Emerson, Lake & Palmer Album: “In the Hot Seat”

This album offers a mixed bag of material. To say that it's a horrible album would be too extreme. But the songwriting is uneven and placid. The good songs are Hand of Truth, Daddy, One by One, Dylan's Man in the Long Black Coat, and the refurbished Pictures at an Exhibition. By and large it's a safe album nothing lost and nothing gained. Emerson's keyboard intro's on Hand of Truth and One by One are infectious and after a week of listening to this album I found it hard to stop hearing them. This album does grow on you in that sense. Greg Lake's voice is darker than in the past but it's in fine form and suits the music. Carl isn't as flamboyant as he was in the past the the music doesn't call for it. I have no regrets for buying it.

It's in the same vein of "We Can't Dance" by Genesis, "Sur la Mur" by the Moody Blues, "Talk" by Yes, or an Asia album.

The picture shown above is not what is on my copy.The correct picture in on the limited edition version and so are the untitled tracks from Pictures Of An Exibition, which if you had ever seen this done live in their better years, was fantastic.This cd defintiely put them In The Hot Seat but is still ok even though they have put out much better material.

This album was a huge disappointment, the proverbial square peg in the round hole. The band did not learn it's lesson on "Love Beach".

Although there are a few positive notes, they are quickly overshadowed. This is mostly all painful, even after giving it a chance.

Some tracks are particularly bad should be re-named by the Producer In The Long Black Coat:

Chops On Ice; Thin Line Between Progressive and Pop; Give Me A Reason Not To Throw It Away; Change For the Worse; Gone (Not a Moment) Too Soon.

ELP should have quit while they ahead with "Black Moon" (1992) and "Live at the Royal Albert Hall" (1993) in terms of their ephemoral 90's comeback. "In the Hot Seat" was just tarnished by quick-fix greed in terms of the quality its tracks are presented in. There isn't a single shred of any timeless ELP instrumental quirks to be found in any of these songs, and the 90's update of "Pictures at an Exhibition" is just plain dolorous! "Hand of Truth", "One By One", and "Daddy" are the only tracks that get the dubious honor of gold, silver, and bronze from me. One last "below the belt" blow on "In the Hot Seat" would be that even under the influence of a 12-pack, "Love Beach" (1978) would sound like heavy dynamic make-out music (HAH)!

What were they thinking ? This cd should be free inside a box of cereal