Are there any other prog albums that have similar sounding synths? I just started listening to IQ, and The Wake blew me away. I have no idea why this album currently has a 3.78. Should be much higher IMO. This might sound like heresy, but I'm willing to rank The Wake up there with the greats like Selling England by the Pound and Thick as a Brick.
My biggest infatuation with this album lies with Martin Orford's choice of synthesizers. Growing up with a SNES and Sega Genesis in my house gave me the opportunity to hear hours of excellent video game music aided by each system's vintage sound cards. Feels amazing to hear the similarities between The Wake and some of my favorite games.
Orford doesn't even shy away from the SNES string sound. Take note of the intro to Outer Limits.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWOugKLRaNQ
And then listen to this track from Final Fantasy IV (II when I first played it).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-75CA9RYGlc
As far as the Sega Genesis goes, the influence isn't as heavy, but my friends and I were doing a listening session of The Wake the other day, and one of them made an interesting remark about The Magic Roundabout's upbeat section a little more than a minute and a half in....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vtj2bm5VSQ4
"This sounds like something out of Sonic the Hedgehog or something."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyb7XbSx3fw
So yeah, I'm sure I'd have to delve a bit more into neo prog to get anything similar sounding since these synth sounds were an 80s/early 90s thing, but that shouldn't be a problem.