after being a "larks' tongues in aspic"/"starless and bible black"/"red"-era purist for so long, i today realised that "the construkction of light" and "the power to believe" are, in fact, good records.

my shit music taste and i thank you for your time.

I unfortunately don't have the new one yet (I always cite lack of funds as the reason, but I just realized I actually do have some money now... hmm), but "The ConstruKction of Light" is monstrous.

First and foremost, the title track. Unbelievable. Especially the part that starts at around 3:00. Fucking beautiful - interlocking guitars at their best. Next, ProzaKc Blues and Larks' IV are both awesome tracks, with a great Belew solo and a great Fripp solo, respectively. FraKctured... well, I don't really know what to say about it. It's pretty cool. The "fairy fingers" parts are the best, though. And how can anyone not love Heaven and Earth?

It's odd to me that this album was so hated by many fans... I think their main reason was that it didn't live up to the expectations after the ProjeKcts, but I can't comment cause I don't have the ProjeKcts boxset (once again, lack of funds). But looking at it objectively, it is a really, really good album. Quite possibly one of their best.

What I really like about King Crimson these days is the spaciness in their music. Some of it makes me feel like I'm stranded on the abandoned wrecks of a space station or something. Credit Fripp's soundscapes, I guess.

In short, yes, King Crimson today = good.

Originally posted by Glare Seethe
Some of it makes me feel like I'm stranded on the abandoned wrecks of a space station or something.

As silly as that analogy sounds, I understand completely. The guitar tone is quite strange in it's clarity and shimmering quality, which adds to the "space station"-esque vibe a lot.

Originally posted by cap'n jazz
As silly as that analogy sounds, I understand completely. The guitar tone is quite strange in it's clarity and shimmering quality, which adds to the "space station"-esque vibe a lot.

Plus the soundscapes add a lot to it, I think. Some of the pieces are more moody, more like floating in space, and some of the more ferocious ones would probably fit nicely on the soundtrack to Alien, you know? It is mostly the instrumental pieces that evoke such images for me - Heaven and Earth for example, plus all the improvisations from "Heavy ConstruKction", if you have it (if you don't, go buy it - it's great).

On TCOL specifically, the artwork obviously accommodates this as well...

I really loved The Power to belive, actually made a thread about it while ago. Level 5 is amongst (imho) their best songs ever.

ive been waiting to check out there stuff for a while. tell me where to begin, what tracks should i download?

Originally posted by sleeper
what tracks should i download?

call me retro, but: Epitaph

Originally posted by sleeper
ive been waiting to check out there stuff for a while. tell me where to begin, what tracks should i download?

Separated by eras:

'69-'72: 21st Century Schizoid Man, Cirkus, Lady of the Dancing Water, A Sailor's Tale

'72-'74: Larks' Tongues In Aspic Part 2, Easy Money, The Great Deceiver, The Night Watch, Fallen Angel, One More Red Nightmare, Starless

'81-'84: Frame By Frame, Indiscipline, Thela Hun Ginjeet, Man With An Open Heart, Three of A Perfect Pair

I don't have "Thrak" yet for some reason, so I'll skip '94-'97.

'00-'03: The ConstruKction of Light, Heaven and Earth, Larks' Tongues In Aspic Part 4, ProzaKc Blues.

Can't recommend anything off the new one yet as I don't have it. I also skipped over a couple of albums that I dont have, "Beat" and "In the Wake of Poseidon". I've really been slacking...

I won't claim to be a huge King Crimson fan. I enjoy In the Court of the Crimson King and In the Wake of Poseidon. The rest I've heard from them hasn't been very enticing.

I'll throw this out there: Genesis is the best progressive band of all time. :)

Originally posted by cap'n jazz
after being a "larks' tongues in aspic"/"starless and bible black"/"red"-era purist for so long, i today realised that "the construkction of light" and "the power to believe" are, in fact, good records.

my shit music taste and i thank you for your time.

how does starless compare to those other two? i own larks tongues and red.

Originally posted by distance


how does starless compare to those other two? i own larks tongues and red.

Uneven. Not nearly as good as the other two. Although it does have "Trio" and "Fracture" which are both classics.

Originally posted by Mr Snatch-O-Rama
Uneven. Not nearly as good as the other two. Although it does have "Trio" and "Fracture" which are both classics.

"Lament" is pretty good too.

Originally posted by ZackZ
I'll throw this out there: Genesis is the best progressive band of all time. :)

My friend played me some of their stuff yesterday; it's good. The keyboard-heavy bits remind me of my beloved Yes, too :)

Originally posted by cap'n jazz


"Lament" is pretty good too.

