How is it for you?

(By the way, I've seen quite a few of your posts lately, just wanted to say you're making great content... keep doing what your doing.)   

thank you very much 

If you have an artist who lasts more than a few years, you are very likely always going to get a stinker or two in the discography, or a middling to poor performance at a gig. Completely natural.

Just thinking about three of my favourites, I still don’t care much for:

Marillion Holidays in Eden, a very misplaced attempt to keep the glory years of Fish commercial success going, probably at the behest of EMI. That they then came out with a masterpiece such as Brave is all credit to them.

Yes. Open Your Eyes is a truly awful album, not remotely worthy of a bunch of 6 year old High School performers, let alone this venerated bunch. The Quest is not nearly as bad, but then again it is an album off such mediocrity that it is barely worth even thinking about, just not bad enough to get angry about.

Genesis, self titled. The first side was brilliant, the second poor, with the execrable Illegal Alien the worst culprit.

Not many artists escape this.

I understand what you mean, and agree. Yet, I can tell about myself that I can experience music (at the best) as something almost heavenly, magic, while musicians are just earthly and maybe can be a kind of obstruction to reach this magic - not least because when you dig deeper for some informations about them, you may find not so little of dirt.

That actually happened to me in a rather shocking way some years ago when I read the book  Our Band Could Be Your Life. Scenes from the American Indie Underground 1981-1991  by Michael Azzerad, as the author gave a very unpleasant description of about half of the bands portrayed in this book, not least Black Flag and Henry Rollins. - Which in fact means that even I'm fond of Black Flag's My War, my enjoyment of it is still spoiled by this book.

I couldn't even understand the author's intention with this book as he seemed to be sympathetic with this Indie scene, and I couldn't stop laughing of the main title as I really don't think many readers got the wish to become a part of the depicted bands after reading this book. 

Hi,

I think it changes as you get older. When you are young, some things are "better" than others and you take to those real quick. At that time, you do NOT know, and sometimes do not care, for the rest of the albums and the band's output, IF the band was not new.

Speed this up, and 30 years later and that band has 9 albums or 10, and you might like that album, STILL, but you don't care for the rest of the band. This could show a multitude of thoughts about that, from album to music, to many other thoughts.

Change this to the catalog of the band, and things change. When you have 8 albums (let's say) that you rank 6 or 7 (out of 10) and one album that you rank 9 or 10 (out of 10) the average now has dropped to 7 or less. Thus your importance for the band, has been lowered I imagine one could say! Now, you are battling the "music" versus the "band" idea and how you might not want your thoughts of that album you love not be as valuable or important.

In the end, within the history of music, it is not the "album" that matters, but the QUALITY of the work that the composer/artist did, which is far more valuable and telling about that person. One of the best examples might be Mr. Robert Fripp ... regardless of one album that we like, or dislike, no one here can EVER say that the band itself is not the most important thing, and the results and work, have been incredible even if played 50 years later!

To me, MUSIC is MUSIC and in the majority of situations it is not about the "album". I have many things I enjoy listening to and it is the only thing by that artist and band, but it does not make them less valuable to me as a band, or more valuable to me as an album ... there are many other albums that also stand up and out and deserve the same accolades, but our LIMITED view and listening of many of these prevent us from giving anyone a good and proper idea about the band, or the album. It all defaults to "favorite" and "like" and has nothing to do with the band, or its work! This is why I can not post on Eastern this or that, or some nationalities I have not heard enough or properly to be able to say ... I like this or not. The poll itself would suffer, if I can only vote for the three I have heard, and thus, make the poll rather uneducated and stupid. Sort of saying that the rest of the stuff is not good, and THAT'S NOT TRUE!

It could be a tricky question for many here ... but as much as some folks might select one album by JT as the one they enjoy the most, I am pretty sure that those folks also appreciate the band and its work over the years. Thus, we might end up confusing the issue a lot more than help it.

Hi,

Hahahahaha ... dream on baby! I've seen the opposite with a producer intentionally having a girl be there to take care of the musicians' "needs" at any time. We'll have to ask the LZ folks about this, and perhaps get Mrs PdB to grow up and stop trying to be a middle class lollipop icon and tell us a bit more than just the drivel and dribble that did not say anything!   

Most waitresses, though, are just trying their best to augment their income if they can, but in my 25 years of restaurants and bars, I can tell you that most of them were more worried about their boyfriends, than they were about the johns.

And yes, it should be about the music, but tell that to the teenager and other folks playing that rap boom-boom loud in their cars driving right by your ears! It's not even about the band or the music at all ... it's about the boom-boom!

