Fragile is Superestimated?

verslibre wrote: But is Fragile supercalifragilisticexpialidocious?

I'd say it's more supercalifragilisticexpialidocious than it is southernplayalisticadillacmuzik

moshkito wrote: Big Sky wrote: ... Even among enthusiasts of Progressive Rock, it has been my experience that RIO and Zeuhl genres of Prog Rock, for example, are just a bridge to far for them. I'm one that doesn't really like the bands in those categories, but I don't dismiss them as untalented hacks. Some of the artists in these genres I have great respect for even if I don't like much of their music. Frank Zappa would be foremost among those artists. ... Liking or not liking is interesting. I have not, for over 30 years found any music, I did not enjoy, and the "like" and "dislike" thing that modern users love to agree on (gives them more of a socialist feel being in agreement with others!!!) is not something that I indulge in, or appreciate. ART, of any kind, is about appreciating the human spirit, and its expression, thus not liking this or that, is simply an emotional perception on our own, and HAS NOTHING TO DO with the art work, generally speaking! That there are different genres, or ideas or styles, is not a problem ... unless you think that everyone has to sound the same, and then ... you would not belong in a progressive therapy group like PA. You, at least, say you appreciate their talent ... but I think that your comments would be much different if that were true, though ... I might be wrong here, but the tone is not favorable in my reading this. Big Sky wrote: ... In my opinion, only ELP at that time was putting out music like Yes that was uncompromising and displayed top level musicianship but sold in the millions and made them a top touring band. King Crimson never had that level of success. ... Strange that you mention KC and don't realize that no band has had more changes and experiments (even on stage) than you have suggested. ELP was not as much of a lack of compromise on stage, because a lot of what they did was difficult and required timing and attention. You don't do a Copland on an empty stadium so beautifully without knowing what you are doing and being detailed and attentive to the work you are doing ... though I think that there are/were moments that were left open for a ween bit of improvising or stretching the piano or the guitar. YES, in my book, quit after TFTO and kinda copied RW's comments, that the curry was better than the music. For me, RELAYER was a finger to a lot of fans, and SH going nuts, was probably another finger ... because he had a few moments that he flew in TFTO that folks did not like! The stunning part of it, was that the album did magnificently and they ate crow from it, and ended up having to play it! By then, I had already fallen off YES, because it wasn't exactly about the music, but about (supposedly) being really hip and cool and SELLING! [QUOTE=Big Sky] ... Pink Floyd never displayed the levels of musicianship that other Prog bands did and generally, their music was more digestible, being much less complex. One can see how they hit it big. ...

Starting with DSOTM, PF was NEVER about the musicianship show off that rock'n'rollers cheap bands like to showcase ... with solos that supposedly make them better than all the others.

With DSOTM, PF was able to add their sound bites and bits together with the music, and create a sort of "musical", which was a problem ... in one thought/idea. The show ended up being mechanical so it could stay/follow the movie and all the effects and not get disjointed and looking bad. As such, it took away the freedoms for improvising and having more fun, and you had to stay attentive to be "right there" where you needed to be. AND, in a few years time, the visuals created a complete show ... called THE WALL.

You can not define PF without finding out about their history with bits and sound bites which went right back to the first days after Syd Barrett, whose many sound bites were used A LOT ... scream your last scream old fan without a basket!!!!! And then realize how much of a story these visuals became. Sadly, you would not know about this ... unless you had the PF bootlegs at the time, which included all the bits between the pieces of music ... my thoughts are that the keyboards, and early synths and equipment, were being setup for the next piece ... PF was (probably) quite ahead in terms of the technology of things, or a DSOTM and following work, would just have been another song!

Sadly, if all one can do is look at PF as a bunch of songs, the rest of its history is not necessary or important!
...