Yar, i'd say that that's the best of the rockier songs - both "Night Watch" (classic solo) and "Great Deciever" (classic riff) are great too. The main problem i have with SABB are the other improvs though - We'll Let You Know, The Mincer and especially the title track have never done anything for me.

And I would have to agree that Genesis is the best prog band. Go and hear "Supper's Ready" if you haven't already...but you have to hear "Musical Box", "Return of the Giant Hogweed", "Fountain of Salmacis", "Watcher of the Skies", "The Lamia", "Dancing With The Moonlit Knight" as well....anything from Trespass to Wind and Wuthering will do just fine.

Oh, yes. And DON'T EVER EVER EVER EVER even think about buying Calling All Shit-stains.

I love all of Selling England by the Pound and The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. I think Duke is ok. Duke's Travels/Duke's End have some EXTREMELY good drumming.

Cinema Show is my favorite track.

NEWSFLASH:

Yes from about 1970-72 pwnz every band, ever.

Originally posted by cap'n jazz
NEWSFLASH:

Yes from about 1970-72 pwnz every band, ever.

Incorrect. Sure, the Yes Album, Fragile, and Close to the Edge all rule, but they're not Nursery Cryme, Selling England By The Pound and Lamb Lies Down on Broadway!

Originally posted by Mr Snatch-O-Rama


Incorrect. Sure, the Yes Album, Fragile, and Close to the Edge all rule, but they're not Nursery Cryme, Selling England By The Pound and Lamb Lies Down on Broadway!

However, Yes pwzned over Genesis with Tales From Topographic Oceans & Relayer. :)

(They both rule. Yum)

Originally posted by zekix
However, Yes pwzned over Genesis with Tales From Topographic Oceans & Relayer. :)

(They both rule. Yum)

Yeah, they're good, but CLOSE TO THE EDGE?!?!?!? HELLO?!?!?!? SIBERIAN KHATRU!?!?!?!?!? WHA~~~???????

SUPPER'S READY? LIKE, HELLO????

Originally posted by Mr Snatch-O-Rama
SUPPER'S READY? LIKE, HELLO????

LOL,. LIKE PHIL COLLINS?!?! I CAN'T FUCKEN WALK SO I'LL WRITE A SONG/ALBUM ABOUT IT!?!?!?!? :D

LOL, LIKE 'OWNER OF A LONELY HEART', LOL? LOL LIKE 'RICK WAKEMAN'S MYTHS AND LEGENDS OF KING ARTHUR' LOL? LOL LIKE 'ANDERSON BRUFORD WAKEMAN HOWE' LOL? LOL LIKE 'UNION' LOL? LOL LIKE 'EVERY SINGLE SONG YES RECORDED AFTER GOING FOR THE ONE' LOL? LOL!!!!! :D

:rofl:

I'm going to keep this thread going FOREVAR.

Some more prog-jhkhfzsnashjks:

Gentle Giant ('In A Glass House' is a really fine record, I decided last week)
Van Der Graaf Generator (A friend gave me 'Pawn Hearts'; it's enjoyable)
Jethro Tull (awesome)

Um, discuss these bands as well? I guess. This can be the official prog-nonsense thread. Yeszzdscf

In the end, King Crimson own all of those bands cause they never turned into shit and are the only ones of the prog bands that are still making relevant music.

Unless you consider Jethro Tull prog. I don't. But if you do, they destroy pretty much all of the others... it's true that they've seriously gone downhill from the mid-80s and on (yeah, okay, they suck now), but the good stuff is so good that it doesn't matter. I'm of those who believe that they were only really prog in '72-'73. The rest of the stuff has lots of progressive elements in it, but in the end is also so different from the others that I don't really think they should count.

There's also Gong - lots of fun. And Camel are awesome. But Tull and Crimson rule all.

It's interesting how there's a similar pattern with a lot of 70s artists, the way their career progressed through the last three decades: the 70s were awesome, the 80s sucked horribly and the 90s brought some sort of a return to form, although none of it ever came close to the golden years.

I have MU: The Best Of Jethro Tull. It's good, but NOW I WANT MORE so tell me an album and i'll try and get it.

king crimson sucks, man

Originally posted by cap'n jazz
I have MU: The Best Of Jethro Tull. It's good, but NOW I WANT MORE so tell me an album and i'll try and get it.

Benefit's my favourite. Stand Up and Thick As A Brick are also excellent.

Gentle Giant's 'Octopus' is a really good record. VDGG's "Pawn Hearts" is one of the greatest prog-rock records.

