love beach (re-issue)
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Category: Progressive Music Lounges
Forum Name: Prog Recommendations/Featured albums
Forum Description: Make or seek recommendations and discuss specific prog albums
URL: http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=120932
Printed Date: August 03 2025 at 16:41
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Topic: love beach (re-issue)
Posted By: grantman
Subject: love beach (re-issue)
Date Posted: September 12 2019 at 10:48
| Most elp fans find love beach garbage in some ways i agree,but with the latest re-issue ,i find there is some buried treasure for example ALL I WANT IS YOU is very beatles like tune no where near as offensive as the song LOVE BEACH .Another example THE GAMBLER and FOR YOU not outstanding songs but none less passable .The true valid songs are CANARIO and the MEMOIRS OF AN OFFICER AND GENTLEMEN it,s not KARN EVIL 9 or TARKSUS but it is more listenable than PIRATES being a dyed in the wool elp fan not as good as works 2 but much better than IN THE HOT SEAT, Thank you for taking the time to read my opinion. |
Replies:
Posted By: patrickq
Date Posted: September 12 2019 at 19:23
| Never been an ELP fan, but was Love Beach really that bad, or did fans just expect better? If it was produced by a different group, would Love Beach been better received? |
Posted By: AFlowerKingCrimson
Date Posted: September 12 2019 at 20:05
Part of it was the year it was released. 1978 was just a bad year for most prog bands. Part of it was running out of good material, part of it was an identity crisis and part of it was pressure from record companies to make more marketable music. As for Love Beach itself yes it's pretty lame for the most part. Maybe it doesn't quite deserve it's poor reputation but it still isn't one of their better albums.
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patrickq wrote:Posted By: patrickq
Date Posted: September 12 2019 at 20:15
| ^ yeah, that makes sense... funny, imho 1978 was a great year for pop/rock/R&B. |
Posted By: dougmcauliffe
Date Posted: September 12 2019 at 21:15
| I think the cover killed it tbh |
Posted By: Fischman
Date Posted: September 12 2019 at 21:23
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There are many worse years than '78, even for prog. The year had some serious highlights. Rush - Hemispheres U.K. - U.K. Dixie Dregs - What If Jethro Tull - Heavy Horses Also, killer rock albums from the Stones, Who, Kinks, Foghat, Molly Hatchet..... Plenty of excellent jazz as well that year. So I'd say Love Beach suffers, not because of it being a bad year, but rather because their peers were actually still putting out quality stuff, so ELP looked particularly bad by comparison. |
Posted By: siLLy puPPy
Date Posted: September 12 2019 at 22:02
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I've never even heard it. In fact i have never had a desire to check anything else past Brain Salad Surgery however i do have the Emerson, Lake and Powell album from the 80s and it has some great tracks on it although it also has some crap -------------  https://rateyourmusic.com/~siLLy_puPPy |
Posted By: richardh
Date Posted: September 12 2019 at 23:58
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What re-issue is this? I have the extended version with the 'work in progress' versions of some of the tracks and those are really interesting. There was some real energy going for this project when it started but I think it just broke down. Apparently Keith Emerson was left 'holding the baby' ( as was the case with In Concert another massive disappointment) and the production was very watered down. You have to understand some of the context surrounding this album. It was as everyone knows a contractual obligation album and none of them were really up to do it. It came off the back of the Works tour where intially they were playing with an orchestra. That for Keith Emerson and probably the other 2 as well , was the highlight of ELP's career. Keith later admitted that he was frustrated with not being able to create this massive sound (MIDI tech later solved this problem with ELPowell) and the weak sounding synths are testament to this. Personally I miss the Hammond Organ too much to ever be able to enjoy this album that much. So is any of it actually any good? Memoirs starts off well then fades badly around the 2/3 mark and 'The March' at the end is a token effort. For You is a very good song and I like that more than some other Lake offerings. Canario is just plain weak compared to Hoedown and the might of Toccata as far as ELP's instrumental efforts go. I quite like The Gambler thanks to the female backing vocals (the only time on a ELP track!) and the title track has some very nifty drumming from Carl. The rest is mostly half-baked stuff that needed a lot more work but sadly the band was in the throws of breaking up. Lake was itching to start a solo career and Palmer was fed up with getting caught in the middle. It was all going down faster than the Titanic! |
Posted By: patrickq
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 01:46
| ^ thanks for this. Helps put things into context. |
Posted By: Gerinski
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 01:52
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It must have been a very frustrating period for the band, they were coming from the very top and in barely a couple of years they found themselves in bankruptcy after the orchestra tour, suddenly people start accusing you of being too pretentious and you realise that people are not eager for your music anymore. You find yourself not knowing which way to go. What you would really want to do or what you should do to keep some degree of success. On top you have internal disputes as to what kind of music each member prefers.
