Nostalgia Can Trip You Up

This is a rock album that I bought in a fit of nostalgia and which turns out to be relatively disappointing. The Very Best of Joe Walsh and the James Gang. I particularly remembered three standout tracks and they stand up well ( Rocky Mountain Way, Turn To Stone and Time Out ) There are two more with impressive string arrangements and a couple of funky workouts that groove along nicely but the remaining ten or so tracks don't really go anywhere. Walsh was a fine rock guitarist and had interesting ideas of incorporating folk and classical elements into his standard rock format ( he had an apparent liking for Ravel, quoting Bolero in one solo and prefacing another track with a synth version of the Mother Goose suite ) But any promise he may have had wasn't really realised when he joined the Hotel California era Eagles and disappeared into the hedonistic lifestyle that song and his own song Life's Been Good were supposed to satirise.