result was a gem of an album, inventive and eclectic, though most critics tended to focus on Messina's country-rock tunes—echoes of his days as a founding member of Poco. On tour to promote the album, L&M and friends turned out to be a tight unit which could improvise the pants off of just about any band around. Hence Loggins and Messina's permanent coupling.

As prime practitioners of rock classicism, they place their stamp on original material inspired by the wide variety of styles which gave birth to the music. The first time I heard their current hit single, "Your Mama Don't Dance," I could have sworn it had been resurrected straight out of the Fifties musical graveyard. The song's slippin' sloppy guitar break would have made Chuck Berry proud. Producer Messina has learned his lessons well; on "Thinking Of You" he intimates the Latino rhythm of the Diamonds' "Little Darling" and the vocal harmonies of Neil Sedaka's "Calendar Girl," but the sound is uniquely his own.

As veterans of the rock scene, Loggins and Messina take a wry view of their environment. "Holiday Hotel" recounts a tale of the bad karma that is the bane of every touring musician's existence, while "Whiskey" sweetly laments that you can't sing anything pretty at L.A.'s teeny haven. A short, sprightly country-pickin' tune seemingly meant to infiltrate the hard-bound definitions of format radio has been given the title "Just Before the News." At one minute and six seconds, it's a station programmer's dream.

Now that Jim Messina is performing regularly again, he has taken the opportunity on this album to exorcise another ghost from his past, Buffalo Springfield (he produced and played bass on Last Time Around)—and by extension. Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. "Good Friend" features a Steve Stills-ish gliding guitar in the kind of soul setting Messina has always wanted to create. "Golden Ribbons," a mournful ten-years-after sequel to "Hard Rain's A Gonna Fall," embroiders some rich CSN&Y harmonies, including a Stills-like vocal, over a very contemporary lyric: "What does it avail a man/To gain a fortune and lose his soul?"

Kenny Loggins continues to contribute whimsy and softness to the team with "Long Tail Cat," a rockin' chair song that blossoms into a minstrel-show tune complete with spoons and fiddle, as well as the tender "Till the Ends Meet" and the Bossa Nova-accented "Lady