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Back into Blue

Quarterflash - Back into Blue Audio CD

A fair review of the Quarterflash "Back into Blue" 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 Quarterflash reviews here, or go back to the Quarterflash tabs.

Band: Quarterflash
Title: Back into Blue
Rating:

Release Date: 1997-06-01
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Walking on Ice 2: Caught in the Rain 3: Back into Blue 4: Talk to Me 5: I Want to Believe It's You 6: Love Without a New (You Keep Falling) 7: Come to Me 8: Grace Under Fire 9: Just for You 10: Welcome to the City

Hard to find rarity!!
It's singles, "Talk To Me" - a #83 pop hit and "Walking On Ice", highlight the LP. Quarterflash's third recording, Back Into Blue was released in late 1985 and only managed to land at #150 on the Billboard Top 200 album charts. The band lost a guitar and keyboard player before the third album and gained more layered synthesizers, giving this release a more pop feel than the other two more adult oriented rock albums. This LP also changed engieeners. John Boylan (Boston) produced the first two albums and Steve Levine (Culture Club) was brought in for this recording. This is the only Quarterflash recording that actually sounds dated. I suppose it's because of the thick 80's synthesizers layered all through the album. It is, however, a great collection of songs. The soft ballad "I Want To Believe It's You" is a beautiful song while "Welcome To The City" and "Just For You" offer more of a danceable bass line. The band broke up after the release of this LP. Quarterflash had a new line up in 1991 only keeping the original (Seafood Mama) members Marv and Rindy Ross. The new line up gave the band a newer rock sound, much more like Heart, Nelson and later Pat Benatar. Unfortunately the album Girl In The Wind was only released in Europe making this a hard to find rarity. It's a great album and definitely worth the search!
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Quarterflash Fan
Catchy in a way but by no means bad, for whatever reason it didn't sell nearly as well. I saw Quarterflash open up for Elton John in July 1982, they're opening act was truly unforgettable! While the 1st two discs have a more raw sound, the third one is a little more glitzy and synthesized sound. Die hard fans should check out Girl in the Wind, a rare material cd, greatest hits and a 2 disc video set, or Trail Band material. A band that I think of when I think of the 80's.

The album that killed Quarterflash
This is the album that killed off Quarterflash. Of Quarterflash's three "official" albums, this is the last and by far the worst. Quarterflash was one of many female-fronted New Wave bands in the eighties. The female vocalists all had a similar style. This CD is 44 minutes long and has excellent sound quality (unlike many budget priced CD's).

In the seventies, Yes and Emerson, Lake and Palmer killed progressive rock with overblown excesses. As an extreme reaction, punk moved in, with a very stripped down sound. New Wave evolved from punk, as a more accessible version of the stripped down sound. At the same time, disco became popular. Eventually disco and New Wave blended. This all happened fairly quickly and neither New Wave or Disco lasted very long, compared to other music styles.

Bands tried to change with the quickly changing music styles, and most were not very successful. Many very popular groups from this era put out one or two very good albums, and put out a final album that was a disaster and contributed to the end of the band.

This album was the death of Quarterflash. It only contains 3 good tracks. Most of the other tracks are the worst things the group has ever done. The good tracks are where the group sticks to the modified New Wave style of the second album (Take Another Picture), highlighted by Rindy Ross's saxophone. The bad tracks are where the group tries to copy the New Wave/Disco sound of 1985, with the overblown synthesizers.

After this album, the group would break up. It reformed with a much different line up, and tried to survive doing live shows at county fairs, living off the two hits from the first album. The group also put out a 4th album in 1990 that went completely unnoticed.

Here I go, here I go,... back into blue
What really gets me cranked up was that Back Into Blue was the last of their three albums. I have a hard time determining whether this album was better than Take Another Picture. Period. With the talent involved, particularly Rindy Ross on resonant vocals and sax, plus Marv Ross's heavy guitar, and the heavy sheets of synthesizers that formed a pulsing backbeat that defined classic 80's music, I felt they merited at least another album or two.

That being said, the racing, breakneck speed of electronic drums and in sync keyboard bass make "Walking On Ice" the best track on the album. In terms of tempo, think Blondie's "I'm Gonna Love You Too" or "You Crack Me Up" by Huey Lewis and the News.

After a nice sax solo by Rindy, "Caught In The Rain" starts with a catchy synthesizer melody that reminds me of Kim Carnes' "Bette Davis Eyes. " with a chorus punctuated by the ringing harmony of the backing vocals. The song yearns of a time of being together, in the eye of the storm after being caught in the rain, i. e. "I will wait for you forever, cause I'm still caught in the rain. "

The title track, a sad slow number, describes that emotional return to someone despite instincts to the contrary: "Some people learn, some will lose/Some people never see a single clue/but here I go, here I go, back into blue. "

The second single, "Talk To Me" could've been done by Laura Branigan, although when Rindy sings the pre-chorus "I don't want to wait here anymore/I can't face another closing door. . . ", I think Blondie could've had a shot at this up-tempo song of loneliness. Thing is, I can't envision them being sax compatible the way Quarterflash was.

The heartmelting ballad "I Want To Believe It's You" is another favorite here. Someone burned one too many times by love finally meets someone, leading to that age-old asking the agonizing questions, "are you the one?" "is it right tonight"

"Love Without A Net (You Keep Falling)" details the experience and folly one goes through: "Love's no gift, love will end. you learn you fall and you learn to bend/And your diamond wings break like glass, you jump again just to see what happens. . . "

"Come To Me" is quite an amusing oddball here, as it is an upbeat calypso-type party song. Rindy though does not out of place singing it.

For one to survive, in a world where "everybody hurries to be eaten or eat" the blues-tinged "Grace Under Fire" advises: "You've got to be diamond, you've got to be steel. The lucky have ice in their veins. They laugh at the devil and burn like a torch in the rain. "

"Just For You" lists the reasons why people have sex: "Some to heal and some to hurt, some for thrills and some for dirt. " You get the idea. It evenly lists good and bad reasons. Love those soulfully-tinged harmony vocals.

The cynical but upbeat "Welcome To The City" is a sour portrait of the big city: "Four hundred dollars buys a room in the city, with a whole lot of people and a hole in the ceiling, freeze in the winter, die in the summer, seventeen kids next door without a mother, hey if you see me coming up the stairs, please don't confuse me with someone who cares. " Sugar and spice, right?

The main difference is that Rindy Ross does all lead vocals here, as Quarterflash went from being a sextet to a quartet, losing vocalist Jack Charles and keyboardist Rick Digiallonardo, with Marv Ross and Rich Gooch adding keyboards to their duties. In terms of songs, there's a consistency of sound, the band seems tighter, heavy reliance on keyboards, particularly the Yamaha QX-1, with Rindy's splendid alto and tenor sax solos sprinkled within. In some cases, some songs sound much the next, but that doesn't hurt the album. And even with this, this album didn't sell well???????????? One of the albums I grew up with and still adore.

A disappointing album
"Quarterflash" and "Take Another Picture" exude both emotion and musical honesty through a jazzy/soft-rock medium. Recognizing that fans need to allow musicians to grow and evolve with the times, "Back into Blue" is a suprisingly poor follow-up to Quarterflash's first two albums. The band apparently left their instruments at home when they recorded "Back into Blue". The album is filled with poppish studio synthesizer which strikes this listener as both shallow and hollow. The musianship evident on the first two albums is hidden by the sequencers of the third. I would advise all but the Quarterflash fanatical to invest their entertainment dollars elsewhere.

You can see a complete list of all Quarterflash discography, or go back to the Quarterflash tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.