Where to begin? There isn't a weak track on the album. AVALON with the trio of classic Roxy albums recorded in 1972-1974. The only complaint is that there aren't any bonus tracks("Always unknowing", "Jealous guy", the single version of "Avalon" and "The Main thing" remix would have been terrific bonus tracks. Also, the mastering, although very good, could do with a revisit. Bob Ludwig's remastering job of the tracks for the boxset clearly are superior to the sound here(although they aren't bad by any stretch).

This album is a candidate for a 20bit remastered special edition with a special booklet on the band, the making of the album and, perhaps, bonus tracks.

Worth owning if it isn't in your collection yet.

A perfect record, but get the remastered version!
Like the cover to this CD, there is a misty, brooding quality to "Avalon." Like a walk along a dewy beach at the prelight of dawn, everything is serene and melancholy at the same time. So much so, that this is Roxy's perfect moment. There is more pent up sensuality here than in dozens of over belting soul singers, and without upping the vocal gale quotient. In that sense, "Avalon" is quintessentially British. Romantic overtures and silky smooth desire combine in "More Than This," opening the disc and setting the mood. By the time Bryan Ferry is crooning "I'll soon be home" at the end of "True To Life," you wish that you were on this journey with him.

Even though Roxy was always an arty band, they were never really a smooth one. There was always a moment on most of their albums that was there to jar you a bit. It seemed that Ferry used his solo records to exorcise his longings (or as some would have it, loungings) and that debonair side to his personality. Later Roxy albums (from "Manifesto" on) seemed to move more into that territory. Ferry brought his exquisite longing to the entirety of "Avalon" ("this space between us, better close it up tonight..."), that it's like he's moving through a long continual slow dance. That being the case, I want to follow him all the way till we stroll into the afterglow of "Tara."

I have had a copy of this album in some form or another since it first came out. Quite frankly, it is on my shortlist for desert island listening. HOWEVER: The remastered version brings out many of the subtle highlights the original CD lacked...so move up to it.

Perfection
I'm right there with the fan from Ohio, this is an album that you just feel right down into your bones. How many times can you say that you hear an album that never really starts or finishes, just flows from one song into the next in complete harmony? Avalon is that album -- it tells a story from the first song to the last, and it definitely takes you on a journey with it. Every time I listen to it, I just don't want to say goodbye to it, I don't want it to leave, which is just what the last song, Tara, is doing in such a poignant way. Think of Kate Bush's Hounds of Love, U2's The Joshua Tree, Led Zeppelin's Houses of the Holy, albums that from beginning to end pull you in, and put Avalon in there with it. Definitely a must-have.

In a class of it's own......
The first time I listened to this cassette, (yes, cassette - that's how long ago I purchased it) I thought it was a little on the mellow side. Then I REALLY listened to it. It is by far the most beautiful, classy and romantic pieces of music I have ever listened to. If this is "chick music" that's fine with me, every chick in the world should own this CD. It doesn't get much better than this.

Fine Roxy Music
Yes, Avalon was indicative of the times, pure 80's at its best -was it featured on an episode of Miami Vice (or was that another Ferry effort, Slave to Love perhaps)? Nonetheless, its a beauty of an album, who cares what shape the band was in when it was recorded. Ferry deserves the credit. BTW, Mamouna was a pretty decent album.
Progressive rock savants Roxy Music reinvented themselves as the avatars of caviar dreams and champagne wishes on this smooth-as-$1,000-cognac 1982 disc. By this point in their jagged discography, Roxy had become little more than Bowie-esque lead singer Bryan Ferry's backup band, with his regal tone ensconced somewhere between the synth-fetish of Ultravox and a friskier Scott Walker. Seemingly gone were the band's herky-jerky days as a democratically run outfit--Avalon's syrupy, New Romantic tone is worlds away from the era when Brian Eno's unpredictable keyboard noodles or Phil Manzanera's rocket-fuel guitar defined the proceedings. The exquisite "More Than This" and the moody title cut give the decadence of Robin Leach's '80s a dignity that those times probably didn't deserve. But even if the Reagan years didn't sound to you like new wave for social climbers, as a soundtrack to upscale daydreaming, Avalon beats an episode of Dynasty hands down. --Don Harrison