The_Noble_Cause wrote:I dunno about that. The lead track, FIB, was proggy, and a slight deviation from their sound w/ middle eastern influences. Other tunes (Bottom of Your Soul, King of the World, Let It Go) were pure TOTO - very melodic with a modern edge.
It's interesting because if you look at the albums, you'll see that the style changes with each singer. Firstly, there's the first Bobby Kimball era.
Toto, Hydra, Turn Back &
Toto IV were your typical Melodic Rock/West Coast/AOR albums (with a hint of progressive on the second).
Then we come to Fergie Fredricksen on
Isolation which I think was the first subtle attempt at going heavier. Still, there was that West Coast sound there.
Then we take a look at
Fahrenheit and
The Seventh One, which as we all know are the two Joseph Williams albums. Now, no disrespect to any Toto members who may read this - but apart from the odd tune here and there those albums just really don't do anything for me - cause I think they are very much a product of their time. The sound goes far more into an 80's pop direction. I know those albums have a lot of fans but to me, that just is not Toto. That is not the sound.
We'll skip the Byron era. If you can really call it an era.
Then Lukather took over for
Kingdom Of Desire and
Tambu. I quite like those two. On those two they went in a kind of a blues rock direction reminiscent of Clapton/Moore.
Then we come to the SECOND Bobby Kimball era. However, the interesting thing here is the music didn't go back to the sound of the original Kimball era. I think it's here they really went into hard rock.
Mindfields was a very transitional album and I think when you listen to it you can hear (I think) that Kimball and the band are trying to get used to working together again and a new sound is beginning to emerge.
Through The Looking Glass (the covers album) is where they start to get heavier. Then of course we get to
Falling In Between where they completely unleash the beast. I'd call it their most hard rock album.
Now we are heading into a second Joseph Williams era. In the second Kimball era they didn't try and recreate what they did in the first Kimball era - and I'm pretty sure the same will be true of this new tenure with Williams. The question is, what haven't they done that they CAN do with Williams?
I think in a lot of ways Joseph Williams COULD have the same kind of singing voice as David Gilmour. He COULD sing that kind of tune. Steve Lukather has said that the new album has "lots of big guitars" and has said fans should "dig the direction" they are going in. Straight away that says to me they are not going for the same kind of vibe as the previous albums they did with Williams. When someone says something like "big guitars" I IMMEDIATELY think of bands like Pink Floyd - who are not ashamed or afraid of totally going nuts on the strings and allowing it to be the heartbeat of the tune.
That just makes the most sense to me. It sounds like completely the logical direction for Toto to go in now. Something BIG. Almost OPERATIC. EPIC in scope and sound. Something beguiling, beautiful and defiantly uncompromising. Surprisingly different yet still recognizable to anyone who knows Toto like we do. I bet it's what they do... I HOPE it's what they do - and I think we are going to absolutely LOVE IT!!!
