Emerson, Lake & Palmer

Big Ears wrote: ELP are my favourite group, mainly for the first four albums with BSS as the zenith. To me they were heavy and progressive, with tracks like Knife Edge, Time and a Place, Living Sin and their versions of Jerusalem and Toccata. BSS remains marvellously experimental and futuristic to this day, if not even more so. Following BSS, Works was a disappointment, although they do contain Pirates and I Believe in Father Christmas, both of which stand alongside anything else by the band.  I like Love Beach a lot, although the synths have always been irritating by comparison with those on the earlier albums. Even the otherwise bland In the Hot Seat, is listenable to me, just to hear Greg Lake's voice. To use a terrible cliche, he really could sing the telephone directory and make it sound good. The ELP with Cozy Powell album has too much echo on Lake's voice, especially as it is not needed, but it does contain a worthy oddity in The Score. Dark Moon brought about the tour which produced the best ELP performance imo that came on the 1992 BBC broadcast from the Albert Hall, introduced by Alan Freeman. The DVD and CD were disappointing, because they omitted Pictures at an Exhibition and Pirates, but there is an official bootleg. Their presentation of this version of Pictures at an Exhibition/Pirates is monumental by any standard.  I came to ELP from Lake/McDonald-era Crimson and Atomic Rooster (less so The Nice who are okay), and you cannot go wrong with either of them. Speaking of The Nice, Refugee without Emerson were very good - the instrumental, Ritt Mickley, stands out. Greg Lake's solo band albums with Gary Moore are worth hearing, as is Keith Emerson's OST for Nighthawks.

^ Agreed but according to his autobiography, Keith was so nervous about this performance with his avowed hero 'Peterson' he seriously considered abandoning the whole show while sitting in his dressing room prior to going on screen....

ELP are my favourite group, mainly for the first four albums with BSS as the zenith. To me they were heavy and progressive, with tracks like Knife Edge, Time and a Place, Living Sin and their versions of Jerusalem and Toccata. BSS remains marvellously experimental and futuristic to this day, if not even more so. Following BSS, Works was a disappointment, although they do contain Pirates and I Believe in Father Christmas, both of which stand alongside anything else by the band. 

Edited by Big Ears - August 01 2017 at 05:05

YESESIS wrote: Oh man! You saw ELP live with a (before Steve Perry)Journey.. Mercy you're lucky. What I wouldn't give to be able to go back in time and be catch that show!

YESESIS wrote: "As for the quintessential rock band... I'm mostly inclined to give the title to Yes, specially if the Fragile / CttE line-up is considered.." Man after my own heart!  "As for King Crimson, you really can't call yourself a prog fan without knowing them.." Yep I was afraid of that. Oh well, I'll have to start making myself like all their stuff now(or at least the essential stuff) like I did with Gentle Giant. Watch, then there'll be some other band that's now the 'acid test' of true prog fandom. And it'll be like this album of literally nothing but random, obnoxious noises. But if you 'can't get into it' or 'find it too challenging' then you're not a 'true prog fan.' No, I'm obviously joking around. But thanks for the suggestion and your input on ELP. I'll get to all those other prog bands later.. going to concentrate on King Crimson now. I listened to some of Red but wasn't liking it, I'll try again though. Plus those other 3 albums.. Poseidon, Lizard, Lark's. Then when I get to where I love those 4 albums maybe it'll lead to wanting to explore them even further.. But anyway it sounds like those are the one that are essential.

Well, of course you don't have to like King Crimson to be a true prog fan, but you should know them. And yes, you should give them a fair chance before dismissing them anyway. Red is one of Crimson's most beloved albums, but it did take me long to like it... still I wouldn't say it's their best. I guess you can see an important change in their musical style compared to the debut (still my favourite from them). However, you might want to focus on the song Red and on Starless. Red should be the easiest to love, but I do like better live versions from the double trio (90's version of the band with two guitars, to bass players, and two drummers, plus one of the guitars is the singer too), or the currently touring band also plays it wonderfully (with three drummes and sax added to the line-up... and by the way, if King Crimson are still going anywhere near you, you should make sure to catch a show, it's one of the best you are bound so see in your life). Starless is one of the most beloved songs in PA from any band, so it might not be so easy to love as red, but it's likely it will have the most lasting impression... though I particularly like better the live version from the previous tours to the Red album, while David Cross was still with the band and they still played that song with violin (I heard that version first, from the live album I recommended of Collectable Vol 1, and for me the main theme of that song was made to be played with a violin, which the studio version changed for guitar). Fallen Angel and One More Red Nightmare took me longer to like, and still are not among my very favourite Crimson songs, but they do are enjoyable, specially for Brufords magnificent drumming. Providence is just a lost case for me anyway.

The.Crimson.King wrote: YESESIS wrote: Yeah I haven't listened to Works in a long time either. You sound like a true fan(not that everyone posting in this thread isn't). I'll definitely have to check out this Mar Y Sol Festival deal(I didn't even know that existed).  A true fan?  You might say that...I did see them at the Oakland Arena on the Works '77 tour    A couple things about that show, the opening band was Journey.  It was about a month before they hired Steve Perry so hadn't blatantly gone commercial yet and still had the proggy tendencies of their early albums.  ELP had already fired the orchestra because they were losing too much money so you got Pirates with Keith filling all the orchestral parts like a madman.  Have always remembered one of Keith's great comments to the audience.  After a song ended a roadie came out and was working on Keith's setup...he walks up to the mic and says: "I'm having a little organ trouble...bet you can all get into that"  As far as the Mar Y Sol '72 album goes, you get a fantastic ripping 23 minute Tarkus, abbreviated 15 minute Pictures at an Exhibition, and their big show stopper from the early 70's, an 18+ minute Rondo with a killer CP drum solo and Keith with some of his finest live Hammond work ever, plus Hoedown, Take a Pebble, Lucky Man, and Keith's 10 minute Piano Improvisation showcase.   Plus the sound quality is significantly better than "Welcome Back..."

YESESIS wrote: Yeah I haven't listened to Works in a long time either. You sound like a true fan(not that everyone posting in this thread isn't). I'll definitely have to check out this Mar Y Sol Festival deal(I didn't even know that existed).

dr wu23 wrote: The first 4 are all excellent imho....the debut being my personal favorite for sentimental and artistic reasons.  After that they took a nosedive for me but 'ces't la vie'....no pun intended. I can listen to the debut over and over again......a great early prog rock work imho.

Edited by YESESIS - July 31 2017 at 16:34