While were all going all-out and mentioning prog bands, i'll namedrop Renaissance, one of my favourites. They were excellent in the '70s, making several classic records - it's not as heavy as say, KC and such, but the band are pretty atmospheric, along with being bombastic at times. Also, they have the wonderful Annie Haslam on vocals. Download "Ashes are Burning" for a pretty accurate description of their sound, and buy either "Ashes are Burning", "Turn of the Cards" or "Scheherezade and Other Stories" (or alternatively, buy Live at Carnegie Hall)

Originally posted by cap'n jazz
I have MU: The Best Of Jethro Tull. It's good, but NOW I WANT MORE so tell me an album and i'll try and get it.

The absolute essentials are "Songs From the Wood", "Minstrel In the Gallery" and "A Passion Play", in my opinion. Guaranteed to blow you away. The rest of their 70s albums are wonderful as well, but these are the three that stand out for me.

MU was the first album I had, too. Actually it was my parents', but well. "Rainbow Blues" kicks so much ass it is unbelievable. And Edit 8 of APP has what is probably one of my favorite melodies ever... it's particularly beautiful when they reprise it at the end on the soprano sax.

As for Renaissance - I borrowed "Turn of the Cards" from a friend a long time ago and remember enjoying it, but I never got around to checking other stuff. But speaking of lovely female vocalists, anybody listen to Steeleye Span? They're a folk band but with lots of prog elements as well. Well, maybe not lots. But some. I don't know. They kick ass, though. Ian Anderson produced one of their albums in '74. Their arrangements are incredible and they were all good singers, so harmonies abound. Maddy Prior was the lead singer and she has a breathtaking voice. She also sang backup vocals on JT's "Too Old To Rock 'N' Roll: Too Young To Die!", and the entirety of Tull played on her solo album, "Woman In the Wings", from '78.

Download "King Henry", "Spotted Cow", "Hard Times of Old England", "Long Lanking", "Bach Goes To Limerick", "The Ups and Downs", "Come Ye O'er Frae France", "Saucy Sailor", "Lovely On the Water" and my personal favorite, the 15-minute epic "Montrose".

Shit, how come we all forgot about Emerson, Lake & Palmer? Easily the most pretentious of prog bands... I can only listen to them in very little amounts cause I just end up getting pissed off at Emerson's endless piano concertos after a while. But still... "Tarkus" and "Trilogy" are both great. And "Brain Salad Surgery" is awesome... well, most of it. It's a shame they didn't separate "Karn Evil 9" into three different tracks, though, cause while the first movement is arguably some of the best music ELP has produced, the second and third are awful.

Ah, ELP. One of my favourites. I think that Tarkus, Trilogy and debut were easily their best works - although Brain Salad has some killer stuff like "Toccata" and "Jerusalem", I do kind of agree about Karn Evil 9. The 1st movement was great, but 2nd was just way too long for what it was. It worked well in "Take A Pebble" but it just didn't work here - although I think it picks up again in the third, bar Lake and Sinfield's ridiculous lyrics.

I think that the Moody Blues are kind of underrated in a way. They're not prog in the "classic" sense, and they can get simpy at times, but damn, could those men write good songs. Pretty much all of their first seven albums are brilliant, and "To Our Children's Children's Children" is one of the best albums ever made IMO.

I actually don't have their debut, but I heard it doesn't hold a candle to the later albums. A friend of mine gave me some bootleg of theirs, from '71 I think, but I couldn't get myself to listen to it, hah. It has "Take A Pebble", though, so I think I'll give it another try just to hear this track.

The lyrics to the first movement of KE9 are pretty cool, I think (starting from "step inside (hello!) we've the most amazing show..."), but in the third they are terrible, yeah.

The Worst Lyrics Award, however, should go to Camel, from '72 until about '80, I think. When Susan Hoover starting writing the lyrics they got much much better. But stuff like "Never Let Go" is just embarassing...

The first side of the debut is certainly a lot better than the second. "The Barbarian", "Take A Pebble" and "Knife Edge" are all ELP classics IMO. The second...well, "The Three Fates" rules if you like Emerson being Emerson. "Tank" is a half-decent rumpus, even if it does feature a studio drum solo, and "Lucky Man"'s not bad at all.

And as for Camel's lyrics....well, their oft-regarded masterwork is an album that features no lyrics whatsoever. So yeah, i'd agree that in general, they were pretty shit as far as lyrics went. Not sure if they would be the worst though - Anderson and Sinfield, while sometimes producing something decent, more often than not just make me cringe, especially in stuff like "Prince Rupert Awakes" and well...all of Topographic Oceans. He obviously went to lots of effort to write those lyrics - but it just comes off completely wrong and he sounds like he's talking a heap of bollocks. Although then again, as far as cringe goes, they both look pathetic compared to good ol' Neil Peart, although Geddy Lee certainly helps with that.

