March 18, 1982 - Asia and Heat Of The Moment

Happy New Year! It's been a long four months since my last release but we finally have the first release of the new year when new band Asia released their self-titled debut album on March 18, 1982. It would actually end up being the number one selling album of the year and it was led by the success of their lead single "Heat Of The Moment" which is the only song I have by Asia in my library. But who is Asia? They were an English supergroup formed of keyboardist Geoff Downes (who played on Yes's "Drama", which I don't have), guitarist Steve Howe (from Yes), drummer Carl Palmer (from ELP) and bassist and lead singer John Wetton (from King Crimson and U.K.). That is quite the superstar line-up and you would think they would make some amazing progressive rock music! However, Asia went for a more pop-y, radio-friendly rock sound and I find it incredibly stupefying that these guys didn't make better music. Even the one song I do have is very mainstream and accessible, although it is incredibly catchy. "Heat Of The Moment" kicks off with a decent guitar riff by Howe before Wetton comes in to sting the first verse. His voice sounds toned down and much more radio-friendly than the oddities of singing for King Crimson; he doesn't sound bad by any means, just like he's not fully giving it his all. He leads this fairly tame main riff and when the backing vocals come in at the start of the chorus things sound very pop-y and catchy indeed. They play another decent verse with Downes adding some piano and follow it with another pop-y chorus before slowing things down even more. They move to a space-y bridge riff with Downes playing some cool synths and this leads right into the final verse before they play a chorus and it's finally solo time! Howe goes off for a guitar solo that isn't the flashiest but still sounds pretty cool and he continues to play overtop while rest of the band resumes the chorus until the song fades to an end. Certainly a memorable track, it's such a shame that this group of guys couldn't have made some more progressive music.

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