AGREED!!!

 

It seems right "but the QUALITY of the work" are albums?

Something else, I do somehow find KC done more important in comparison with some other bands than they have deserved - can evaluation like that be done objectively?

  "the jazz cabbage"?, I've heard many but never this one before - where do you learn that stuff, JD?, because I would surely like to hear some more of it.

What do you say, Paul?

moshkito wrote: Most waitresses, though, are just trying their best to augment their income if they can, but in my 25 years of restaurants and bars, I can tell you that most of them were more worried about their boyfriends, than they were about the johns.

I can indeed believe that.

 

I've been wrestling with the same or similar question earlier with regards to creating a list for the " http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=123802" rel="nofollow - All-Time Top 10 Progressive Rock Bands " thread. In fact, I am finding it difficult to come up with 10 all-time favourite bands because I operate squarely at the "album level" rather than the "band level". Rarely do I get more than one or two albums of a given band, and even for bands where I do have several albums, they often do not feel like favourite bands. And many of my favourite albums are the only albums I have from the bands, and therefore those bands can't be regarded as favourite bands.

 

Beginning for a couple of or some years ago, I've began to think like the more albums I'm fond of from a band the more is it my favourite band, and after beginning thinking like that, I've discovered that some bands can feel like my favourites, for instance certainly ELP.

- But I didn't even think of making a try with " http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=123802" rel="nofollow - All-Time Top 10 Progressive Rock Bands " - it certainly felt pointless to me. And I really don't know because picking some favourites feels to me like putting other bands aside, and it's like let them down. 

On the other hand, I've had a period over quite a lot of years when Pink Floyd was my absolutely favourite band, and I could say to somebody:"My absolutely #1 are Pink Floyd and Karl Marx."  I had even all PF records, released before The Division Bell - where I afterall drew the line.

 

"I prophesy disaster" is a lyric from "A Plague of Lighthouse Keepers" by Van der Graaf Generator on their Pawn Hearts album. It is also the name of a Van der Graaf Generator compilation album.

 

By the way, although it would be difficult for me to list 10 favourite bands, I can very easily list one, Van der Graaf Generator, who I have based my PA forum identity on (although I did recently change my signature to a Peter Hammill lyric instead of a lyric from the VdGG album that is my avatar).

 

Great question.

My favourite band for some time has been Emerson, Lake and Palmer. They were a great live band and produced some massively important music that doesn't need listing by me. They were innovative, exciting and brave as a band. Other artists looked and took note of them. That's the facts. Did they produce a killer album like say Pawn Hearts or The Snow Goose? Sadly no, but my feelings don't change. It is what it is but no one is going to convince me that VDGG or Camel were a better band. You can look back and it may seem like that now because ELP made many bad decisions but what has that got to do with music? Really it doesn't IMO.

 

I certainly like to hear praising ELP because I can at least think of them as a band which has made 5 albums I'm fond/very fond of, and I surely have some special feelings for them.
Trilogy was my very first Prog album which I got at the age of 15. I've never got tired of listening to ELP albums, on the contrary, I've become more fond of them over the years, and I find ELP as a very important Prog pioneering band, as well (you've heard that before).

     My favorite band is Triumvirat, and they split back in early 1981, and their leader, Juergen Fritz, except for an abortive attempt at a comeback album in 2002, has totally distanced himself from "Triumvirat the band", but none of that stops me from them being my favorite, the thing that hooks me is their music which thrills me as much as when I first discovered it in the spring of 1985.

                 My other favorites, Giger Lenz Marron, Dzyan, Passport, except for Passport, are also long gone in terms of recordings, and touring, but that is ok; I have the music, and am grateful to say I do.

It's a combination of the two for me, but ultimately it's the albums that do the *talking.

*or singing

Hi,

After a concert with King Crimson in Seattle (w/ 3 drummers), my friend on the way out to get the car stated that ... "this puts a new meaning in what is music!"

I'm not sure there is objectivity here, but one must accept and understand the quality of the rehearsals and study that ensures that KC is at the top of its game. IN that sense it is more like classical music, but we don't know, or understand that comparison. 

Thus, the "total" of the music is important, not one album! And when the group/band/composer can not only show it, but also continue to make it better ... you know the answer. One "album" or one hit wonders, or one album favorites die hard at that moment.

Hi,

After a concert with King Crimson in Seattle (w/ 3 drummers), my friend on the way out to get the car stated that ... "this puts a new meaning in what is music!"