The best prog lyricists, for me, would have to be the other two Peters - Gabriel and Hammill. Both are excellent.

Heh, for a moment there I thought you were talking about the other Anderson as a bad lyricist... gave me a bit of a scare.

Camel - their strongest tracks are the instrumentals, mostly (Earthrise is gorgeous), but I personally feel The Snow Goose isn't as good as Mirage or Moonmadness as an album. Oh well. "Echoes" is my favorite song and it's not even from any of those albums.

This just reminded me of Caravan. Except I don't know anything about them aside from the fact that I can never find any of their songs on Limewire. Nice album titles, though. If I had any money I would just go out and buy something... Or perhaps I should just give up and start burning cds. I'm one of those who like having the original.

Ah well.

Oh yeah, about the lyrics. I'm not too familiar with Yes' lyrics (or music, for that matter), but I don't think Sinfield is that bad... at the very least, his lyrics are very colorful, which is something I like. While it's true that it's at times too much and often doesn't make any sense, I'll take "Formentera Lady" over "Never Let Go" or "Song Within A Song" any day...

Yeah, I suppose. And unlike Camel, he certainly has his moments. And when he has those moments, they're excellent - like "Epitaph" for example. At least he's not uber-pretentious, like some. A lot of the time, Sinfield just intentionally wrote a load of bollocks, i think. Like "Schizoid Man" for example, or "Cadence and Cascade"...he's not bad at that. But sometimes, he just let drama get the better of him...like "The Letters" which was just laughable, and "Ladies of the Road" which would probably have been a classic, if penned by Led Zeppelin, and not dat ol' King Crimso.

Originally posted by Glare Seethe
Heh, for a moment there I thought you were talking about the other Anderson as a bad lyricist... gave me a bit of a scare.

Camel - their strongest tracks are the instrumentals, mostly (Earthrise is gorgeous), but I personally feel The Snow Goose isn't as good as Mirage or Moonmadness as an album. Oh well. "Echoes" is my favorite song and it's not even from any of those albums.

This just reminded me of Caravan. Except I don't know anything about them aside from the fact that I can never find any of their songs on Limewire. Nice album titles, though. If I had any money I would just go out and buy something... Or perhaps I should just give up and start burning cds. I'm one of those who like having the original.

Ah well.

Oh no. John-Boy Anderson is certainly right up there with the best of prog's lyricists.

I haven't heard 'Mirage' but I do have 'Moonmadness'...personally, I prefer Snow Goose, although Lunar Sea is probably my favourite Camel song.

I personally don't rate Caravan. I only have "In the Land of Grey and Pink"...and well, it's nothing really memorable to me - kinda mediocre. However, if you like Gong (especially the David Allen-era Gong) then it would probably be a good idea to check them out. "In the Land of Grey and Pink" is often regarded as their best.

Lunar Sea is great, and the version on "A Live Record" is especially fantastic - Mel Collins' sax added a lot.

Frankly, a lot of people have already told me that Caravan aren't that memorable, but I feel compelled to hear for myself. I do like Gong quite a bit...

I'd say it's certainly worth it if you like Gong. I'm not an expert by any means on both bands, but I think they fall into the same ballpark - I'm not sure if Gong came out of the Canterbury scene, but Caravan certainly did. Actually, they're kind of semi-comparable with Camel as well, I think - so i'd highly recommend them to you.

Yeah, I will definitely check them out. I was actually reminded of them because of Camel - was talking about Echoes, which is from their '78 "Breathless" album. Richard Sinclair (formerly of Caravan) was in the band at the time, and I believe his brother Dave (likewise, formerly of Caravan) joined as well once Bardens left... and I've seen Camel mentioned as part of the Canterbury Scene several times already, although I dunno how accurate it would be to say that...

Yeah, I think Camel were from the Canterbury scene. While not necessarily like the major, jazzy Canterbury bands (Soft Machine, Hatfield and the North et al) they had that kind of light, airy feel of the Canterbury scene, as does Caravan.

I love Gentle Giant. I have their first 6 albums. I don't like them as much as Genesis though. I don't care that Genesis went on to suck, they made enough good music for me to listen to forever.

Camel is good. I haven't heard to much from them since they didn't really make it in the US so I can't really get many CDs of theirs.

How about Brand X? :) They have chops to spare. Unorthidox Behaviour is a SUPERB album. Some of their other stuff is good too. Listen to Not Good Enough - See Me! off of their Product album. It's a good track to silence the Phil Collins doubters.