The first four albums of Saga are exquisite works of delicate progressive rock, with careful melodies, symphonic arrangements and powerful and crystalline guitar riffs that related them to other contemporary AOR bands and similar styles.
At the beginning of the eighties the band definitively distanced themselves from all of them with their own personality in their album "Worlds Apart", confirming this trend with their next "Heads Or Tales" of 1983.
However, in the latter they do not follow the same line as in that spectacular work that was "Worlds Apart", departing from the epic to fully enter the more accessible progressive pop that was already seen in other bands such as Yes, Genesis or Asia in the eighties.
Saga shows here a perfect sound of synchronization between the keyboards, guitars and the powerful voice of Michael Sadler, with harmonics as brutal as simple as well as fluid as we can hear in "Cat Walk".
The exquisite "The Flyer", the duality of "The Sound Of Strangers" or the progressive "The Vendetta (Still Helpless)" end up curdling an album of magnificent high school progressive pop.
"Images At Twilight", would be the title of the second album from Saga, here the band is already mature enough to make a remarkable album.
The group gives a radical change to the sound of the first album, with a predominance of guitars to the detriment of keyboards that become mere accompaniments with the occasional sporadic lucidity and in general a much more compact sound among all its members.
With better production, this work includes what is perhaps the group's best-known song; "You're not alone".
Even the album cover is much more complex and elaborate.
In 1978 the Canadian band released their debut album and on this first album the group's unmistakable style was already intuited: predominance of keyboards, great voices and vocal harmonies and great rock guitars. This first album is in general an excellent album with some ups and downs due to some filling theme, something repetitive.
His style is close to the pop-progressive of Genesis from the "Duke" era, with AOR influences, and even to those who see in this album the style that some years later bands like the supergroup Asia would do with a brilliant and successful result.
The identity sign that the group would adopt in the following years, an insect similar to a dragonfly, appears on the cover of this first album.
The album contains great hymns that would be classic to be performed live in the following decades of the band's history such as "How Long", "Humble Stance", "Climbing The Ladder", "Will It Be You", "Ice Nice" or the best song on the album and one of the greats pieces from his repertoire; the complex "The Perfectionist".
"Worlds Apart" is the fourth album by the Canadian band s Saga, for many it is a better album than the previous Silent Knight with a series of really excellent songs, although the AOR vibe is not far away, nor are the tastes of the time (New Wave style), is a very elaborate work. It is the live star album, with many of the songs that would soon become classics of all their performances. The duration of the songs is conventional average except the last one which is a little longer.
Tracks such as the catchy and powerful "On The Loose", the rhythm "Wind Him Up", the progressive "Amnesia", the commercial rock of "The Interview" and especially the brilliant progressive "No Stranger", make up an album that shines in its entirety.