[/QUOTE]

was able to see KC concerts in Seattle in 2017.  i think all part of the radical action tour.  amazing!

Subsonsciously and perhaps even consciously I feel that there were the times when the trees were nicer and the water was bluer. And I want to be part of those times' atmosphere. I want to soak that atmosphere. Or the atmosphere to soak me in. Or both. 

It could be myself written those words, Woon D., even I like quite a lot of post-70's music, as well.

The music that we all enjoy cannot be produced without the proper chemistry.  Fripp and Zappa knew this.

It is a chicken & egg argument, but I find the musicians themselves to be inseparable from the product. 

Hi,

I think that in those days we had something to fight for, and agree on. Today, with mass commercialization, so much is trivial that not enough matters to anyone, and then ... the music and social combines reflect that ... I mean, look at it ... what is worth fighting for, your right to choice or a long song about ____________? 

The times, and places, normally, are what helped create the "scenes" that we love so much, and the real truth behind it, is for you to look at film, theater, literature and other arts ... and they are doing the same thing. Today, with media commercialization, this is impossible until the media controls get hacked and changed.

When I was younger, it was all about the albums and the music... I was actually quite fiercely opposed to basing my listening choices on the personalities of band members and paid their 'rock star lifestyles. little heed, secretly guilty that my purchases would in some way only promote their lifestyles... 

Of course, much has changed over the decades and because most artistic proponents of prog are probably as broke as we are, my stance has softened considerably on this front.

I don't know how you feel Yogev, but I was actually visibly moved when I saw Orphaned Land perform Mabool in 2006, because of their back story in trying to make their brand of Progressive Symph/Death Metal a unifying force against many odds in your homeland.. that did spur me on to support the band because of who they were...

Speak for yourself. 

Perhaps when bands hardly ever have a line up change (ie Rush) then it's easier to view the entire body of work as a seamless and evolving situation rather than getting stuck on just one or 2 albums.

I'm the former bass player to Bob Fripp's early Guitar Craft student, Alonzo "Lon" Jones, and his rather amazing band, CAVU (Ceiling and Visibility Unlimited).  

Having partaken in the prog creative process at a high level taught me that, when the band is "in the zone," the muse visits and the music results. 

The music listened to by fans is just a pale approximation of the joy that the musicians feel at its creation.  We fight, we laugh, and then we get down to work.  There is no more magic moment in life than that. 

I may have strayed a bit from the main question, but I think it was an interesting tangent at least.

I like this response a lot. It helps me see into a view that I can't see in myself, as my favorite band happens to be the same one that made my favorite album and favorite song, was my favorite live show, and has had a couple of my favorite musicians. But there's not any rule that says all that should be true of everyone, and undoubtedly ELP are a great choice for a favorite band for all of the reasons you mentioned!

It's really cool that you've been able to play this kind of music at a very high level. It isn't that cool however to kind of puff your chest out about it and consider your own answer to the question to be the only correct one. I'm sure many of us here are musicians in some capacity and do have some understanding of that euphoric feeling we get when creating music. However many of us are also massive music fans of the listening kind, who form special bonds and attachments to particular records or bands we weren't a part of based on how well they connect with us. 

Everyone's going to connect with music most completely in their own way, and for some it's the albums as artifacts and works of art which outrank the evolving nature of bands in personal importance. For you obviously it's the experience of creating music at a high level which reigns supreme, a feeling I'm inclined to share myself actually. I haven't played prog with any famous or semi-famous musicians, but I did play saxophone in my school concert and jazz bands for about half my life, and those times when everyone was playing their absolute best were indeed magical. The feeling I would get when a solo would come out just right was otherworldly, like I was in perfect control of my own destiny. On the other hand though, I've absolutely teared up listening to certain Dream Theater albums, burst out laughing in delight along with Queen, and actually felt closer to God at the end of Supper's Ready. Records can have otherworldly qualities for me as well.

I liken it to relationships. You may have a one night stand with a particular album and band, other bands have a few distinct albums created over a period of time that one relates to, and then there are bands who create enough quality albums that you take with you for decades. Alas, for me, bands and I eventually break up -- they go in a certain direction, which is certainly their right in following a muse; however, If I am uninterested in following, I leave and we go our separate ways. 

C'est la vie et musique.

I was speaking to a woman years ago who lamented that she had no musical talent. 

I told her that she could make the sweetest music any musician could wish to hear. 

She looked at me quizzically, so I started clapping my hands.  

