Anteater

What a difference two years playing shows non-stop, some experimental ideas and a willingness to take a few risks does for a band! It is here on Once Around The World, produced by famed space rock pioneer Steve Hillage of Gong, where the rudimentary pop sensibilities from Big Lad... begin to diversify and meld fantastically with the progressive tendencies that It Bites are no longer afraid of hiding. It bombed commercially and went over the heads of most critics, but that's all part of the fun in writing about it now!

So, to start with, there's quite a bit to like here for both the casual and more serious listener. Hard-hitter ‘Midnight’ and the oddly spacious 'Black December' retain the straightforwardness that marked their debut approach, but once we get to ‘Yellow Christian’ you'll notice a clear development in how Dunnery and co. are approaching song structure while still flourishing in vibrant guitar-driven hooks, resulting in one hella awesome ballad. “Hunting the Whale”, too, is definitely better than anything these guys did before, along with possessing one hell of a bridge. All of this, however, pales to the well-edged knottinness of 'Rose Marie', a hard rocking marvel which is pure pop-prog perfection for three minutes and 34 seconds:



Moving along though, the compositional merits and intricacies of the two longest cuts here, ‘Old Man & the Angel’ and the title track are absolutely magnificent, and in some ways define everything It Bites had originally aspired to become at their formation back in 1982: progressive rock in the vein of Genesis melded with not-quite Queen power-pop theatrics, tightened & topped with a sharp rock n' roll sensibility while playing together with the sort of chemistry you’d expect from bands more at home in jazz clubs. One listen through the extremely rocking ‘Rose Marie’ or the second half of ‘Yellow Christian’ will convince you if you don’t believe me, and their live performances are even better!

In any case, I suppose what I’m getting at is that although some of their debut material’s questionable at best (AKA ‘Calling All The Heroes’, 'Wanna Shout'), it’s a sophomore album like this that illustrates a common truth in bands; even if the debut isn’t that great or a mixed bag, if a group can learn from the experience and hone their sound well enough then the ensuing sophomore album will, more often than not, definitely showcase that band’s strengths at their creative peak, and Once Around The World is a textbook example. The title track alone is a measuring stick at just how big a difference twenty months can make!

So, even if this isn't your cup of tea, quit putting New Order, The Church, The Smiths, etc. on pedestals and wake up; we have entire magazines and a thousandfold reviews devoted to glorifying all of those classic works already. What we have here on the other hand is a bit different from the usual fare, an album that does successfully in one release what a hundred other bands since the mid 80’s have tried to do but failed miserably at for the most part: make progressive rock interesting and relevant to people who couldn’t give a shit otherwise, and with a few exceptions I have yet to hear too much that comes as close to that particular ideal.

Despite some of its moments of cheese, this is one of my favorite albums of all time and THE essential release from this band. Get it even if you don’t get anything else by these folks, and that’s an order!


Here's some killer live renditions from this album to put my review into perspective a bit.

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