Uplifting/Feel good Prog

HolyMoly wrote: micky wrote:

Tasavallan Presidentti Milky Way Moses

I prophesy disaster wrote: Three albums that I can think of at the moment that I think are on the positive side of the negative-positive spectrum but might not be considered by others:   Tasavallan Presidentti Milky Way Moses

All Tasavallan Presidentti´s (that means the president of republic for all of you don´t know) albums have a really good vibes! What I recommend to start is Lambert Land. Really spiritual one, although Milky Way is also really close. And one that comes into my mind from that fact Presidentti is playing in the back of his first album is Pekka Streng. Really good vibes in his both albums!

Instrumental progressive spacerock always gets me going :D

Ozric Tentacles

Wow, even more for me to listen to now. I don't think I'll be able to get to all of it in 10 lifetimes lol. Anyway, thank you all very much again. You're awesome. 

YESESIS wrote: Dellinger wrote: Oh, if you like the idea of epic instrumentals, then once again, Mike Oldfield. All four albums from the seventies are side-long instrumental songs... well, perhaps Tubular Bells not exactly... but whatever, that's the point. However, they may not have the most complex players you could find, specially when Oldfield himself tried to play a wide variaty of the instruments... it's more relaxed and soft. But however, I guess you should at least check him out. Try Ommadawn first =D Haha, thanks again man for the recommendation. But you know, you don't want to try Zappa because of the 'strange noises' long loud burps, etc. General weirdness that he's famous for. Well I also am hesitant to try this Oldfield person because he did soundtrack for The Exorcist. It's just one of those things I think. You have your guy and I have mine, and could be that neither is right for the other person. Or something. Anyway thanks again man, I know you mean well with all of your suggestions that you give me. Cheers.

So that's the reason you are hesitant about Mike Oldfield. But you got it upside down. Oldfield didn't write the music for The Exorcist, he wrote a piece of music he really needed to do, and some years later some guy involved with the movie happened to hear the music and thought it would work nicely, because of the eerie atmosphere, I would guess. Actually, I have never liked horror movies, and I have never seen that one... and an extra reason for not wanting to see it is exactly because I don't want to relate that beautiful piece of music with that story (more tan I already do just because I know where it was used). Really, the music has nothing to do with demons and possesions and whatever, and I might want to remember (perhaps wrongly) that Oldfield himself wasn't at all happy about that turn of events because that's not what his music was all about (just listen to the whole álbum, you'll se how after the intro, that is the part used on the movie, the music goes into such beautiful dreamy places... until the caveman comes in... and then the sailor... but that's another story, just like Zappa's fooling around with his own music). Actually, if you listen to the intro without that movie's preconception, you'll find it is beautiful and doesn't have to evoke anything from it. And then there's the other albums from the 70's, full of beautiful moments.

And even more, if you are still hesitant, then perhaps you can try the 2003 re-recording, which is actually the one that I have. I don't really know how different it is, but Oldfield seems to have been trying to recreate it the most faithfully possible. It seems he was not satisfied with some issues from the original because of his lack of experience recording music at the time... he was 19 or whatever, and wrote, played, and recorded most of the piece by himself. However, I remember once, in a review or a forum discussion, someone mentioned (as a detriment for him for the re-recording) that the new recording lost some of it's eerie atmosphere, and he didn't think it would have made it into the movie if that had been the way originally recorded.

Now, for Zappa, I really haven't gotten into it. The recommendations given to me seem to have been good places to start... only that I usually check out new music through internet at the office while working (I got a better connection there), but I haven't given myself the time to open the fórum there and look for the thread and see the albums recommended. But I guess I really should do it... I only need to find those posts again.

Dellinger wrote:   Yes, I really loved Return to Ommadawn too... not as much as the first one, that's one of my very favourite pieces of music, but it's no lesser album at all anyway. Hardly will you find someone who came back to the style of music that made him famous is the first place, during his classic era, to name it some way, some 30 years later, and créate something really worthy of his earlier Works, without sounding tired or just going through the motions.

So true. Specially when he didn´t succeed even near as great with Tubular (second version is the only worth listening after the first one).

Mike Oldfield is the inventor of new-age music, some people say.
He's the most positive hippie-musician I can think of (and Jon Anderson, but they worked together).

Guldbamsen wrote: Another one, completely unlike the previous, is the Samla Mammas Manna debut. I challenge anyone to put this baby on and not leave with a big smile on their face.

Just about prog's ultimate feel good and fun album.