Frontiers

After the somewhat uneven Escape, featuring new member Jonathan Cain, we arrive at Frontiers! By now, the new lineup has had one album and one tour under their belts. The songwriting, recording, and live playing have gelled, and it's time to crank out a masterpiece.If you follow the band's progression, you find certain milestones where the band shifted into another gear, and jumped forward. The first was with the album Infinity, and Steve Perry joining the band. The next milestone was with Departure, and a solid album of great songwriting and playing. Jonathan Cain coming on board helped with the next milestone, and that is this album. Really, this starts the best and most mature recording period of the band, with the classic trio of albums: Frontiers, Raised on Radio, and Trial By Fire. These together may not contain the majority of songs typical in the greatest hits collections, but the band reached a point to where they could do great things and not have to depend of writing hits. They could move to the next level and write and play music that they really enjoyed, and we can too.Part of what makes this album so great is that there are no weak or wimpy tracks. The surprise addition of kick-@ss rockers shows the band in a whole new light. Chain Reaction is very cool and strong, but even the more pop-oriented lead-off single Separate Ways has both pop-hooks and melody, and powerhouse production (check out those guitars and drums too!) This may be their most cohesive album, with all the songs working well together and next to each other.Okay, if you don't have this, go ahead and click on the necessary buttons. Then, load it in the CD player, crank it up, and enjoy! Even the production and mixing have a bigger and more stadium-oriented sound, so you get a little more of a live presentation of the band (one of their highlights) over other albums. The packaging artwork is nice too.

I have always contended, and still do, that the Frontiers album was and is Journey's best album overall. It was, of course, released when Jouney was at their peak both as individual musicians and as a band. The album's music is at once more agressive than Escape, shows great growth in their writing skills, takes more risks than they did on Escape, and the album is just more consistant across the board. So, what impact does remastering and expanding this album have? It is a notable improvement across the board!All of the songs sound better due to the remastering. The biggest single knock on this album was how overwhelming some felt J. Cain's keyboards where on the original mix. While I have never agreed with that view, the mix between Cain's keyboards, Schon's guitar, and Perry's vocals seems to have a better blend overall.There are four songs added to this album that were originally recorded from this general time frame; Only The Young, Ask The Lonely, Only Solutions, and Liberty. The first two can be found on Journey's Greatest Hits disc. The last two, I believe, have not been issued as studio recordings before outside of Only Solutions (which I believe was on the original "Tron" soundtrack). So, what impact does adding these do to the disc? It actually takes a great overall disc and makes it better! All four songs still feel like vintage, top-of-the-heep Journey and actually make the album feel more complete. The only way they could have made this a "better" album would have been to remove the one song that has never sounded good, "Back Talk". Of course, that would not make for a very good re-issue from a historical standpoint, so there was no way that would happen.With this re-issue, in my opinion, most fans only need three albums to fully enjoy Journey, Infinity (remastered and expanded version), Escape (re-issued and expanded - not sure why they didn't bother remastering this one???), and this one. Those three in rotation would leave a listener "Journeying" to heaven. Regardless, this CD is an absolute must, even if you have the original CD release and especially if you haven't owned this album since the original vinyl!

Love this cd

This is one of their best albums and remastered it took it to a whole new level!

Para ser una recopilación, le faltó Open Arms y Don't Stop Believin' , muy bueno el bono del minidisco vinilo bebé.

Wanted the vinyl and loved it!

I actually have been following Journey since the '70's but never actually bought Journey CDs except for their Greatest Hits. This is the second one I bought since it was at a rock bottom price for a new CD. With CD's going up, I decided to buy. I wasn't disappointed. I even liked the songs that were not hits and the writing is excellent. This extended version includes Only the Young and Ask the Lonely which were not available until their greatest hits since they were in movie soundtracks. Get it while they last.

Muy buen disco y los extra que trae son nuy buenas canciones

Great album! Love Journey

Un disco que debes tener si te gusta el Rock Melódico, el A.O.R. Además, viene muy bien presentado y un single con 4 temas.

Great album! the sound is class. Unfortunately cover damaged in shipping.

J'ai acheté ce vinyl à l'époque mais il est assez usé et vu qu'il ressortait je l'ai commandé de suite car c'est un de mes albums préféré de ce groupe et en plus il y a un 45 tours en bonus.