Journey

Few bands have wasted so much talent as Journey. A super-group formed by three California veterans (guitarist Neil Schon and keyboardist Gregg Rolie of Santana, Frank Zappa's drummer Aynsley Dunbar), Journey were famous even before they recorded anything. Their debut album, Journey (Columbia, 1975), began a series of best-sellers that turned Journey into a money-machine. Neil Schon's shimmering guitar riffs propelled energetic and feverish instrumental jams such as Kohoutek and Of A Lifetime

Their technical skills shine on Look Into The Future (1976), that contains Look Into The Future and I'm Gonna Leave You, and on Next (1977). Unfortunately, the music that came later was pedestrian pop-metal for attention-impaired kids, the kind of AOR that would rule the airwaves. New vocalist Steve Perry and the driving and melodramatic Wheel In The Sky made Infinity (1978) the album of a substantially different band. The same album also contains the ballad Lights. Evolution (1979), featuring Steve Smith (a Berklee School alumnus) instead of Dunbar on drums and containing Lovin' Touchin' Squeezin', and Departure (1980), containing Anyway You Want It, led to Escape (1981), the commercial zenith of this phase, adding Jonathan Cain's jazzy electronic keyboards to the mix. Who's Crying Now, Open Arms and Don't Stop Believing are even less original and more kitschy, leaning towards the format of the late-night sentimental ballad. Stone in Love, however, contains Neil Schon's best guitar solo.

Frontiers (1983), with Separate Ways and two more romantic ballads (Faithfully and Send Her My Love), seemed to end the story, but Schon, Perry and Cain reformed Journey to record Raised On Radio (1986), yet another million-seller, with their last choral heavy-metal, Be Good To Yourself, while another yawn-inducing ballad (Only The Young) climbed the charts.

Schon, Cain and John Waite (former Babys vocalist) formed Bad English, an equally (commercially) successful super-group that released Bad English (Epic, 1989), with When I See You Smile and Price of Love, and Backlash (Epic, 1991). But the quality of the music got more and more trivial.

Perry, who had already debuted as a solo artist with Street Talk (Columbia, 1984), which included Oh Sherrie, resumed his solo career with For The Love Of Strange Medicine (1994), which included You Better Wait.

Hired as a second guitarist by Carlos Santana when he was just fifteen, promoted to leader of Journey at only nineteen, and with forty million records sold under his belt, Neal Schon was one of the undisputed child prodigies of the instrument. Schon, who had already recorded two albums with keyboardist Jan Hammer, Untold Passion (Columbia, 1981) and Here To Stay (Columbia, 1983), embarked on a solo career with Beyond The Thunder (Higher Octave, 1995), an album of instrumental watercolors in the vein of Craig Chaquico, featuring Jonathan Cain�s keyboard arrangements. While Send Me An Angel, Big Moon and Call Of The Wild retain Journey�s heavy melodicism but in a less rock-oriented context, the mournful melody of Boulevard Of Dreams, expressed through soaring guitar lines, represents its transcendence in terms of continuity. Between visionary exoticism (Bandalero and Zanzibar) and sensual jazz (Cool Breeze), Deep Forest stands out, an acoustic ballad accompanied by orchestra.

In 1995, Schon reunited the original Santana lineup�minus Carlos�under the name Abraxas. He then released his second solo album, Electric World (Higher Octave, 1997).

Jonathan Cain debuted as a multi-instrumentalist with Back To The Innocence (Interscope, 1994), followed by a soft jazz-rock album for piano and orchestra, Piano With A View (Higher Octave, 1995), whose best tracks (such as Tell It To My Heart) are essentially high-charting ballads. It was followed by the exotic Body Language (Higher Octave, 1997) and the orchestral For A Lifetime (Higher Octave, 1998).

Perry, Schon and Cain re-re-formed Journey to record Trial by Fire (Columbia, 1996), which contains the usual mid-tempo rocker, Message of Love, and the ritual slow ballad, When You Love A Woman. Perry left the band before Arrival (2001).

Revelation (2008), featuring new vocalist Arnel Pineda, included a disc of re-recorded classics.