Shortly before his death from prostate cancer in 2007,
Dan Fogelberg completed his final studio album, locked it in a safe deposit box, and directed his wife to release it after his passing. Long considered one of the landmark artists of the '70s smooth singer/songwriter genre, the Illinois native released very little new material in his last decade, making the classic sound contained on
Love in Time all the more welcome. Full of songs that could easily sit alongside his biggest hits such as "Longer Than," "Same Old Lang Syne," and "Leader of the Band," the album pairs
Fogelberg's soothing voice and expert songcraft with just the right amount of subtle instrumental backing. "Come to the Harbor," with its jaunty strumming and electric sitar motif, sounds like
Cat Stevens' "Peace Train" meets
the Beatles' "Norwegian Wood," while "Sometimes a Song" is a quintessential
Fogelberg love ballad, with a stick-in-the-head melody and spare, acoustic guitar-based accompaniment. A cover of
Neil Young's "Birds" is dressed with gorgeous
Eagles-esque vocal harmonies and serves as a poignant and chill-inducing closer, its final -- and in this case literal -- lyric, "it's over," seeming to echo long after the song ends. A gentle, finely crafted, and passionately performed album,
Love in Time is a career coda both satisfying and bittersweet. ~ Pemberton Roach