One last note. I think your evaluation of a bands stature is strange, and it was not the same everywhere. Paris, London, LA, NY would have very different ideas, and sold differently. TFTO did really well in the East Coast because it was appreciated. Here in the West Coast it was trashed, and YES only got an ovation at the Long Beach Arena (TFTO show I saw!) when they played the first bars of Roundabout ... which was SICK. I started crying and left the arena ... the MUSIC was not important, because only the song mattered ... the sickest moment in my whole life, right up there with the locusts and idiots that were fighting for pieces of the pig at Anaheim Stadium ... and PF should have stopped the show and request those fans be removed ... they were not there for the music ... PERIOD.

Yo have to draw a line somewhere ... if you're not there for the music and what it inspires you inside, what are you there for?

Trashing FRAGILE is really sad ... and not necessary, unless folks think that bands are their toilet paper and nothing else!
[/QUOTEto "

Moshkito,

I think you miss the point of my post, nor was I attempting to address every issue with each band. Some responses to your points.

1) The Art / Music / etc question. I don't enjoy certain types of music or movies or art. Art is entirely subjective whether you "like" it or not. I don't care for rap or most country music. There are some tracks that I have "liked", but those are two types of music I don't usually "enjoy" to listen to.

Among movies, musicals and love stories are not something I generally enjoy. My wife doesn't like most sci-fi movies. My son and I are big into sci-fi. This has nothing to do with the "appreciation" of the arts or your reference to "socialist feel." It's just not my cup of tea. I really don't care if it's something you will not "indulge" in or "appreciate." Seriously I don't care.

2) I'm quite aware that King Crimson has had many changes to their lineup. That has nothing to do with my post. Yes had quite of few lineup changes too. My mention of Crimson was only they did not achieve near the level of success, in popularity or music sales of albums, that Yes or ELP enjoyed. Yes and ELP were selling out large arenas such as Madison Square Garden or filling out football fields. Their album sales dwarf King Crimson. They were doing this while recording music that was for the most part not radio friendly.

3) Pink Floyd. I was not attempting to define their music. I was not making a point about their use of experimenting with technology, their history or whether Syd Barrett was off his rocker. My only point was that it's understandable why Floyd became popular. Their music was not nearly as complex as most of their Prog bretheren. As a band, they did not have the musical chops associated with Prog and therefore that was never a highlight of their music.

It was songs, such as Money, Have a Cigar, Run Like Hell and Comfortably Numb that most people heard on the radio and gravitated to. My wife bought DSOTM long ago ( late 80s when she was in high school) before we ever met. I just asked her why she bought DSOTM. Friend of hers liked Floyd and played their music in the car often. In particular, she said she liked the song "Time" and "Money." Found out those songs were on DSOTM and bought the CD. Nothing more or less.

4) You have a different opinion on Yes than I do. It seems that with Tales going forward you had "fallen off Yes" and did not "like" their music going forward. I'm fine with that. No philosophical puffery needed to explain why.

5) Popularity was addressed only in a general sense. In the US, Prog artists usually have been more popular in the NE of the United States than other sections of US. The US is quite large though. By comparison, Great Britain is about the same size as Oregon. Many reasons why music ( or any interest) may be more popular in one region or country. In sports, NASCAR has long been more popular in the South. Lacrosse was for much of it's history popular only in the Mid-Atlantic States and Long Island. Cricket is not even a thought in the US. But, it is quite popular in India, Pakistan, Australia, New Zealand and Great Britain to name a few.

My random thoughts:
If you were trying to explain to a Martian what 'progressive rock' is then it's very simple , you point them in the direction of Yes. ELP would be a close second. It doesn't matter whether they are underrated or overrated , they represent the genre as well as anything else did. ELP, dispite Roger Waters saying otherwise, were a proper band and could rock up any any festival and not look strange alongside the likes of Sabbath and Purple. Yes on the other hand took the idea of the neo classical prog ensemble to its very zenith when Rick Wakeman joined what was already a stellar line up. The likes of Genesis and Floyd didn't like being called 'prog' at all or being lumped in with those bands. Tull were passengers but never authors or creators of the genre, they mainly followed after realising it was the way to go. Crimson weren't a proper band but more a project as Fripp said on many occasions but made some of the most innovative albums. Fragile can only be overrated because Close To The Edge exists but actually most understand that without Fragile then CTTE likely doesn't happen. Yes also had a definable style and approach through the classic album run of TYA to GFTO. That's why I think they are the most important band of then genre and could be considered now the 'flagship band'.

