Never mind, if they shortened the beginning, I would definitely keep it on the album. Some nice flamenco sounding guitar, though I think it's electric. And then some rather pleasant wanking. Overall, a decent album to listen to while you’re making pizza, building a house, or working on a story set in the '80s. It’s kinda like a Steven King novel that would be so much better if someone did some editing.
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