Boston made one of the best albums ever with their first album that came out way back in ’76. With that, it was always going to be tough with whatever they put out afterwards. Don’t Look Back was a great follow up, but all the reviews said it wasn’t as good as their first. It took another eight years for Third Stage to see the light of day and yep, it was still compared to the debut.
First up, I will say the production is stellar. Super clear and very loud, and Tim Scholz’s guitar sound is epic. There are some really good songs on here. Amanda, which opens the album is such a good power ballad with the emphasis on the power, it sounds huge. My favourite is Cool The Engines. Killer guitar sound and the middle section is awesome.
My criticism is that there are too many slow songs and not enough tunes that rock. Even though the sound is stellar, it can’t hide the weakness of some of the songs.
7/10 from The Grooveman.
