What the duo puts together here is a beguiling, curious mixture of soul, folk, rock, and even funk – a real crossroads of an album which their songwriting and harmonies and personalities not only hold together but flourish. The whole “Abandoned Luncheonette” theme – it is kind of a concept, kind of just a loose thread holding the thing in place – that feeling of something old and decrepit and decaying and on its’ way out, and yet from its’ ashes something springs anew, completely innocent of what came before it and ready to carry on again. “When the Morning Comes” starts the album off on a rather innocuous note, but it builds from there, jumping up in intensity. By the time one arrives at the desperate, slow-burning groove of “She’s Gone”, you know what you are in store for, and the strange thing is, not even half of the album is through yet. The tile track is a microcosm of the album, for sure, going though in a little under four minutes the life cycle I described above, with Hall and Oates joining in with the background vocalists at the end of the track, ringing out “month to month, year to year” like their lives depended on it. Then “Lady Rain” comes on, which contains some very strange progressive stylings, including a bizarre electric violin solo, just to up the ante even further. Finally, the weird mélange of styles that is “Every Time I Look at You” ends the record on another head-scratching note. This one veers from street-walking funk to sing-along groove to – where in the hell did that country-pickin’ banjo come from – and all of the sudden the song fades out on this really strange tangent.The whole thing needs to be heard in full, and many times, at that. Obviously, only portions of this rather loose style would be incorporated into the future act, but for now, it’s great to hear from the perspective that once upon a great time, the H20 boys could art rock and roll with the best of them, at least for an album or two.
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