Finding the secret ingredient4 Out Of 5 Stars
Founded by a pair of Santana sidemen and recording three albums of heavy-duty fusion rock, Journey was a band with chops galore but little commercial success to show for it. Guitarist Neal Schon and their manager decided they needed something extra to push the band to a different level, so they decided to hire vocalist Steve Perry. In an effort to polish and refine their sound, they also pulled in producer Roy Thomas Baker, who was in his stride at the time with albums from The Cars and Queen. With all the elements in place, Journey set about recording their fourth album.
"Infinity" sounded like a whole new band. As a songwriter, Perry pulled Schon towards more traditional song structure. Baker brought the band focus; not only did he get the band to lose the fusion excess, he polished the already superior musicianship in Journey to a level of majestic the group had never before reached. His penchant for layered multi-tracked harmonies benefited Journey's sound on songs like "Feeling That Way." Perry's soaring tenor blended nicely with Greg Rollie's voice, and both "Lights" and "Wheel In The Sky" barely missed the top 40. There was also the Kelly/Mouse artwork that popped off the cover, again unlike anything the band had done before (and becoming a theme the band would come back to throughout the decades).
The sucess of "Infinity" also finds the band in a sudden state of flux. Drummer Ansley Dunbar would bow out after this, and Rollie would tire of being Perry's second banana after that. For the moment, however, Journey had found the magic formula for their climb to the top with "Infinity" and the soon to come "Evolution."
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