Music and fandom do not exist in a vacuum.  I also have emotional moments when listening to music, but I rarely listen to any recorded music these days.  It interferes with my creative process.  

I can imagine that!, as writing has been not so little of magic in my life.

Hi,

Simply based on a lot of posts I make on improvisation (and in my book I have a whole section on KC), not only in rock music, but in other arts, there is a LOT of magic in the work of an improvisation, specially if the musician KNOWS that they just found a fountain of youth and creativity. The main issue, is, AT THIS TIME,  that the whole thing is so commercialized that no one has much of an idea what can/could/does possibly happen and takes place in an improvisation. AND, above all, improvisations that are way beyond a riff of "idea" (like Tago Mago's two long cuts), where the point is NO IDEA, which helps one thing more than most folks realize ... communication and working with each other and not fall back into the "trix" (they's for kids, right?) because they had already exhausted all the trix in the first hour ... the 2nd and 3rd hour are the ones that matter and help the most ... if musicians were willing enough to try things that might, and might not, have anything to help with, but it creates a form of exercise that is helpful in the long run, because you DO NOT KNOW what it can help with until it happens.

KC's vision of work and improvisation, is too much tied to classical music (let's say) in that you have to play it better and better and cleaner until you can do it without looking or worrying about the notes. That's not exactly an improvisation, although the ability to accidentally find something on an error becomes a nice thing here, though some bands/folks don't like it because it "took away" from the improvisation itself!

The MUSIC is most important. HOW you get there is another story since you can go westward, or eastward and still get to the same point. None of the different trips is any "better" than the other in this example. But having a better/stronger idea of what to do with improvisation (specially the ones studied by so many theater/film groups in Europe in the 60's and 70's) goes a heck of a long way to help ... but these days, you have to go to work in the morning, and then go change the nappies! 

Ciao ciao bambino ... improv on Cliff Notes for everyone else! I sincerely do not think that most have any idea what "improv" means beyond finding a riff and getting onto it! In theater/film that's not even considered an improvisation! AND (above all) not enough to keep an audience with you!!!!! Make sure you remember that!

Hi,

Sadly I think you hurt your argument here. There is no such thing as a "stronger" this or that. Picasso does not have a greater discography (instead of art) than Miro, or Dali! You still stare and wonder at all three and their work!

The moment you enter into the subjective idea of something or other your argument loses its strength and you must see that. In 40/50 years time, when you have heard 10K more albums and at least 2 or 3K more bands, the idea of something being "stronger" or "favorite" enters an area that is totally ridiculous ... and you will see THEN how silly the choice thing is in the first place, and very immature at times ... and that's not to say that youth does not have its place, IT DOES and almost all of the PROGRESSIVE folks at the start had just been teenagers and turned 20 or so when the majority of these great works appeared. But, within a commercial state, this is impossible. It all becomes a favorite to help the sales of the big ones already "owned" by commercial interests, thus interfering with the actual educational and instinctive value of all the arts.

It's kinda insane and ridiculous to think "quality of the albums" based on one piece ... so DaVinci is a genius based on one painting and the rest of his stuff is all worthless doodles? So everyone meets Guernica, but no one can see the massive thing in Chicago? Essentially, you have to get off the "greater" or "lesser" anything in your discussion, and if you compare, you must maintain a different point ... like GG was based on some literary ideas, and PFM more on classical music, something that you can actually put your teeth on! Then I think your work will have more depth, but right off the bat say "quality" of their geography ... is nuts, totally nutz. 

You can have your favorites, like many of us do, but you'll never know which band is my favorite of all, because I don't have one and I don't go around saying that one minute of this is better than one minute of Orff, Beethoven, or Mozart, or Banco, or Pink Floyd!

Hope this helps ... 

Right, and that has been a bit of a problem to me, as well, as I didn't find it fitting to the rest of the music, for instance on the "serious"/dark Tarkus. But then I read that it was a part of their approach to music, not being very serious all the time, and now I try to view it and accept it that way.

A part of my approach to a band is that I only want an additional album with it if it's really distinctive from the one(s) I've already got. And that is how I want it in my whole music collection, that almost every album in it must some how be different from all the others, and representing something else. - That criteria has ELP in fact fulfilled exceptionally well, as I've found it okay to get as many as 5 albums with them, and in fact together with Genesis as second best, only next after Pink Floyd (6 albums). - While I have at most only 3 albums with all other bands/artists.

Hi,

It was quite audible on the bootlegs, most of which on ELP were not that good, and I don't think it was the recording, but that the band was going through the motions. I would have liked to ask any of the three that question, although I doubt they would admit it, but the having to play the same song 947 times, is a bit ... over the top, and you are likely to blow it apart!

