Strange Inside The Lost Tapes

After waiting so long for the second Strange Inside album, here we get the third in quick succession. We could be on dodgy ground here if the bulk of the CDs of this "Lost Tape" ilk are anything to go by. 10 tracks are on show, adding up to a fairly miserly 42½ minutes. The standard Strange Inside formula of synths and guitars is largely stuck to and I must admit, though the material here is not as polished as his other albums, it is by and large very listenable. At times it reminded me of early Level 42 or even Jan Hammer. The music chugs along at a fair old pace producing lively melodies and plenty of sequential rhythms. Once you start to delve a little deeper however, the limitations of the album start to become clear. Some of the synth voices and especially the drums sound very thin and ideas-wise the music soon becomes shallow and a bit tedious. Undoubtedy the base material is there, and the beguiling track 2 'Forever' shows vividly the underlying talent which has so spectacularly come to fruition on his later works. But Gerd Lubos is hardly a cult figure whose every musical excursion demands release, and I don't think this does Strange Inside's credentials any good at all. The "night thieves" who temporarily deprived Gerd of these tapes and prompted the title of the CD should really have kept hold of them. (GG)

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