If you like the Skorps...
Drew Cheney | Sacramento, CA United States | 09/21/2005
(5 out of 5 stars)
"...then you probably already know about this album. Being an older, harder-to-find piece (I'm speaking about the graveyard cover, not the black-with-portraits cover), if you really want some good tunes, then you've found them.
Though this album sounds dated at times (music styles), there are other instances where the music takes some very "modern" turns. You can't say that the Skorpions were ahead of their time -as a whole- but they certainly were inching towards a kind of newness, borne of their great musical abilities. When you have good musicians working together, you're going to get good music.
The quality of the recording is very good, too, which is very evident when you compare this album to other albums of its time; there's some great music that's poorly recorded, and this is not in that camp.
The reason I wanted this album was so I could get my hands on the full, un-edited version of "Sails of Charon" [see EDIT below]. Great mood, GREAT guitar work, great song. Some German bands would get campy, and though the Skorpions' lyrics sometimes lean towards the Old-Navy-Commercial feel, "Sails..." somehow manages to keep a straight face.
Overall, there are some great songs, and Roth really shines on this last album with the rest of the boys. If you want some radio-play Skorpions, this is not the album for you. If you want some good music with that fun, rockin' feel (and a good ballad thrown in... c'mon... it's the SKORPIONS...), then you'll enjoy this album.
EDIT: It's been brought to my attention that I was misled in my research, and that this version of "Sails" is the same length as on the black-covered album. I'm sorry if my review led anyone to repurchase this CD, if there was no care about the original artwork. I was told that the Japanese pressing might have the longer intro... but I can't confirm."
The Trimmed Sails of Charon
Jason Brown | SLC, UT | 01/07/2008
(4 out of 5 stars)
"Great album, as is all the Scorpions' '70s output, IMO, but I partly bought this based on the previous reviewer's mention of the full version of The Sails Of Charon, which as of this writing isn't the case. This disc is the same as the cheaper domestic version. All track lenghts are identical between them. If having the original artwork isn't important to you (which admittedly it is to me), go for the cheaper black cover with the band's photographs."