I feel Prog rock (on terms of most famous groups), has always been kind of pop... C'mon, we have Lucky Man, Time and A Word, Jerusalem, Dusk, Entangled, Wond'ring Aloud... The Prog makes your hits on the mainstream music. Owner of A Lonely Heart is a prove. Maybe not today, but on your eras... Aqualung is a classic together with Dust in The Wind from Kansas and Stairway to Heaven from Led.

The great Prog bands of past have a commercial, and easy and simple songs. In 75, one year after a great live album Welcome Back My Friends, with a supreme and powerful versions of the ELP songs, Greg Lake does a I Believe on The Father Christmas, an single that became famous to english mainstream (i saw reports that the music was played in the shopping malls on a reviews From Works Vol. 2 on this site).

The Prog on your complexity, you find on b-sides groups and a prog subgenders. But on prog mainstream, i belive only King Crimson has had sucess with factually complex songs. He haved this power...

Edited by ELPmasters - May 02 2025 at 22:10

Logan wrote: Fragile is my favourite Yes album, and always has been, which is not to say that it's of highest quality, but I enjoy it the most. And I really love a short piece such as We Have Heaven, and love the shift from that into South Side of the Sky. To me Long Distance/The Fish works beautifully on the album. While I commonly dislike it when people bandy around terms like overrated, the massive enthusiasm and indeed praise for Yes that I have seen from people is not shared by me and fandom tends towards the extreme (fanatics). I'm happy for people to love what they like (provided it's not doing harm) but I would also hope for some broader perspective. For instance, I have seen someone praise Yes, declare its awesome greatness, while completely condemning and ridiculing Magma as garbage. I understand not liking the constructed language, but there is clear compositional and musicianship skills coming from Magma which I would think one could appreciate intellectually even if you don't like it. I think Magma's debut is much stronger and more mature than Yes's first two, for instance. So I guess I am saying, even if I don't like the term, that people seriously overrate Yes. I see that in the praise and in how dismissive some Yes fans are of of other bands. But then one could could say that of fans generally. The much loved Yes album that never connected much with me is Close to the Edge, and it's hardly my favourite three track album (I much prefer Bubu's Anabelas for instance). Never-the-less I recognise that Yes has been very significant to Prog, has talent, and that Close to the Edge has been a very significant album. It does not and never has amazed or enthralled me like it has with many others, and that's fine.

Greg,

A number of thoughts on your post. First, as you stated, you are going to find fans of any artist, whether it be Yes, Rush, Pink Floyd or Taylor Swift who are going to dismiss any other artists outright labelling them trash. That happens. I think what is more likely is if you are a fan of lets say ELP, there is a good likelihood they will like Yes, Genesis, Jethro Tull, etc as well as like probably some Jazz Fusion such as Weather Report or Pat Metheny.

Even among enthusiasts of Progressive Rock, it has been my experience that RIO and Zeuhl genres of Prog Rock, for example, are just a bridge to far for them. I'm one that doesn't really like the bands in those categories, but I don't dismiss them as untalented hacks. Some of the artists in these genres I have great respect for even if I don't like much of their music. Frank Zappa would be foremost among those artists.

As for Yes, there are many who consider them the quintessential Prog Rock band as they check every box of what people think of when one thinks of Prog Rock. They were very influential. And they were extremely successful. They sold 10s of millions of records and were one of the biggest touring acts of the 70s. If memory serves me right, they were the first artist who sold out Madison Square Garden ten times ( Billy Joel holds the all-time record I believe).

