Moody Blues or ELP

Weird how times change.

Today, I would vote for ELP, and in many ways, I got Rachel Flowers to thank for that as to how she showed many of us, what great compositions ELP had that could not be done acoustically in those days, because it was all about the far out show. Or worse, if you were an 19 year old and showed your professor of music your Tarkus composition and called it a piano concerto (a la Rachel), you would get laughed off and probably immediately get a C on your course! That is was developed into what we know in the album, shows something about the time and the place, but also, the creativity that the 3 members used to bring up the material they put together.

By comparison, while I was into the Moodies since their first (second?) album with that orchestra and that huge hit song (Nights in White Satin), however, I always felt that the poetic stance they had taken in the earlier days, kinda got left behind and then it became about being cool, and not exactly poetic. Some of the later albums were still nice, however, they did not have the beauty and the design that their most important album did.

By comparison, Keith Emerson's work with ELP, is getting played in orchestras and shown to be quite well composed and valuable. Not to mention that it will also bring us to the concert, when we simply don't care for Beethove, or Tchaikovsky as much anymore!

Today, I would have a hard time voting, knowing that Keith's music has been shown to be a lot more than just a rock song with idiosyncratic this and that to show some fun on the stage. The Moodies is not exactly thought of that way, even though Tuesday in the Afternoon, would be a wonderful piece to be played by an orchestra!

There are so many reasons.

I've been listening to the Out Of The World box set of their classic live shows over the weekend and they were an incredible live band. However they were all over the shop in terms of putting together anything remotely coherent . I do think they achieved something special with Brain Salad Surgery but it still wasn't enough to satisfy many people. In part this may have been due to Dark Side of The Moon. Music was moving on from the 'messy bands' like ELP too 'cleaner' better organised prog bands. Fact remains though that very few bands of any genre at the time 1970-1974 could live with ELP when they were right on it. Sadly the truth gets lost over time unless you take the time to go back and listen to those performances. The Isle Of Wight performance is still outstanding for its sheer ferocity and power. No wonder so many other bands were annoyed at them! 

10 years later both are still among my favorite bands, but I go with ELP now.

Ok, I decided to vote anyway and for the Moody Blues but it turns out I already voted for them a while ago.