The
Call's 1990 album
Red Moon was the group's most mature effort to date, fully realizing the potential and strengths the band had been building on since the early '80s. Unfortunately, it was also the nail in their commercial coffin, effectively banishing them from major labeldom. Little was heard from the band for the rest of the '90s, until the surprise (aesthetic, if not commercial) comeback of
Heaven and Back. Following
Red Moon's lead, the album forgoes synthesizers in favor of more organic textures, but adds the rock fervor of the group's '80s material. "Criminal" bears a relentless organ riff that drives the song like a repeating punch in the gut. "World on Fire," originally heard in the film Light Sleeper, is the soundtrack to a soul's descent into hell, while "Musta Been Outta My Mind" is a rollicking, bluesy rocker. The slithery, minor-key "All You Hold Onto" sounds as if it came straight from the band's
Reconciled album, while "Love Is Everywhere" finds
Been and company adept at
Beatlesque balladry. Seven years on from
Red Moon,
the Call sounds as focused and energetic as ever, making singer
Michael Been's overproduced 1994 solo flop seem like a dim memory.