SHINE ON BRIGHTLY

A question that I still have in my mind: which was the first Progressive Rock album in history? Some people say that it was KING CRIMSON`s "In the Court of the Crimson King", which is a very good album. But by 1968 PROCOL HARUM with this album in particular was a very big influence in the development of that musical style, I think. At least, the inclusion in this album of a great piece of music like "In Held `Twas In I" was a real indication of how very good things could be done mixing several styles of music in a musical "Suite" of almost 18 minutes of duration with several titled parts, each one of them with different moods and "Symphonic" influences. I can`t remember now if there was a "Suite" of a similar duration being released before 1968, but in the same year IRON BUTTERFLY`s "in-a- Gadda-da-Vida" long song was released. But the style of that long piece of music, even if it has some Prog Rock influences, it even is more influenced by Psychedelic Rock.

"In Held `Twas In I" was composed by Gary Brooker, Matthew Fisher and Keith Reid. In this album this song was performed without the orchestra (but the orchestra was employed in their "Live" album from 1972, and was arranged by Brooker), but using a sitar in some parts, and with Fisher even singing lead vocals in "In the Autumn of my Madness" part and playing the very good piano part in the "Grand Finale" part. By this time Fisher and Brooker were working very well as a team of composers creating a very good musical piece. In their next album ("A Salty Dog") , Fisher was going to continue to contribute to the songwriting and even contributing some orchestral arrangements, singing more lead vocals and even being the producer of that album. Robin Trower was also starting to write songs with Reid. Unfortunately, this very good line-up of the band (Brooker, Fisher, Trower, Wilson, Knights and Reid) could not continue working together due to some personal problems between the members, and by mid 1969 Fisher and Knights left the band.

While I consider that the main song in this album is "In Held `Twas In I" , this album also has some other very good songs, like "Shine On Brightly" (which maybe is one of the most played songs in concert from this album and one of their most known songs), "Quite Rightly So", "Rambling On" and "Magdalene (My Regal Zonophone)", all with some "mysterious" lyrics written by Keith Reid.