Eclipse (2011)
1. City of Hope
2. Edge of the Moment
3. Chain of Love
4. Tantra
5. Anything is Possible
6. Resonate
7. She's a Mystery
8. Human Feel
9. Ritual
10.To Whom It May Concern
11.Someone
12.Venus
Talk about a letdown. With Revelation, Journey had improbably pulled off the impossible: recapturing the spirit of their prime with enough conviction to convince both casual fans and skeptics that lightning had, at least partially, struck twice. So when whispers began circulating—loud, persistent whispers from trusted sources in the melodic rock sphere—that Eclipse was something altogether bolder, heavier, and, allegedly, better, expectations were cautiously raised. One particularly influential commentator raved in advance, promising a reinvention so powerful it might just outdo Escape.
It didn’t.
Whether that early praise was a genuine reaction or a result of being too close to the flame is a question best left for message boards. But the damage was done. For anyone who walked into Eclipse expecting the second coming of Frontiers, what followed felt less like new ground and more like betrayal.
This is, unmistakably, Neal Schon’s album. Not just in spirit, but in structure—he’s the sole composer on nearly every track, and the emphasis on guitar is undeniable. It roars, it wails, it dominates. The problem? Very little of it connects. The album is loud, aggressive, and undeniably energetic—but it’s energy without emotional architecture. A kind of stadium-sized self-indulgence where hooks go to die.
Schon had made no secret of his dissatisfaction with Revelation, calling it too much of a backward glance. Fair enough. But what he delivered in response is an album that attempts to rip away the band’s melodic core and replace it with pure power. In doing so, he traded timelessness for testosterone—and the results are poor overall.
There are flashes—Tantra and Ritual both contain fragments of the old DNA—but even these tracks falter under the weight of overstuffed arrangements and meandering structures. They reach for transcendence but rarely find form. It’s as if the band remembered the sound of Journey but forgot the soul.
Some may argue that, at this stage in their career, Journey should do what pleases them rather than cater to public expectation. But fan goodwill is not an inexhaustible resource, and this album, while ambitious in scope, feels curiously hollow. Not because it’s different—but because it lacks direction. For a group that once moved mountains with deceptively simple choruses and heartfelt ballads, this feels like an album in search of itself.
In the end, Eclipse doesn’t fail for lack of effort—it fails for forgetting why people fell in love with the band in the first place. It’s an album made for the stage but not for the heart. Let’s hope the next outing remembers the basics.
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