TAPFRET

In the following years my dad bought Yessongs and ELP. I liked Yessongs so much that I took my cassette recorder and made a "live" recording of it. If the sound quality of the album wasn't questionable enough, I compounded it. We also obtained some greats when one of my uncles was "born again" and some pastor encouraged him to get rid of all his rock albums. My dad was glad to take them off his hands. From that collection we gained: Machine Head, A Passion Play, Minstrel in the Gallery and Tommy. My first purchases of my own on LP were Goodbye Yellow Brick Road and Fragile. In the following years I discovered Rush cassettes on discount racks of the local drugstore.

At age 15 I began playing guitar. It was at this point that I began to turn toward the simple and aggressive. Hardcore punk really caught my ear as being a great aggression channel as well as music I could learn to play in my first month of playing guitar. I also discovered Black Sabbath around the same time, another collection of easy guitar songs. With all this, I still enjoyed the previously mentioned albums. As my guitar playing improved, I lost the taste for hardcore punk, it just didn't have the complexity I desired. Although there are still bands that I embrace from the time, they tend to be the more stylistically diverse bands like SubHumAns, Bad Brains and Crass. The time was ripe for my own musical growth; 1984-1988 saw the metamorphosis of punk and metal into crossover scenes of Thrash Metal, Black Metal, Speed Metal, etc. The bands prevalent to these scenes, Slayer, Anthrax etc. all used the aggression and speed of Punk and blended in fullness, greater complexity and superior recording quality to the mix. I was totally onboard with these changes. When bands like Fates Warning, Watchtower and Dream Theater came around the circle was complete. The complexity of the Yesses and ELPs of my past had blended with the power and aggression of the 80's Punk/Metal backlash.

With the rediscovery of progressive influence came the desire to acquaint myself with prog roots and some bands that I may have missed from the 70's. A large percentage of my cash went into CDs in the early 90's. This was even more compounded by the internet coming to the mainstream. Now bands from all over the world were now accessible. MP3.com became an outstanding source of material that would otherwise never see life on the shelves of local record stores. Of course, Progressive Archives now plays a big role as well. The ability to share musical influence in an international forum is a truly beautiful thing.



Favorite non-PA listed bands/artists:

Michael Hedges
Alex MacHacek (added!)
Strapping Young Lad
Bela Flek and the Flektones (added!)
Buckethead (added!)
Bumblefoot(added!)

Classical/Orchestra:
Igor Stravinsky
Holst
Alberto Ginestera
Ravel
Bartok
Villa-Lobos