NURSERY CRYME

Given the historical significance and the sheer creativity that went into this album, I think it has to be either a 4 or 5 star album. Given the production limitations and some unevenness in content, I'm going to be conservative and go with 4 stars, though I could also support a "must-have, essential" classification.

Great albums often start with great cover art, and the illustration of a girl croquet-ing heads about a field is one of the best in prog in my opinion.

How about the music? Well, it's certainly creative and ambitious. In other words, quintessential prog. However, it sometimes comes across a bit disjointed. Take The Musical Box: there's plenty of good melodies, and you have to love the rousing finale, but the stops and starts tend to hurt the song's momentum. My favorite here would be Salmacis, with blissful mellotron, a well-told story, some nice guitar-work, and some great stuff by Collins. A true team effort, in writing and performance. This is what I would look for more of in subsequent works, and fortunately I would get it!

The bottom line is that once you make the crossover into prog, it's only a matter of time until you pick this up, and when you do, you won't regret it. Nursury Cryme certainly led to more greatness and even higher highs for the band and individual players, but does not quite reach masterpiece status.