Two often unpersuasive musicians have combined to make an album better than any of their past work. Alvin Lee and Mylon LeFevre may have always been talented, but their performing contexts did not highlight their strengths. In this recording partnership, each has released the other from the conventions in which they both stagnated.

On On the Road to Freedom, we discover that Alvin Lee isn't just a slick blues guitarist and purveyor of boogie, and that LeFevre can do more than spew out gospel jive. The new music doesn't conform to any idiom—just a general feeling of Southerness. The original material has a self-scrutinizing aspect that is simply stated and credible. Among the best are Lee's "Fallen Angel," "Carry My Load," and the title cut.

The two non-originals are beauties. Ron Wood's "Let 'Em Say What They Will" is a good-natured but hard-nosed guitar rocker. George Harrison's "So Sad (No Love of His Own)" sounds to me like one of his best songs. Both writers perform on the album.

LeFevre and Lee sing with a virile dignity reminiscent of Eric Clapton's singing on Layla. They have my respect, and their partnership is too mutually beneficial to be limited to a single album. (RS 158)

BUD SCOPPA