When ELP Jumped the Shark

 

Emerson , Lake, and Palmer were 3 individuals with different music tastes and when they composed, it was very obvious that their personal directions in music could have very well been conflicting with each other personally. Carl Palmer was definitely interested in following Keith Emerson's direction and enjoying himself with the gymnastic aspect to it. Apparently it appealed to him which is why the 2 of them were such a perfect pair regarding their interplay during live transmission, but still...Carl Palmer liked different kinds of music that didn't appeal to Keith Emerson...so perhaps Palmer was there to take a ride and have fun.


All 3 of them "sold out" with a degree of commercialized formula type material. Carl Palmer produced some more commercially viable material with Asia. Keith Emerson produced some "Funk" oriented commercial sounding 80's mainstream material on his solo album "Changing States" ...but he also recorded "Hang On To A Dream" when he was in The Nice. The song was written by Tim Hardin..(I believe), but Emerson had an interest in songwriting and to understand that you have to view his entire career and pick up on the essence of it.  "Hang On To A Dream" was a commercially viable song that even Jeremy Spencer from Fleetwood Mac covered at the BBC and as Spencer had an interest in songwriting more than Progressive Rock. He disliked "In The Court Of The Crimson King" and most Progressive Rock in general. Keith Emerson also had skills to be a commercial songwriter and Jeremy Spencer was covering the song like The Nice did ...so keep in mind that Emerson could have already composed commercially viable songs ...on his own...that were never released...and many years before the release of Tarkus.

Greg Lake was then ...and is now...still..a full scale one hundred percent skilled commercial singer/songwriter. Beginning with "Lucky Man", which many people may not think that to be commercial, but in 1971..it could have been..because it really did not differ THAT MUCH from a commercial "Folk Rock" song on AM radio in the 70's. "From The Beginning" was a little more crafty and much smoother and could actually be compared to a Jazzy Folk oriented tune written by Joni Mitchell in the late 70's. As time progressed Greg Lake made attempts to be more mainstream sounding and it is evident that exists on Works Vol. I.     ELP worked very hard  at being progressive...no doubt...but Emerson and Lake were ..aside from that...skilled songwriters. Carl Palmer had a personal interest in that aspect to writing as well..as he has a track record of working with singer/songwriters..unlike Jeff Beck who gave up on singer/songwriters and released successful instrumental albums in the 70's. I believe that ELP were under the same pressures from the record companies that every other Progressive Rock band was under during that particular time period. Most of those pressures revolved around getting rid of the drawn out progressive side and replacing it with more contrived material and that's around the time Love Beach was released. 

I still like the episode of Cheers where Rebecca Howe said she worked for the prestigious law firm, Emerson Lake & Palmer.  HAHAHAHA!  Maybe you've heard of them?!  

But "jumping the shark" implies that they went so far as to become ridiculous, and I don't think we can say that from ELP, they just got victims of their musical discrepancies and the period when the interest for that kind of music quickly vanished. 

The flying piano stunt at California Jam was regarded at the time by many as an equivalent of ELP jumping the shark. What kind of rock and roll is this? It was yet another example of reckless fun that was adored by the fans and hated by, well, just about everybody else.

Works kind of stumbled over the shark - and it was no longer so much fun because the band began taking itself more seriously, and the cracks were obvious. But the tour was great (still lots of reckless fun).

And then there's the infamous Love Beach album cover. Reckless as hell, but no fun at all. As was the case for so many great bands around that time, things were never the same again. I guess there's a limit to how many sharks you can jump.

But I never really cared for all the silly 'beerhall' tracks they did on the earlier albums either.