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The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band CD (album) cover

SGT. PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND

The Beatles

 

Proto-Prog

4.36 | 1218 ratings

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ModernRocker79
5 stars Most likely the most influential Pre-Progressive Rock album, though some of these tracks could qualify as Progressive Rock. You have the Art-Song of She's Leaving Home, the Indo-Prog of Within You Without You and the Symphonic Prog of A Day in the Life?

The album is connected in many cases with songs going directly into each other and its use of a musical reprise was an important influence on Progressive Rock and Pop Music in general. The album packaging and printed lyrics on the album was another important influence. Not every song is Progressive but the Beatles were too varied to be considered one genre of music.

Some people consider the length of a song as a Progressive Rock feature a point I don't agree. Sgt Pepper has two songs that go over five minutes. Now compare this with Pink Floyd The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, Jefferson Airplane Surrealistic Pillow have one only one song each over five minutes long. The Byrds Younger than Yesterday and The Beach Boys Pet Sounds have no songs going over four minutes. Then when you factor much of Sgt Pepper is connected without pauses it was an interesting experiment in long form

Ok get back to the album here are some of my favorites

Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds- Very Proto Prog with its interesting use of vocals, Indian drone, and keyboard sounds with the use of use of Metric Modulation which was not a common feature in Rock Music. Fixing a Hole- A nice Psychedelic Pop song with an almost Jazzy Feeling

Being For The Benefit Of Mr. Kite- Another Proto-Prog song that uses a sound collage as a musical backdrop to create a circus feeling.

She's Leaving Home- Art song with its vocals and string style of Eleanor Rigby. It's very much in the vein of Classical Music.

Within You Without You- A Indo-Prog song with its fusion of Eastern instruments and western strings. Indian classical music Within You uses a raga-like form that contains both major and minor thirds in different octaves, kind of a combination of mixolydian and Dorian modalities).

Good Morning Good Morning- Anyone say Math Rock on this track the song, which is played at 117 beats per minute, has an unusual time signature in that 5/4 alternates with 4/4. For transition between 5/4 and 4/4 beat, 3/4 is used. There are a total of 64 bars, which can be grouped in seven groups with three, unique bar sequences: A, B, C, B, C, B, A, which is symmetrical relative to the middle B part (disregarding the last, fadeout bar).

Sgt Pepper Reprise/ A Day in the Life- This is Progressive Rock in my opinion. You start with the hard rocking musical reprise and it segues into 'A Day in the Life' full orchestra playing atonal, aleatoric crescendos. Another song that uses mixed time signatures and it uses multiple parts. Then it ends with a forty second piano chord and then it surprises with a hidden track of backward and forward vocals.

ModernRocker79 | 5/5 |

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