Homecoming
Artist: America
Community Score: 8.50

Homecoming, America's finest album, refines and focuses the folk-pop approach found on their debut release. The songs here are tighter and more forthright, with fewer extended solo instrumental sections than before. The sound quality is clear and bright; the colorful arrangements, while still acoustic guitar-based, feature more electric guitar... Read More

Silverbird
Artist: Leo Sayer

Leo Sayer's debut album introduced a singer/songwriter (actually he wrote just the lyrics; David Courtney did the music) of some talent, though not remarkable talent. The production screams 1973, with its mainstream pop and hard rock beds and some overlays of symphonic strings, and Sayer sometimes strongly echoes Elton John's early-'70s work,... Read More

Pilot (From the Album of the Same Name)
Artist: Pilot

With its swirling keyboards and falsetto vocals, "Magic" became one of the great one-shots of the '70s, and it shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone familiar with one-hit wonders that Pilot's accompanying full-length isn't as good. Despite the lack of strong material, the album is hardly without merit. Pilot, along with producer Alan Parsons,... Read More

First Grade
Artist: Thomas Jefferson Kaye

Thomas Jefferson Kaye steps out of his usual spot in the producer's chair for his second record, 1974's First Grade, handing the reins over to Gary Katz (Steely Dan). Together, Kaye and Katz create what appears at first to be a fairly typical bit of M.O.R., L.A. rock -- caught somewhere between tepid country-rock, Southern boogie, and the... Read More

Horse with No Name
Artist: America
Community Score: 9.60
Boz Scaggs & Band
Artist: Boz Scaggs

Although most listeners know Boz Scaggs primarily for his 1976 disco-era, multi-million seller Silk Degrees, he produced several excellent recordings in the years leading up to that breakthrough. Boz Scaggs & Band is the middle release of a three-disc spurt which Scaggs produced in a two-year period, between 1971 and 1972. Although it is weaker... Read More

Bright Eyes
Artist: Melissa Manchester

On her second album, Melissa Manchester remained largely under the influence of some immediate predecessors, though she was beginning to show evidence of an original talent. The impact of Laura Nyro still could be heard on songs like the title track and "O Heaven (How You've Changed to Me)," with their vibrant gospel tone. If Manchester seemed... Read More

Apprentice (In a Musical Workshop)
Artist: Dave Loggins

Kenny Loggins' second cousin hit the big time for a couple of months in 1975 with "Please Come to Boston," a serviceable and sentimental soft rock gem from his second album, Apprentice (In a Musical Workshop). Part of the lexicon of harmless '70s singer/songwriters like Dan Fogelberg and James Taylor, Dave Loggins never again regained the... Read More

Angel Clare
Artist: Art Garfunkel
Community Score: 9.00

Garfunkel (he was billed without his first name here) had a lot riding on his debut solo album, and Angel Clare, named after a character in Thomas Hardy's novel Tess of the d'Urbervilles, lived up to the heightened expectations for the man who had sung "Bridge Over Troubled Water" and other Simon & Garfunkel favorites. Garfunkel took no chances,... Read More

Chicago II
Artist: Chicago
Community Score: 8.17

The Chicago Transit Authority recorded this double-barreled follow-up to their eponymously titled 1969 debut effort. The contents of Chicago II (1970) underscore the solid foundation of complex jazz changes with heavy electric rock & roll that the band so brazenly forged on the first set. The septet also continued its ability to blend the... Read More

Manna
Artist: Bread

Bread's third album, Manna, isn't so much a step forward as it is a consolidation of strengths, as the group sharpens their skills and carves out their own identities. It's clear that the rift between David Gates and Robb Royer and James Griffin is beginning to take shape, as the album is evenly divided between Gates tunes and Royer/Griffin... Read More

Just a Boy
Artist: Leo Sayer

Before Richard Perry took Leo Sayer to the top of the charts in 1976 and 1977, his former bandmate and sometimes songwriting partner David Courtney provided all the music to Sayer's lyrics here and co-produced with manager Adam Faith 1974's Just a Boy album, featuring the Top Ten 1975 hit "Long Tall Glasses (I Can Dance)." Leo Sayer had a geeky... Read More