Yes was doing this while making albums that were daring and uncommercial. Close to the Edge, Tales and Relayer are three albums that have a total of 10 tracks. 6 tracks take up entire sides. 4 tracks are about ten minutes in length. This was not music made to be played on the radio. Yet millions of copies were sold. The question becomes how was Yes able to enjoy as much success as they did while playing music that was not commercially friendly.

In my opinion, only ELP at that time was putting out music like Yes that was uncompromising and displayed top level musicianship but sold in the millions and made them a top touring band. King Crimson never had that level of success. Genesis, while popular only reached the level of popularity Yes and ELP enjoyed when they made the decision to become commercial. Kansas became a must see band ( at least in the States) when Carry on Wayward Son and Dust in the Wind were being played on FM radio every 30 minutes.

Pink Floyd never displayed the levels of musicianship that other Prog bands did and generally, their music was more digestible, being much less complex. One can see how they hit it big.

Rush was beginning to achieve the level of success of Yes and ELP, while displaying the same uncompromising attitude in the late 70s. Jethro Tull could be argued, although they made much more music that was radio friendly than Yes or ELP in the 70s.

So, no, Yes is not overrated. The musicians in the band are among the most celebrated not only in Prog Rock, but Rock music in general. They have had a massive influence on Progressive Rock. Anyway, that's my thoughts on the matter.

I prefer The Yes Album and Fragile to CTTE because I think the songwriting is more accessible. I’ll probably get flack for that but that’s fine. CTTE is also great but it’s a bit patchwork in its construction.

What I find particular about Fragile is its quirkyness and playfulness, but it may also seem to be lack of depth and substans - even Jon Anderson might say that it was about spirituality and being uplifting.

Man... I have a natural predisposition to like a worst works from the bands, but Open Your Eyes i really don't processed. The best moment is a Boundaries Jon's reference in Somedays... Someshow... Talk is a monument... Awaken rebirths in Endless Dream. Jon is a God of voices of rock and cultural with Milton Nascimento, Freddie Mercury and Peter Gabriel

Edited by ELPmasters - May 01 2025 at 20:50

For me, what made Fragile stand out from any other album I'd heard in my life (this would be 1974) was how totally disparate the collection of songs were. There was nothing like it I'd ever heard! (Not sure if there's ever been an imitator do it as well.) Not only was the overall contrivance mind-blowing, but so many of the individual songs were mind-blowing in their own right. I mean, who in 1972 was letting each and every one of their individual members express themselves in the way that they alone wished to express themselves PLUS pull of not one, not two, but three mini-epics whose skills-demonstrations, riffs, and lyrical hooks would prove to be so iconic? Who gave drummers the chance to do what Bruford did on "Heart of the Sunrise"? Who else had a convoluted, nonsensically-lyricked, eight minute song receive high-volume radio play--for over fifty years now! (I mean: who doesn't know "Roundabout"? Even my grand children know "Roundabout.") And who else was throwing around church organs and complex multi-voice vocal weaves over complex, mutli-dimensional hard rock at that time like Yes did on "Southside of the Sky"? Add into the mix the fact that many of these songs--in expanded, exacted, or medley versions--continue to be concert favorites to this day (with Jon & The Band of Geeks).

No. The contribution Fragile made to A) the legitimacy of progressive rock music and B) the legacy of prog and rock in general cannot be underestimated.

Top 3 Super-Underestimated YES Albums

1994: YES - Talk - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_lUj1d4fSCsm1W8MpGqww4v1UzFASfbfcI
1999: YES - The Ladder - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nqDU0J8X8x2WSBB7xRsGir8Smfl2hlMrU
2023: YES - Mirror to the Sky - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_mdLFJt9iPnV0i5cqbPQzOA3-wD3VEgJxA