Keith's long friendship with Dr. Bob Moog and his team vanished and he resorted to Yamaha and Korg synths, surely great instruments but I can imagine that the personal relationship with Japs must have been completely different, much more cold and distant than what it was with Moog where he felt as part of the development team. It must have been like having had a taste of heaven and suddenly being thrown into hell. Easy ingredients to fall into a depression... |
Posted By: grantman
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 06:22
| 2017 remaster including 1978 alternate mixes and 1978 rehearsal outtakes previously unreleased on the bmg label |
Posted By: Jeffro
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 06:49
The cover sure doesn't help. If I didn't know ELP and I looked at the cover and the album title, I might conclude that it was a disco album
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Posted By: kenethlevine
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 07:42
I'll add Renaissance "A Song for all Seasons" to the prog list. Camel's "Breathless" was also pretty good as was Jeff Wayne's "War of the Worlds".
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Posted By: Slartibartfast
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 10:32
Yeah, the cover really cracks me up.  The other thing that comes to mind is Love Beach = Washed Up.  ------------- Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened... 
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Posted By: grantman
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 11:21
| Two things i remember one the band did do a promo at chumfm toronto played cuts from love beach ,i found even keith was not big on it the other is the gleeful or joyous sounding greg lake voice sounds on the record, rather than his usual performances of their music. |
Posted By: omphaloskepsis
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 11:35
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Too Soon! |
Posted By: HolyMoly
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 11:42
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I kind of like Love Beach. Might even give it 3 stars on a good day. ------------- My other avatar is a Porsche It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle if it is lightly greased. -Kehlog Albran |
Posted By: Fischman
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 12:36
Yeah--I mean is that ELP or Pablo Cruise?
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Posted By: Fischman
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 12:38
Agreed, Really, I could go on and on...in both the prog and non prog realms. Heck, I even love the Moodies' Octave from that year.
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Posted By: Fischman
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 12:41
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I once read that ELP was still under contract to deliver one more album and, yes, the record company was trying to get them to be more mainstream, but ELP just wanted out, and tried to get out, but the record company got the lawyers to hold their feet to the fire. As a result, ELP simultaneously made an album that would satiate their corporate masters' desire for something catchy and current sounding, while deliberately making it as bad as they possibly could as a sort of veiled FU to the company and the music world in general. I wish I could remember the source. Seemed legit at the time.
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Posted By: dr wu23
Date Posted: September 13 2019 at 14:02
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LOL.......... ------------- One does nothing yet nothing is left undone. Haquin |
Posted By: Sean Trane
Date Posted: September 14 2019 at 01:38
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Always found Luv Bitch laughable  despite "the epic".
It's (78) definitely a step down to previous years (despite you not mentionning the two National Health studio albums), and still the weaker 70's year (I find 79 superior to 78), but I'd sell my mommy to some Saudi slave master (he wouldn't know what's coming to him ) to have a few more years of that even quality for every decade after the 70'sAs for jazz, I think it was on a steep downhill slope by 78 - even the ECM and Milstones labels weren't as strong as earlier on in the decade.
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Posted By: richardh
Date Posted: September 15 2019 at 01:03
Quite plausible although I'm not convinced that 'they made it as bad as possible' deliberately. Quite a lot of time and effort went on it and afterwards they did promote it with interviews and a very rare Top of The Pops appearance (following Sarah Brightman and 'I'm In Love With A Starship Trooper' if I remember correctly) . It was even a Radio One record of the day. They did regard it as a 'project' and that was to do a more commercial based project but they really needed help on this and that was perhaps a stumbling block. They were very insular in that regards so they were trying to get into a world that they didn't know well enough. As a positive it still sounds like ELP and specifically it was the last time that Carl Palmer sounded like the great drummer he once was before going down the boring double bass drum route with Asia. (There was PM in between but that was not very good). Lake sings well on the album but Keith just sounds like he phoned in his keyboards. Overall its not a total disaster and a chunk of was included on the Return Of The Manticore box set they released in the 90's. That at least suggests that they cared a bit about it as I'm sure they could have vetoed its inclusion if they had wanted presumably.
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Posted By: richardh
Date Posted: September 15 2019 at 01:11
that had passed me by so I have ordered it . Unsurprisingly its very cheap!
