And so Saga have one last chance to impress me. Is it likely? At the moment I would say I’m slightly less meh towards them, but not much. This, then, is the third album I’m taking, going on recommendations from their fanbase, and as it’s a good deal more recent than the first two, who knows what might happen?
House of Cards (2001)
So we’re now twenty years ahead of
Worlds Apart, and it’s interesting to me to note that this album did not chart, nor have any hit singles. Could it be better for that, or will it be a really poor effort? Still no long tracks, despite this having twelve, the most of the three I’ve looked at so far. The opener, “God Knows”, has a long-ish ambient sort of intro but then turns into another sort of uptempo boppy thing, though there is a harder edge to this, I will admit. The speech samples are quite annoying, and this is not the first time Saga have done this. I can’t say this excites me anyway. It’s not terrible but it’s still kind of meh, and really, I’ve always been a believer that you need a good track to kick an album off, and this isn’t it. Maybe it’ll get better. “The Runaway” has a sort of AOR feel to it, which has always been where I see Saga more positioned than as a prog band. It’s pretty guitar driven, and again it’s okay but not what I would call a breakout track. Sounds a little like something maybe Pat Benatar would have put out in the mid-eighties.
Could “Always There” be that breakout song? It’s certainly caught my attention, so that’s a start. Sort of a slow-ish acoustic guitar riff running through it, with a nice hook in the melody. I have to say, I like this one. Again though it has more an kind of maybe indie vibe rather than anything prog, but then Marillion have “After Me” and there are plenty of non-proglike songs in the catalogue of any prog band you care to name, so that’s not really a minus against them. I don’t think i’d call this a ballad, but it certainly is the slowest track so far. And, at the moment, far and away the best. “Ashes to Ashes” is a lot more proggy now, and I think I may also like this one. Got a sense of mid-era Arena about this, for sure. Another of the Chapters things. Good keyboard parts, with some ambient sounds in there too. It is a little repetitive though. Far better is “Once in a Lifetime”, a sort of waltzy semi-ballad that sounds like it could really have what it takes, as long as they don’t blow it as they tend to do so often.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CkmEb32jjE
No they didn’t try to overextend it or make it into something it wasn’t. That was very pleasant, and a good hook in it too. If they wrote more songs like that it’s possible Saga might impress me more, or at least induce me to look into their other albums (this is fourteen of twenty-two, so far), and in fact “Only Human”, rather surprisingly, continues the trend set down by “Once in a Lifetime” (there is another track, called, rather appropriately, “So Good, So Far”, but it’s not on my version, being only available on US and Japanese pressings). Another kind of semi-ballad with some nice soft percussion and picked guitar, it has a good sense of emotion in the vocal, and even an almost Rotheryesque guitar solo. Impressive.
And it more or less keeps going with “That’s How We Like It”, which ups the tempo but resists the urge to do their usual and stomp and bounce along, keeping well clear of the pop side of things, and again putting me in mind of Arena and maybe It Bites too. The chorus is perhaps a little cheesy, but I can probably forgive them that, seeing as, after a shaky start, this album is proving to be much more enjoyable than I had expected. The short piano instrumental is lovely, and then another uptempo but no less great song in “We’ll Meet Again” with some fine guitar work and a driving beat, and this is another of the Chapters. That leaves us with only two tracks, and to be fair, even if they’re s
hit - and at this point I don’t think they will be - this album is still a quantum leap forward for me in my attempt to get into Saga. Maybe the later albums are where it’s at.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFI-YlJZK8I
Okay well there’s a somewhat embarrassing semi-rap or chant at the opening of “Money Talks”, but once it gets going it’s a pretty damn fine song, even if it does tend a little too far into pop, even (shudder) boyband territory. The hook is enough to earn it forgiveness for that though, and I’m still engaged. We end then on a sort of descending piano line into a guitar riff and a strange laugh as we pile into the title track, with a sort of boogie blues tune which confuses me a little, and I would have to say it’s not the ending I would have hoped for. “Money Talks” would have been a much more satisfying closer, not to mention that they bring those speech samples back in and really I find the track quite a mess. It’s a poor final taste of this band, but I’m still happy enough with this album, head and shoulders above the other two I listened to.
Track listing
God Knows
The Runaway
Always There
Ashes to Ashes (Chapter 11)
Once in a Lifetime
Only Human
That’s How We Like It
Watching the Clock
We’ll Meet Again (Chapter 15)
Money Talks
House of Cards
So at the end of my little excursion through the music of Saga in three albums, have I changed my mind? Well, a little, to be honest, mostly based on this one. I still don’t see them as a band I would be too interested in pushing myself to like, and if, as I imagine is the case, it’s only the later albums - say, those in this century - that might appeal to me, well then there are another, what, eleven albums I’d have to listen to which I might not like. And it’s not worth that. Not to mention that, should I find I do like the post-2000 ones, there are only eight more of them to listen to. I can’t see that it’s worth my while, whichever way I look at it.
All I can say is that I’ve gained a smidgeon more respect for them as a band, but as a progressive rock band, I’m afraid that, a few tracks here and there apart, I really don’t see it. If I had an icon that was a partial smile, I’d use it, but I can’t say Saga have put a smile on my face yet. Still, it’s a better result that it was before I began, and I guess that’s something.
Result for this album: 
Result so far: 
Final result (for now) on Saga: