Comments for Utopia, Adventures In Utopia

This is one of the stronger Utopia albums. The highlight of the album is the outstanding "Caravan" which features a great keyboard/ guitar duel between Roger and Todd at the end. Other strong points are "Set Me Free", Utopia's only top-40 hit, featuring Kasim on a great vocal performance, "You Make Me Crazy", a raunchy Willie Wilcox lead vocal, and one of the band's signature tunes, "The Road To Utopia". It also includes the less than spectacular "Rock Love", which became a staple of Todd's live shows for several years to come until he became rap-master Rundgren. Another low-light is the altogether annoying "Last of the New Wave Riders", featuring one of the most grating, annoying refrains in the entire catalog of Utopia music. Kasim gets another showcase with the acoustic, soft "Love Alone". The remaining songs, "Second Nature", "Shot In The Dark", and "The Very Last Time", are all harmless enough, but not particularly outstanding. At any rate, "Caravan" alone makes the album a must have.

The most consistent and thus the best Utopia album. Stylistically, somewhat of a transition with the soon-to-be standard pop-rock vein (Second Nature, Set Me Free, The Very Last Time) and a trace of the prog-rock past (The Road to Utopia, Caravan, Last of the New Wave Riders) but without the very-soon-to-appear dose of Beatlemania. Not a single bad cut, which is quite an accomplishment for this band.

This is the album that got me into Utopia. I had just seen them at the Knebworth festival in Englan where they performed some of the songs. Caravan is my all time favourite Utopia song. Rock Love is also a favourite.

The album was a little campy in spots but it stands out in my life as an album that earmarked many things in my life. Things like my marriage, my faith and my own convictions. The copy I had got lost and I've missed it ever since.