Where do you find your new releases?

 

Hi,

It's meant more as a challenge than an insult. A musician that thinks that he can no longer learn anything, is not an artist, for the most part. He/She has lost that "spark" that helps create and illustrate the inspiration for what you can do.

It reminds me of a tennis player that kept beating his son left and right ... and when asked he finally said, when is he going to want to beat me, then? And it's true ... a lot of it depends on your ability to learn and improve and get better ... and a format, or a riff, is way too simple in music history for anyone to (probably) learn a lot more about music and what can be done with it. AND, this is one of the MOST IMPORTANT THINGS, that helped create what we call "progressive music" ... 

Hi,

I lived in a house with a band for many months (early 1980's), and they were fair to better musicians, and were creating what was (basically) a very progressive piece of music, slightly inspired by "The Wall". I, had, by then, already over 2500 LP's and some 400 hours of Space Pirate Radio shows on tape ... in general, the folks in the band didn't mind the comments, but never acted on them, and while I can not say that it might have helped them with my comments, although I thought, and still think a wee bit, that my listening ability and insane variety (they saw all the albums over there!), was about making comments that were musically inclined, or at least within the scope of a composition, however, already at that time, the whole thing was about "song" and they preferred to keep their music in splashes of wonderful material that was (essentially) wasted.

You don't listen to that much DIFFERENT music and not learn something!

The folks were two brothers (named Payne), and a couple of others, one of whom I worked with in a bakery, and he was the bass player (Mike) and main composer. This band did OK in the Santa Barbara/Ventura areas and got a lot of attention, but I think their "focus" was that there was a massive difference in their make up chemistry that hurt ... one guitarist was fairly good, but undisciplined, the other guitarist was too disciplined, and a sort of studio player, and his wife also played the bass, fairly well in another band, that also got attention.

Later, up here in Portland/Vancouver (USA, Oregon/Washington border), I spent time taking pictures with a couple of bands, and went up around the West Coast with GONG, and have on tape some conversations with Daevid Allen, who agreed with me that there was a general problem with many musicians about being open to doing different things, but he hoped that the band GONG showed that they all had a very strong input to what the band was about, which was still very much Daevid, but musically, it was all of them since Daevid was very different on his own solo albums. Those reviews will never be released, as I feel they were too personal, and some folks might not like it. But I certainly would not think, and Daevid saw my collection and commented on the incredible diversity of it, that he was not being honest ... if there was one thing, it was that Daevid was very open and a very "together" person, that pretty much gave his life to the muse of the word and the music.

I am not sure, that most folks have picked up so much from a literary house, and then an artistic chance, to be able to make some comments ... the difference in the quality of the design of the "progressive" music is clear ... I'm a progressive and stand up for the freedom and the experimentation, but in my eyes, you are a very modern listener, that might have heard a lot of the older music, but my wonder is if the attention to what the music is, and does, took effect ... since a lot of your comments seem to doubt the veracity of the philosophy, or ideals that created "progressive music" for which you think name dropping is more important.

I can name for you over 100 of them, up to and including some literary giants, and it won't make a wee bit of difference to you or anyone else here ... you don't EXPERIENCE all that and learn nothing from it, and I have systematically always written about them here, as an illustration that the world of the "higher arts" (for lack of a better term, sorry!), is indeed a very special place that is not about the sales numbers, or the "fame", like things are here to some extent.

Doesn't make me right, or wrong, any more than you, but name dropping is for the folks that can't see much of anything in my book ... in my "sights" the only ones that "doubt" are the ones that do not know which path to take, left or right, or which voice is true ... and it is safe to joke that only the Fool knows!

Everything, from school, to college, to University and to my record and music collection, and my love for film adds up beautifully ... it is all about the "same thing" ... the discovery of the new light, or the new words or the new universe ... and its desire, and ability to be as clear as possible about it all ... which sometimes is impossible since it all comes from an area that has a completely different language ... and so it is for "progressive music" since its inception.

For older/well-known artists, I usually find CD's from music stores, libraries, and thrift shops.  I know I won't find specific albums I might be looking for on any given day, but over time I've been able to collect most or all of the discography of certain artists; for example: I have most of the albums from Jethro Tull, Mike Oldfield, Tori Amos, ELP, Bela Fleck, Miles Davis, but it took some time to find them all.