Following his stint in the group
Metro
with
Sean Lyons
and
Peter Godwin
,
Duncan Browne
turned up in 1978 with his first solo album since the dawn of the '70s.
The Wild Places
isn't much like his
Immediate
album
Give Me, Take You
-- indeed, it's more like a lost
Roxy Music
album, or perhaps a lost
Bryan Ferry
record. It's electric, and the music has a sense of drama as well as beautiful melodies that were even better realized, with lush contributions on the synthesizer and related keyboards by
Tony Hymas
and a fierce guitar sound courtesy of
Browne
himself, aided by the upfront presence of
John Giblin
Simon Phillips
on bass and drums, respectively. The music runs the gamut from edgy
progressive rock
to straight-ahead
rock & roll
(the latter highlighted by
"The Crash"
), though
was at the top of his game, as both a singer and composer, working in an introspective, romantic vein, as on the killer title cut and numbers like
"Roman Vecu"
"Kisarazu."
Long out of print in the United States,
was reissued on CD during late 2000 in Japan. ~ Bruce Eder