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Living Eyes

Bee Gees - Living Eyes Audio CD

A fair review of the Bee Gees "Living Eyes" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all Bee Gees reviews here, or go back to the Bee Gees tabs.

Band: Bee Gees
Title: Living Eyes
Rating:

Release Date: 1981-01-01
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Living Eyes 2: He's a Liar 3: Paradise 4: Don't Fall in Love With Me 5: Soldiers 6: I Still Love You 7: Wildflower 8: Nothing Could Be Good 9: Crying' Every Day 10: Be Who You Are

The Bee Gee's:The Next Phase
The disco backlash had swept through the industry and helped fuel an already bad recession. Generally speaking so many things in music changed after 1980. The Bee Gee's were right at the center of the storm. As the newfound blue eyed soul influence of their music hit during the mid 70's it was bang on time for the disco era and that's how it manifested itself:Barry Gibb's piercing high voice and all. So while they had no problem landing a lot of hits and. . . . . well honestly and quality of the songs and the grooves were strong they become condemned by what I've heard called the "freeze out". Obviously continuing in a disco oriented direction wasn't going to work for the Gibb's anymore so they had to try something else. The interesting thing about this album is that they really didn't know exactly what that new style was going to be so they scanned the trends and came up with an idea. Since blue eyed soul,as a genre had transitioned from disco to what was being called "soft rock" and since The Bee Gee's had already made music that pioneered both genres in many ways that seemed the wisest route to take. The result is an album that generally takes a detour from dance songs,all of which were usually mistaken for disco at this time whether they were or not so this album consisted largely of what I'd best described as soft rock n' soul ballads that were as heavily orchestrated,crafted and produced. . . . as what had come on albums such as Spirits Having Flown. So basically they sound a bit the way they did in the late 70's only there's no disco type tunes. The title song,"He's A Liar" and "Cryin' Every Day"" are the only real uptempo songs and they are actually pretty edgy rock n soul with some very mild new wave synth influence. The majority of this album consists of softer ballads such as "Wildflower","Paradise" and "Be Who You Are" and the best of those tunes is the soulful,compositionally involved "Nothing Could Be Could". The result didn't exactly pay off commercially and this ended up being their last album for seven years as a result. It's not a bad album if your in the right kind of kind. Interesting enough it does show that in terms of rhythmic invention the Bee Gee's actually gained a lot more than they lost during their late 70's period.

Living Eyes Review
This CD was very underrated and it shows the phenominal melodies of the Bee Gees even after the Disco Era. I would reccommend Living Eyes to anyone.

A Great Overlooked Album
Natual in 1974. This album which came out in the Fall of 1981 was the least commercially successful album for the Bee Gees going back to Mr. It Followed, of course, the great success of Saturday Night Fever(1978) and "Spirits Having Flown" (1979) with their disco theme. The boys had just finished writing and producing the Barbra Streisand album( "Guilty") which sold over 14 million copies world-wide and was the most successful album of her career to the present day. They had also written and Barry had produced "Heartbreaker" for Dionne Warwick which had revived her career. This album "Living Eyes" moved the boys into a more adult/contemporary direction. The title track peaked at #45 after the first single, "He's a Liar" had peaked at #30. But the best tracks on the album are "Paradise" and "Don't Fall in Love with Me, Baby". They are both soulful ballads with their charateristic great harmony. However, there was a strong "anti Bee Gee" reaction going on in the country in late 1981 and they had been too indentified with disco to escape this backlash. This is too bad for this is one of their more emotional, soulful album offerings and deserved much better respect from pop radio at the time. But, in their determined way they went on to their next project(writing and producing Kenny Rogers in 1983 as well as writing and singing 5 tracks for the Saturday Night Fever follow-up("Staying Alive in 1983, something which Barry later regretted thinking that "Fever" should have been left alone with no sequel. If you did not purchase or now do not have "Living Eyes" it would be a great addition to any Bee Gee's fan's collection as well as others who may not have liked their "disco period".

Best Bee Gees Album; Suffers from Misconception
In actuality, this album waned at the charts precisely because it did not give its listeners the consistently upbeat, fast-moving, high-harmony songs that they had come to expect from the Bee Gees by this point. The biggest misconception about Living Eyes is that its relative failure in comparison to previous Bee Gees albums (peaking at #41) was due to a backlash against disco. The Bee Gees this time listened too much to their critics, deciding on more mature material, and thus did themselves in as far as chart success goes.

However, this album, in my opinion, is clearly their best because, in addition to the strength of practically all of its tracks, Living Eyes caught the Bee Gees during that slit in their career AFTER they had abandoned songs with snappy hooks like "Tragedy" but BEFORE they began relying on those awful and stale drum machines that plagued their late 80s work, as in the single "One". As a result, you get the heartfelt, mature Bee Gees of the late 80s, but with the more natural production and instrumentation that characterized Bee Gees albums throughout the 70s, beginning with Mr. Natural.

All in all, a very strong, passionate, blue-eyed soul and soft rock album that will stay fresh. I know. I listen to this album everyday and I still can't get enough. .

A Few Stars In An Odd Collection

It is unclear whether the Bee Gees truly wanted to completely break away from their disco sound in this 1981 album or whether it was done to fulfill their last album contract with RSO records. Note: This is a re-issue until Rhino Records releases the Remastered Expanded version. Each Gibb stakes out a portion of the album with mediocre results. However, half the songs are good enough to warrant seeking this CD out. The first single, "Living Eyes", which barely charted is a wondrous ballad with nice guitar work. "He's A Liar", a song that raises more questions than it answers is a great, out of step, rock and roll melee. "Paradise" and "Don't Fall In Love With Me" are two more great harmonizing ballads that make the first side listenable. The upbeat "Cryin' Every day" also pushes the synthesizer/drum beat envelope. It's not "Spirits Having Flown", but maybe that was the whole point.
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You can see a complete list of all Bee Gees discography, or go back to the Bee Gees tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.