Love Beach

Well-tanned, the members of ELP grace the album cover on the shores of Nassau, Bahamas where it was recorded. Certainly after the financially disastrous tours following the Works tour, the band was in need of a break. The album reflected the extremes of ELP - when they were good, they were great, but when they were awful, you had Love Beach. (The band has since acknowledged that the album was pursued only to fulfill their contractual obligations with Atlantic). Pete Sinfield provides lyrics for the record, though the sun must have also affected him as well: here's the refrain from the title track: "I'll make love to you on love beach". The first side contains a series of shorter songs, mostly penned by Greg Lake that amount to little more than over-arranged boogie rock, though "For You" is marginally tolerable. The second side however raises a little more hope, with the Keith Emerson penned album-side long "Memoirs Of An Officer And A Gentlemen". The first and fourth sections trace more familiar ELP (read classical) terrain, while "Love At First Sight" is overly romantic sap. "Letters from the Front" however is most successful, offering a more modern take on the ELP sound. The album barely cracked the Top 50 on both sides of the Atlantic, and the band folded with little fanfare; both a posthumously released live album and a greatest "hits" would seem like a feeble postscript. Carl Palmer then fronted the short-lived PM before joining Asia, while Lake released a couple of solo albums a year later. Emerson would subsequently turn to the steady work of movie soundtracks.