{"id":47049,"date":"2025-01-08T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-01-08T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/double-vision\/"},"modified":"2026-07-04T11:20:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-04T11:20:07","slug":"double-vision","status":"publish","type":"review","link":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/double-vision\/","title":{"rendered":"Double Vision"},"content":{"rendered":"

Leave it to hit-chasing arena rockers Foreigner to adopt industry slang for a group\u2019s second album as a kind of mission statement; this identical-twin sequel to their 1977 debut<\/a> is nothing if not sophomoric. <\/p>\n

Double Vision<\/i> features the same lineup as said debut\u2014Lou Gramm (vocals), Mick Jones (guitars, vocals), Ian McDonald (guitars\/keys\/horns), Al Greenwood (keys), Ed Gagliardi (bass) and Dennis Elliott (drums)\u2014along with the exact same vibe. Alternately blustering and whiny, swaggering and wallowing in self-pity, Double Vision<\/i> plays out like a Mardi Gras of arrested emotional development. <\/p>\n

As before, the formula-driven album contains precisely three varieties of songs: brash, riffy rockers; sappy, maudlin ballads; and yawn-inducing mid-tempo numbers. An early warning sign appeared when I scanned the track list for the first time in\u2014admittedly\u2014decades and found the only titles I recognized were the three singles. Much of the rest is as memorable as the fine print on a rental car agreement.<\/p>\n

First single \u201cHot Blooded\u201d (which reached #3) kicks the album off in classic Foreigner style, its horny-adolescent haiku of a lyric poured into an airtight, radio-ready song structure. I once described this track<\/a> as \u201cdumb as rocks\u201d\u2014an unkind thing to say about those poor innocent stones, who wouldn\u2019t be caught dead singing a couplet as mortifying as \u201cYou\u2019re makin\u2019 me sing \/ For your sweet, sweet thing\u201d\u2014but this song\u2019s central riff and chorus are as inescapable as an IRS audit.<\/p>\n

Opening side two of the original vinyl, the #2 title track is the highlight here, with snappy verses segueing to ringing choruses and an arrangement that leaves space for the entire band to strut a bit (the lyric is gibberish, but around here we call that Tuesday). Third single \u201cBlue Morning, Blue Day\u201d (#15) is three minutes of victimhood wrapped around a driving, sticks-like-glue guitar-and-keys melodic hook, as an increasingly desperate Gramm pleads his case to an ex who I always imagine rolling her eyes at his histrionics.<\/p>\n

From these modest heights, the downhill grade grows steeper.<\/p>\n

The vaguely cinematic instrumental \u201cTramontane\u201d is the only one Foreigner ever released and the most interesting track on the album, representing a road not taken, with Greenwood as lead writer. Jones\u2019 post-bitter-breakup rant \u201cBack Where You Belong\u201d manifests an unexpected Beatlesque flair, even if it\u2019s in service of a clich\u00e9-ridden lyric that he insists on singing himself (whatever, guy).<\/p>\n

And then you\u2019re into \u201cOh dear\u201d territory, a familiar Foreigner haunt.<\/p>\n

\u201cI never knew a man could be so lonely \/ That life could treat a man so wrong\u201d goes the topic sentence of \u201cYou\u2019re All I Am\u201d a drippy, droopy Jones ballad of zero-self-esteem codependence. Gramm and McDonald co-write \u201cLove Has Taken Its Toll,\u201d a rumbly barroom blues-rocker that manages the feat of swaggering and whining at the same time. \u201cLonely Children\u201d is a mid-tempo m\u00e9lange of disparate riffs and ideas that never jell, and \u201cI Have Waited So Long\u201d is a Jones penned-and-sung ballad that\u2019s syrupy enough to be poured over waffles.<\/p>\n

Closer \u201cSpellbinder\u201d generates some actual musical tension with the most prominent bassline the group ever featured, powering the final track of Gagliardi\u2019s career with the band. A steady build draws in guitars and strings, but it\u2019s like dressing a stick figure in royal purple; you\u2019re still left with empty clothes.<\/p>\n

\u201c[S]lickly produced, commercially powerful, but artistically vapid\u201d is how dean of the West Coast rock critics Robert Hilburn<\/a> described Double Vision<\/i>, which honestly seems generous, even for an album that somehow made it to #3.<\/p>\n

And then there\u2019s the Rock Hall. <\/p>\n

Putting Foreigner in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is the musical equivalent of giving In \u2019n\u2019 Out Burger a Michelin star\u2014and yet, people line up by the thousands at their drive-thrus every single day. If it\u2019s formulaic meat-and-potatoes arena rock you\u2019re after, Foreigner serves it up with eye-watering consistency, and Double Vision<\/i> will do as well as any of their first three albums, which are all basically the same one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":35168,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[7739],"rating":[11204],"class_list":["post-47049","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-foreigner","rating-rating-c-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/47049","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47049"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/47049\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35168"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47049"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=47049"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=47049"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}