PF went on, really early about the audiences and had to ignore them, when DSOTM started the stage thing that was computerized and timed really tight, which meant that none of them could make "mistakes" and many of them were not exactly visible if there was a part one of them was having issues with (during The Wall, PF had doubles playing the same thing to ensure that a mistake could not be heard!!!). And this whole thing got to a head when Roger (famously) blew up at the Anaheim Stadium audience because they were fighting for the pieces of the blown up pig that flew over them ... the fight got some folks arrested! And Roger was not happy. Roger was also upset on the show at the old Sports Arena (the one where people got busted), when he specified that there was too much dope and it was affecting their show! This is all on the bootlegs, but cleaned out on the live stuff so you never hear it!

But the best ELP bootleg I had, was the saddest of them all ... during TARKUS, which was a very impressive performance, one person shouted out at least 5 times ... LUCKY MAN ... and that fudger should have been taken out of the concert hall right away by security for lack of respect. However, this happens to a lot of bands, when folks don't like the new stuff and want the old stuff. Even LZ got upset when folks kept asking for Stairway to Heaven, and they were not in the mood for it as it was a difficult piece of music that required attention to detail, and on some nights at least one of them was not on it! I think it was Santa Barbara, that they got boo'd as people left for not playing STH, but I can not verify that at this point.

The best example, of course, is on a video is FZ getting tired of an idiot asking for a guitar solo and he put the guitar down and never touched it the rest of the show and conducted the band instead! 

The biggest, and harshest, point of all this, is that too many "fans" stick to the hit songs, and they don't want to hear the different stuff, and this happened to JT during an early tour of PP and folks kept asking for Aqualung.

Somewhere along the line, the artist is going to revolt to this and tell the fans to get stuffed. And rightly so, specially as many of these were big enough to not have to give a damn. And of course the best one was the one that got upset because folks kept asking for Light My Fire, and Jim stopped in the middle of a song and screamed out for them to shut up, or they will leave. And for many minutes (some say even 20) he stared at the audience and no one moved and you could hear a pin drop! And the rest of the show, was finally happening and at the end, the audience exploded ... I guess you could say that the emotions of the whole evening finally came out and people applauded like crazy, what would have been a really strong and very pointed show.

I don't like to differentiate between the albums and the music ... it's the same person, or persons. It's the respect that goes along with it that I have an issue with, and many folks just don't care because they think their 10 bucks to the band gives them the right to say anything they want ... and that is not the case. You can say it, but pay the price later. One artist I saw, stopped the show and had 2 folks removed before they continued! RIGHTLY SO!

cool 

I think best bands (to my personal taste) sound just like themselves. None exist in vacuum, of course, so there are similarities and influences, but the big picture is their own. So that particular music I enjoy could've been made only by that certain band at that certain time if that makes sense. 

As opposite, a lot of (current) mainstream hit music sounds, to me, like it could've been made by anyone. It's a product made to sell units. 

Another point is that there are many bands I've enjoyed seeing live but not on record. Actually seeing the band in front you can bring another level to the music, though there are of course others factors, too, when you compare live and recorded music. 

Hope this helps? What would this possibly help with? Maybe you prefer to think of all art as being of equal quality, but you're not going to convince me of that. Art is subjective. Subjective things are prone to being ranked and rated by the people who like to do such things, and that is their prerogative. I happen to be one of those people. You happen to have a different philosophy. C'est la vie.

Whether it possible or apt to seperate the artist from what he creates is an age old issue.

Can we appreciate Wagner in the knowlege that he was a raging anti-semite? Can we read Lewis Carroll with the shadow of peadophilia hanging over him? Can we enjoy a Tom Cruise movie in light of his support for Scientology? Should we support hair metal despite its raging sexism and mysogyny? Should we dismiss Black Sabbath for their supposed advocacy of satanism? And what about the {Dixie} Chicks?

In part I think it depends on how much the artist advocates their beliefs in their work and how much the person appreciating that work is willing to tolerate.

What interests me is where people draw the line and if that line is in different place depending on the artist. Is it easier to tolerate something unpleasant if the music (or whatever the artform) is really great to you. 

Hi,

Fun fact ... one of the concerts for Earth Wind and Fire had a 90%+ number of black folks. The following week, Michael was in town, and his show? 50/50 on both colors. 

So when we consider innovative, we should also consider something else that is not thought to be important, but in this case it was!