![]() This is a strong sophomore effort from the German lads. One of the important aspects of Scorpions is revealed here too and that is conveying emotion. Most of this record consists of more drawn out songs with a peaceful texture. There are no Jazz elements or psychedelic influences, and the Black Sabbath like guitar tone is gone. More lineup changes were in store for the band throughout the decade, but it must be noted this was their first collaboration with bassist Francis Bucholtz, one of the members of the band's most successful era. but his stuff with Eloy is pretty good too. His style is very energetic, and little things like the cowbell at the end of the "Speedy's Coming" chorus are nice touches. In retrospect, Jürgen Rosenthal, who plays on this album, was the most promising of all three drummers who played in Scorpions while Roth was there. The drum production is courtesy of engineer Mack, who is also responsible for the superb live drum sound on Black Sabbath's "Dehumanizer" recorded 18 years after and to the drum sound on Deep Purple's "Stormbringer", recorded just a few months later in the same studio. Overall, this is also the Scorpions album with the most acoustic guitars on it. There are also some major hippie moments, aside of the lyrics and album cover, such as the tripping section at the beginning of "Far Away", which can't really be found on any other Scorpions album. There are elements on this album which Scorpions never tried before or after such as the Spanish-like chord progression on "They Need a Million" (Therion would rather copy that on "Melez" it also became the staple of a song like Amorphis' "Nightfall" though probably indirectly influenced by Kingston Wall's "Another Piece of Cake"). The result is somewhat eclectic and it is feasible to discern which elements are from the Roth/Dawn Road camp and which ones are from the Scorpions camp (and with or without Michael). To make matters a bit more complicated, the keyboardist who wasn't actually a full member also came from Dawn Road, and some songs were co-written by a former Scorpions member, Rudolf's brother Michael. So technically the band could have taken the name Dawn Road rather than Scorpions. This album was created as two bands came together: two members from Scorpions, who had recorded "Lonesome Crow", and three members from Dawn Road. This album is very diverse in its sound and song structures, probably due to the new members' influences from Uli's band Dawn Road, and the band looking for material to fill an album as much as musical direction. Fly to the Rainbow is another growing experience for the Scorpions and the band would truly hit the jackpot with the following year's In Trance.The second full-length album by the legendary German Hard Rock band. Roth insists, however, on taking center stage for "Drifting Sun," which exposes his shameless Hendrix-isms, down to the opening riff lifted straight out of "Spanish Castle Magic." And while it closes the album in rather schizophrenic fashion, the epic nine-minute title track would become a concert standard - albeit without its senseless folky intro. In fact, the band bursts out of the gate in surprisingly straightforward fashion with the hard rocking "Speedy's Coming" before resorting to the aforementioned bad habits on otherwise promising tracks such as "Fly People Fly" and "They Need a Million" the first never really gets off the ground, seeming almost like a prelude to the title track, and the second is let down by the weak vocals of guitarists Rudolf Schenker and Uli Jon Roth, who have no business competing against vocalist Klaus Meine. On their second effort, Fly to the Rainbow, the Scorpions begin to establish their trademark hard-rock sound while exorcising the last of their remaining psychedelic hippie tendencies.
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