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Posted By: miamiscot
Date Posted: September 16 2019 at 08:37
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It's every bit as bad as the cover indicates. But 1978 had its moments: Bubu Anabelas Happy The Man Crafty Hands Cathedral Stained Glass Stories Banco ...di Terra Mike Oldfield Incantations Steve Hackett Please Don't Touch Bill Bruford Feels Good To Me Peter Gabriel Scratch Dixie Dregs What If Jose Cid 10,000 Anos Jethro Tull Heavy Horses Rush Hemispheres UK UK
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Posted By: richardh
Date Posted: September 17 2019 at 00:46
| I've actually always rated And Then There Were Three very highly and regard that as a highlight of the year. Hemispheres never really resonated with me that much and I felt that Rush had already nailed the formula on the previous album especially with Xanadu. The UK debut album was the best of the prog bunch imo. They managed to blend jazz-rock fusion and symph prog successfully . Incantations is close to my favourite Oldfield album although Ommadawn just gets that mantle. 1978 was the arrival of Kate Bush on the music scene and that just about trumps everything else that happened in that year. Of course we also had the birth of the whole NWOBHM thing with Judas Priest and that sort of lead to prog metal via Maiden and a few others. Punk wise The Stranglers were still building on their early excellent releases with Black and White and Siouxsie and The Banshees released their excellent debut album in 1978 The Scream. I also loved The Buzzcocks Another Music In A Different Kitchen (RIP Pete Shelley). Punk was winning not surprisingly while prog was arguably ending before it's neo revival in the early eighties. |
Posted By: BarryGlibb
Date Posted: September 17 2019 at 05:25
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You can pick up the 2LP Love Beach release from 2017 new for $7.37 here: https://www.deepdiscount.com/love-beach/190296980183" rel="nofollow - https://www.deepdiscount.com/love-beach/190296980183 Even if it is crap; that is definitely a bargain!
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Posted By: Rednight
Date Posted: September 17 2019 at 14:17
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Saved by Memoirs of An Officer and a Gentleman (except for that thudding round of a lyric in "I spent 1938 in the United States of America"), Love Beach (re-issue) is good enough to collect for completest status. ------------- "It just has none of the qualities of your work that I find interesting. Abandon [?] it." - Eno |
Posted By: verslibre
Date Posted: September 17 2019 at 17:24
Crazier yet is, as I understand it, the same thing kind of happened to Vangelis. The label was asking for his next album. He hadn't even started working on it. The label said they were going to dispatch a courier to pick up the "master for the new album." He said come and get it. He fired up his CS-80 and the result was an appealing, if abstract, extended excursion that got split into two pieces and became Van's 1978 LP Beauborg. Of course, that could be bogus. But if that's what happened, cool. ------------- https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_ipg=50&_sop=1&_rdc=1&_ssn=musicosm" rel="nofollow - eBay |
Posted By: Psychedelic Paul
Date Posted: December 07 2020 at 17:02
I knew there had to be another fan of ELP's much-derided Love Beach album out there somewhere, even though it took me an hour to find this old thread, but it was worth it.
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Posted By: SteveG
Date Posted: December 07 2020 at 17:24
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I thought that threads got locked after 6 months. Or was that wishful thinking. ------------- This message was brought to you by a proud supporter of the Deep State. |
Posted By: JD
Date Posted: December 07 2020 at 20:48
------------- Thank you for supporting independently produced music |
Posted By: iluvmarillion
Date Posted: December 07 2020 at 22:00
| It's the anniversary of Greg Lake's death so it's probably a good time to issue a new edition of Love Beach. The only reservation I have with albums like Love Beach is that it doesn't represent the band's best work. There are so many better albums out there by bands less famous than Emerson lake & Palmer, but they don't achieve the reputation they deserve because people prefer the names of the bigger bands. |
Posted By: Cristi
Date Posted: December 08 2020 at 01:00
might be 16 months who resurrected this thread? Take it with him.
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Posted By: chopper
Date Posted: December 08 2020 at 01:48
You mean you actually spent an hour of your life looking for someone else who likes Love Beach?
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Posted By: Psychedelic Paul
Date Posted: December 08 2020 at 02:06
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^ Yes, I knew I'd seen a thread about ELP's Love Beach sometime in the past, but it was just a question of finding it again.
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Posted By: Cristi
Date Posted: December 08 2020 at 02:13
nobody has ever made so much fuss about Love Beach in the whole history of this forum.
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Posted By: Psychedelic Paul
Date Posted: December 08 2020 at 02:19
Well, it's a good thing I'm here then to give Love Beach some much-needed love and praise.
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Posted By: Cristi
Date Posted: December 08 2020 at 02:21
ok Paul, you love the album, I get it, now you can stop.
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Posted By: Psychedelic Paul
Date Posted: December 08 2020 at 02:24
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^ At the same time as searching for this old thread, I was also looking for a tribute thread last night for Genesis' Calling All Stations, but I haven't managed to find one yet.
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Posted By: Cristi
Date Posted: December 08 2020 at 02:29
there is no thread because most people dislike the album. I see you have time to kill, but it's not worth it. You can make a thread about it but predictably you get most people disliking CAS. It's not even worth it. |
Posted By: Psychedelic Paul
Date Posted: December 08 2020 at 02:55
At least you and I like Genesis' Calling All Stations album, even if no one else does. I might have time to kill, but I was multi-tasking last night by listening to all of Steve Hillage's albums at the same time as searching for the old Love Beach thread, in just the same way as I'm checking out all of the albums today by the British Jazz-Rock band, IF: I'm Reaching Out On All Sides |
Posted By: chopper
Date Posted: December 08 2020 at 02:56
You have too much time on your hands.
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Posted By: Psychedelic Paul
Date Posted: December 08 2020 at 02:59
At least it hasn't all been Wasted Time. |